Query by forms: User-oriented relational database retrieving system and its application in analysis of experiment data
✍ Scribed by Zbigniew Skotniczny
- Publisher
- Elsevier Science
- Year
- 1989
- Tongue
- English
- Weight
- 550 KB
- Volume
- 57
- Category
- Article
- ISSN
- 0010-4655
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✦ Synopsis
The Query by Forms (QbF) system is a user-oriented interactive tool for querying large relational databases with minimal queries definition cost. The system was worked out under the assumption that user's time and effort for defining needed queries is the most severe bottleneck. The system may be applied in any Rdb/VMS databases system and is recommended for specific information systems of any project where end-user queries cannot be foreseen. The tool is dedicated to specialists of an application domain who have to analyze data maintained in databases from any needed point of view, who do not need to know commercial databases languages.
The paper presents the system developed as a compromise between its functionality and usability. User-system communication via a menu-driven "tree-like" structure of screen-forms which produces a query definition and execution is discussed in detail. Output of query results (printed reports and graphics) is also discussed. Finally the paper shows one application of QbF to a HERA-project.