The Problem of Incomplete Information in Relational Databases

In a relational database the information is recorded as rows in tables. However, in many practical situations the available information is incomplete and the values for some columns are missing. Yet few existing database management systems allow the user to enter null values in the database. This monograph analyses the problems raised by allowing null values in relational databases. The analysis covers semantical, syntactical, and computational aspects. Algorithms for query evaluation, depe...