Ehlmann, BK, Rishe, N, Shi, J. (2000). Formal specification of ORN semantics
. INFORMATION AND SOFTWARE TECHNOLOGY, 42(3), 159-170. 10.1016/S0950-5849(99)00051-8
Ehlmann, BK, Rishe, N, Shi, J. (2000). Formal specification of ORN semantics
. INFORMATION AND SOFTWARE TECHNOLOGY, 42(3), 159-170. 10.1016/S0950-5849(99)00051-8
Object Relationship Notation (ORN) is a declarative scheme that permits a variety of common types of relationships to be conveniently defined to a Database Management System (DBMS), thereby allowing the DBMS to automatically enforce their semantics. Though first proposed for object DBMSs, ORN is applicable to any data model that represents binary entity-relationships or to any DBMS that implements them. In this paper, we first describe ORN semantics informally as has been done in previous papers. We then provide a formal specification of these semantics using the Z-notation. Specifying ORN semantics via formal methods gives ORN a solid mathematical foundation. The semantics are defined in the context of an abstract database of sets and relations in a recursive manner that is precise, unambiguous, and noncircular.
