Issues in Active Real-Time Databases

Active databases and real-time databases have gained increased interest in recent. Both active and real-time databases are considered as important technologies for supporting non-traditional applications such as computer integrated manufacturing (CIM), process control and air-traffic control. These applications are often event driven and need to react to events in a timely and efficient manner. In this paper we address the problem of merging active databases and real-time databases. Active real-time database is a fairly new area, in which very little research has been carried out so far. However, the use of active real-time database applications has a great potential. In this paper we address several issues and open questions such as semantics, assignment of time constraints and rule selection, which need to be considered when designing active real-time databases. We will highlight issues associated with event detection, rule triggering, rule selection and evaluation in a active real-time database system. A real-time event detection method for multi-level realtime systems is proposed.