modeling and querying structure and contents of the webdbis/publications/99/idm99sl.pdf · modeling...

Modeling and Querying Structure and Contentsof the Web

Wolfgang MayInstitut fur InformatikUniversitat Freiburg

Germany

Modeling and Querying Structure and Contents of the Web

Overview

� Integrated Architecture for Web Data Extraction

� Unified World Model

� Implementation: F-Logic/FLORID

� Examples / Case Studies:

– the DBLP Publications Web Server (single-site)

– Geographical Information (multi-site)

Overview 1


Integrated ArchitectureF

LO

RID

Sys

tem objects, incl. Web pages

wrapper + mediator rulesSGML-Parser application logic rules

url�.get �� :- �� :- ��

http/ftp-Web Interface

User

F-Logic

exte

rnal

Res

ourc

es Internet

HTMLurl�

HTMLurl�

� Unified, monolithic framework for wrappers and mediators

� F-Logic: unified data model, wrapper, mediator, andquerying language

� Data Model: Representation of the Web fragment andapplication-level representation.Structure + Contents of the Web as a unit

Architecture 2


The Web Model

� unified object-oriented model

– the Web (carrier of information)

– the application domain (carried information)

� graph-based model

� inter-document-leveltopology of the Web ((Web) skeleton):

– nodes: Web documents,

– (labeled) edges: hyperlinks between documents.

– skeleton: no information apart from the link structure isavailable;

� intra-document-levelThe page markup (tags):induces a tree structure of the page contents.

� Web skeleton and parse trees: application-independent

� an object-oriented model of the application domain.

The Web Model 3


The Skeleton: URL's and Web Documents

� Every resource in the Web has a unique url.

� document associated with a url contains hyperlinks to otherurl's

�x� �� y� � SK � the Web document x contains a hyperlink

labeled with � to the Web document y.

(“�a href � y � � ��a�”)

Example: The DBLP Server

The Web Model 4


Example: The DBLP Server

dblp

conf�index�a� conf�index�l� conf�index� a�tree�� journals�� series��

conf�vldb��

��

conf�vldb�vldb��

conf�vldb�vldb��

conf�iclp��

conf�popl��

��

conf�popl�popl��

conf�popl�popl��

conf�edbt��

��

conf�edbt�edbt��



��

a�tree�s�Altman� a�tree�A��

��

a�tree�j�Jarke� a�tree�A��

��

a�tree�l�Lockemann� a�tree�A� ��

��

a�tree�s�Senko�� a�tree�A ��

��

��

journals�tods�tods��



journals�tods��

journals�lncs��

journals�is�is��




journals�is��

��

journals�lncs��

allcon

f

LPconf

DBconf author

Altint�Amit

Altman

Janssens�H�Jega

Jarke

Lo�Raymond�Loid

Lockemann

Sengupta�S�Sevil

Senko

journalsseries

EDBT

ICLP

POPL

VLDB

VLDB

VLDB��

VLDB��EDBT

EDBT�

EDBT��

EDBT�

ICLP

POPL

POPL��

POPL�

TODS

IS

Inf�System

s

VLDB

LNCS

vol��

vol��

vol��

vol�

vol�

vol��

vol��

��

IS��

IS��

LNCS

Contents

Lockem

ann

IS�

IS�

Senko

IS�

Senko

VLDB��

Senko

VLDB��

Altman

Senko

Altman

Jarke

Lockemann

Lockemann

� skeleton: Web pages and hyperlinks

� corresponds to real world objects:journals, conferences, books, and authors

The Web Model 5


Extending the Web Skeleton: Parse-trees

� real-world objects are represented as individual Webpages, or by substructures.

� integration of parse-trees

The Web Model 6


Example: Extended Web Skeleton of DBLP

dblp

conf/vldb/ conf/vldb/vldb76 journals/is/

vldb76.parse is.parse

�head� �body� �head� �body�

some text �ul�. . .�/ul� . . . some text �ul�. . .�/ul� . . .

�li�. . .�/li� . . . �li�. . .�/li� . . . �li�. . .�/li� �li�. . .�/li� . . .

�a href=. . .�M.Senko�/a� –title– �a href=. . .� Vol.1�/A� �a href=. . .� Vol.2�/A� . . .

�a href=. . .�E.Altman�/a� journals/is/is1 journals/is/is2 . . .

a-tree/s/senko a-tree/a/altman

senko.parse

�head�. . .�/head� �body�. . .�/body�

some text �table�. . .�/table�

�tr�. . .�/tr� . . . �tr�. . .�/tr� �tr�. . .�/tr�

�th�1976�/th� �td�. . .�/td�. . .

M.Senko �a href=. . .�E.Altman�/a� – title – �a href=. . .�IS1�/a�

is1.parse

�head�. . .�/head� �body�. . .�/body�

“Number 1” �ul�. . .�/ul� “Number 2” �ul�. . .�/ul� . . .

�li�. . .�/li� �li�. . .�/li� . . .

�a href=. . .�M.Senko�/a� title

hrefs@(VLDB)hrefs@(Inf.Systems)

hrefs@(VLDB'76)parse

html@(0) html@(1)

body@(0)body@(1) body@(. . . )

ul@(0)

ul@(. . . )ul@(1) ul@(. . . )

li@(0)

li@(1)

li@(2)

hrefs@(M.Senko)hrefs@(E.Altman)

parse

html@(0) html@(1)

body@(0)body@(1) body@(. . . )

ul@(0)ul@(1) ul@(. . . )

ul@(0)ul@(1)

ul@(. . . )

hrefs@(volume1)hrefs@(volume2) hrefs@(. . . )

parse

html@(0) html@(1)

body@(0) body@(1)

table@(0)table@(4)

table@(5)

tr@(0) tr@(0)

td@(0)td@(1) td@(2) td@(3)

hrefs@(E.Altman)

parse

html@(0) html@(1)

body@(0) body@(1)body@(2)body@(3)body@(. . . )

ul@(0)ul@(1)

ul@(. . . )

li@(0)li@(1)

hrefs@(M.Senko)

hrefs@(VLDB76)

Example: The DBLP Server 7


Extended Web Skeleton

� extended Web skeleton: unified – but still based on theWeb representation, not on the application semantics.

� many objects have already a direct counterpart in theextended Web skeleton.

– objects have a Web representation as a Web pagereferencable via url.

– objects correspond to nodes in a parse-tree (journalvolumes and papers).referencable in HTML via page�anchor.

– counterparts in several parsetrees� Object fusion:Objects as objects in the Web representation and in theapplication model.

– mapping between nodes/arcs of the extended Webskeleton and instances of distinguishedclasses/relationships of the application modeling.

� XML?Parse-tree � application-semantic model?

Example: The DBLP Server 8


Formal Framework: F-Logic

� object-oriented database language

� id-terms are composed from object constructors andvariables (capital letters) as usual.

� is-a atoms: o�c

� subclass atoms: c �� d

� Method applications to objects:o�m�v� (scalar)o�m��v� (multivalued)analogous with arguments: o�m��x�� xn�v�.inheritable:c�m��v�

c�m��v�

� Signatures of methods:c�m�v� (scalar)c�m��v� (multivalued)

� Variables allowed at all positions

� Entities can act at the same as classes, objects andmethods

� Rules over atoms: �head� :- �body�.

� Program: a set of rules

F-Logic 9


Example: F-Logic Model of DBLP

paper institution

journal p

conf p publisher string person

journal vol

journal integer conf proc conf series

oj�

oi��

ois

odi

ov�� ovldb

omes

oeba

omj

opcl

oejn

orwt

ouka

ogmd

journal p �paper� conf p �paper�

paper�title�string� authors��person��

journal p�in vol�journal volume��

conf p�at conf�conf proc��

oj� � journal p�title��Records� Relations� Sets� Entities� and Things� authors��fomesg� in vol�oi��

odi �conf p�title��DIAM II and Levels of Abstraction� authors��fomes� oebag� at conf�ov��

oi�� journal vol�of�ois� number�� volume�� year��

ois � journal�name��Information Systems� editors��fomjg��

ov�� conf proc�of�ovldb� year�� editors��fopcl� oejng��

ovldb � conf series�name��Very Large Databases��

omes �person�name��Michael E� Senko�� omj �person�name��Matthias Jarke� a�l�� orwt��

orwt � institution�name��RWTH Aachen��

��

��

authors

editors

editors��Ye

ar�publish

er

invol

of

a�l��Year�

of

year

name name

namead

dress

name

name

title

atconfvol� year

number

authors

invol

of

editors��

�authors

author

s

atconf

of

editors

editors

a�l��

a�l��

a�l��

�title�Records� Relations� Sets�

Entities� and Things�

�title�DIAM II and Levels

of Abstraction�

�number��

volume��

year��

�name�Information Systems�

�year�� name�Very Large Databases abbrev�VLDB�

�name�Michael E� Senko�

�name�Edward B� Altman�

�name� Matthias Jarke�

�name�Peter C� Lockemann�

�name�Erich J� Neuhold�

�name�Uni Karlsruhe�

�name�RWTH Aachen�

�name�GMD Darmstadt�

F-Logic 10


Formal Framework: F-Logic

� path expressions:��o�m�� that o s�t� o�m �o�

��o��m�� all o s�t� o�m ��o�

?- P �conf proc.of[abbrev�“VLDB”], P[year�1976],

P..editors[affil@(1976)�A].

� object creation by path expressions in the head:o�m��

� Derived equality via object fusion:o� � o� � � � �

implemented in the object manager.

� Aggregates: sum, count, ...

� nonmonotonic inheritance

� FLORID: bottom-up inflationary semantics with user-definedstratification

F-Logic 11


Requirements for Implementation of Web Access

� non-logical features � built-ins:

� Web Access via http-protocol,

� Parsing of HTML/SGML/XML,

� Matching with Perl Regular Expressions,

� Logical issues:

� Suitable modeling (classes)

� Object creation on demand

� Object fusion

� Navigation in the model

� Powerful, flexible reasoning

F-Logic 12


Exploration of the Web

� classes url and webdoc.(subclasses of string)

� class url: url�get implemented as an active method (C++):

u�get ��

– accesses the Web document which is accessible via u

– assigns it to u�get (object creation)

– becomes an instance of class webdoc

– and several properties are automatically filled in.

u�get�hrefs�� u��

u�get contains “�a href � u� � � ��a�” .

url��string�get�webdoc��

webdoc�url �url� author �string�

type �string� hrefs��string ��url� ��

modif �string� error ��string��

url�get�wd�� url��get�wd��

wd�webdoc�url�url�� hrefs��label ��furl�g�

wd��webdoc�url�url�� type�html� ��

Exploration of the Web 13


Data-Driven Web Exploration

� in course of the information extraction and restructuringprocess, additional pages are recognized to be relevant:

U.get � A:author[homepage�U].

url� �

�HTML��HEAD��HEAD�

��

�A HREF�url��label��A�

��

��HTML�

� �z �wd�

url� �

�HTML��HEAD��HEAD�

��

�A HREF��A�

��

��HTML�

� �z �wd�

hrefs��label�

� approach implements a hybrid concept by embeddingdata-driven wrapping into a warehouse approach

��

��

�

��

� ��

�

�

�

WWW

�

dblp

vldbis

76 v1 v5� � senko

��

��

Databaseaccess along hrefs��

loadanalyze



Parsing of Web Pages

� url�parse: active method

� generates F-Logic representation of the parse-tree,

� assigns it to the object u�parse �parsetree

– SGML-tagged groups �tag� � � � � tag� become objects,

– classes webdoc��tag�,

– navigation: o��tag�� o��tag��nare the segments inside o��tag�

– tag attributes: o��attr�

- tables whose header contains '1998' in any headerrow/column are identified by

?- T �wd.table,

T.table@(Row).tr@(Col)[th@(0)�S],

substr(S,“1998”).

- the contents of the third column of the 17th row of a giventable tab is addressed by

tab�table��tr��THD��.

� hyperlinks emanating from the parse-tree:

Z[hrefs@(Label)��Url] �Z:(U:url.parse.a), Z[a@(0)�Label; href�Url].



Wrapping

� url�get, url�parse: raw, uninterpreted data� Extended Web skeleton

� wrapping by F-Logic Rules

� Logical Markup:Parser-basedDBLP-server: sufficiently well-structured HTML

- direct correspondence between HTML-nodes and objects(extended Web skeleton).

� Optical and Syntactical Markup:pattern matching via regular expressions

- construction of object-oriented model fromscratch/identifying new objects

Wrapping 16


More than Parsing

� not all Web pages provide logical markup

� well-structured pages need further wrapping:

– keywords,

– commalists,

– text search for relevant words

auth�, auth�, ... , and authn: title. number n inVolume v of series, pages p� p�, year.

Pattern Matching in FLORID

Perl regular expressions by the built-in predicate

pmatch(�string�,“/�regexp�/”, [�fmt-list�], [X�,. . . , Xn])

pmatch(STRING,

“/nA ([�:]*): (.*)n.ns

Number ([0-9]*) in Volume ([0-9]*) of ([a-Z]*),

pages ([0-9-]*), ([0-9]*)/”,

[$1,$2,“$4($3)”, $5, $6, $7],

[AuthList, Title, Num, Series, Pages, Year])

AuthList is a commalist ...

Wrapping 17


Example: DBLP Server

constructing the application model:

dblp[url�“http://. . . ”].dblp.url:url.dblp.url.get.

dblp[journals page�(X:url)]�dblp.url.get[hrefs@(“Journals”)��X].dblp[conf page�(X:url)] �dblp.url.get[hrefs@(“Conferences)��X]. ,

dblp.journals page.get.dblp.conf page.get

% conferencesS �conf series[name�S, url�(U:url)], U.get � % “VLDB”

dblp.conf page.get[hrefs@(S)��U].

(S.year@(Year) �conf) [series�S; year�Y; url�(U:url)],U.get � % “VLDB”@(1976)

(S �conf series).url.get[hrefs@(“Contents”)��U],pmatch(U,“/[A-z]*([0-9]*).html/”,“19$1”,Year).

% ... similar for journals

Wrapping 18



Every paper on a conference or journal volume page isrepresented in an �li� tag, e.g.

�li��a href=. . . �author��/a�, . . . , �a href=. . . �author��/a�:�b�title�/b� pages.

conf paper �� paper.journal paper �� paper.

% conference papersp(P) �conf paper[parsenode��P] �

C �conf, P �C.parse.li.

% journal papersp(P) � journal paper[parsenode��P] �

V � journal vol, P �V.parse.li.

% papers: titles and pagesP[title�T] � P �paper, (P.parsenode.li@( ):b)[b@(0)�T],string(T).P[pages�N] � P �paper, P.parsenode[li@( )�N], string(N).

% papers: authorsN �author[name�Name; url��(U:url)], P[authors��N] �

(((P �paper).parsenode.li@( )):a)[href�U, a@(0)�Name].

Wrapping 19



% authors pagesU.get � A:author[url��U]

% authors homepagesA[homepage�(U:url)], U.get �

A:author.url.get[hrefs@(“Homepage”)��U].

� data-driven Web exploration

Wrapping 20



� single-site source

� “best case”-example

� well-structured HTML/SGML

� parser-based wrapping

� Model contains Web skeleton, parse-trees and application

Wrapping 21


Generic Wrapping Tasks

Extracting contents of the pages:

� Logical Markup

– HTML-Lists

– HTML-Tables: Headers, Columns

� Optical Markup

– Paragraphs

– Boldfacing, Emphasizing

� Syntactical Markup:

– Commalists, Semicolons, Parentheses

� Generic Rules for these tasks

� program skeleton completed by application-specific rulesand refining rules (rapid prototyping).

� (semi-)automatical approaches for wrapper-generation:not (yet) provide a sufficiently fine granularity

Wrapping 22


Mediating: Integration and Restructuring

� every source defines a schema

� overlapping classes

� different names for objects

� object fusion

� Inter-Source Links

Integration 23


Conclusion

� practicable approach (multi-source MONDIAL case study).

� unified model for Web representation and model of theapplication,

� integrated data model/language for wrapping, mediating,and querying.

� Further Work:

– “intelligent” wrapping (analyzing of tables)

– Usage with search engines

– XML

Conclusion 24


Appendix: Formal Semantics of Web Access

Herbrand semantics of get and parse:

explore � URL � �HB

parse � URL � �HB

A Herbrand model H of an F-Logic program P is a model of Pwrt. Web-Access (built-in semantics of u�get and u�parse) if

� if H j� u � url u�getg, then explore�u� � H

� if H j� u � url u�parseg, then parse�u� � H

... integrated into the TP -operator:

For an F-Logic program P and an H-interpretation H,

TP �H� �� H � fh j �h� body� � ground�P ��H j� bodyg �

TW��P �H� �� H �

TW�i��

P �H� �� C��TP �TW�i

P �H��

�Sfexplore�u� j TP �TW�i

P �H�� j� u �url u�getg

�Sfparse�u� j TP �TW�i

P �H�� j� u �url u�parseg�

Then use TW��P .

Conclusion 25