Closed World Assumption OReilly
English | Size: 1.13 GB (1,211,769,004 Bytes)
Category: Tutorial

The Closed World Assumption (CWA) is an extremely important concept in the database world, despite the fact that it isn’t usually spelled out explicitly. Basically what it says is this: Everything stated by the database, either explicitly or implicitly, is true; everything else is false. This presentation explains the CWA in detail and shows why it’s preferred over its rival, The Open World Assumption (OWA). In particular, it examines the claims, sometimes heard, to the effect that the database community operates under the CWA while the semantic web community operates under the OWA. It also explains how “missing information” can be handled without any need for nulls or three-valued logic. [Read more…]