ANSI SQL Hierarchical Data Processing Basics

March 17, 2010

The SQL-92 standard unknowingly and without planning introduced the capability to perform full hierarchical data processing with its introduction of the LEFT Outer Join operation. This natural hierarchical processing capability will be explained in this article.

Database Hierarchical Structure Introduction

The SQL-92 standard unknowingly and without planning introduced the capability to perform full hierarchical data processing with its introduction of the LEFT Outer Join operation. The reasons this powerful capability has not been used were covered in my previous Database Journal article Ten Problems with XQuery and the SQL/XML Standard. This natural hierarchical processing capability will be explained in this article. Current built-in hierarchical processing support in relational databases has been proprietary and very limited. Externally added hierarchical processing is not automatic, it is user driven using functions. Database level hierarchical support for XML and legacy hierarchical databases like IBM's IMS and Structured VSAM requires support for both multiple node types and multiple data occurrences. The support for this level of hierarchical processing is not practical if performed procedurally and externally. It must be performed internally and automatically to be practical. This will also be covered in this article.

Hierarchical Structure Basics

Hierarchical structure principles involve hierarchical data preservation based on parent and child relationships. This means that parents can exist without children in the database, but children can not exist without a parent. If a parent with children is deleted from the database, the related children and all descendents are removed also. Typically a delete command to a virtual structure in memory would work the same, but would probably not be persisted. In the case of retrieving and building the virtual hierarchical structure in memory by only selecting the nodes desired, the unreferenced nodes are sliced out of the resulting structure and do not cause removal of lower level nodes. This is known hierarchically as node promotion and can cause node collection to automatically occur where a higher level node increases the number of pathways directly under it. This process changes the structure, but still preserves its basic structure semantics and integrity. SQL's SELECT operation works exactly the same way with its variable SELECT list skipping around intervening data types. This is known relationally as projection.

Previously, hierarchical structures received a bad reputation for being fixed and not flexible when relational databases became popular. In actuality, this did not take fully into account the use of logical hierarchical structures such as virtual structures mentioned above. Logical hierarchical structures have unlimited flexibility and even more capability for dynamic changes to the structure than relational. They can be used in the modeling of relational tables into a logical hierarchical structure. Flexible logical hierarchical structures also follow precisely the same hierarchical processing principles as fixed physical hierarchical structures. This capability can be used heavily in extending SQL's hierarchical processing to XML and legacy databases.

Divide and Conquer the Hierarchical Processing Problem

The “M” in XML stands for Markup and that was what XML was designed to handle. The additional use of XML for database data was an afterthought.  Database data use is more fixed than Markup data. Markup data requires user navigation to get the full flexible use out of Markup data. Database data being more fixed with a more specific use does not need to be navigated by the user; it can be accessed transparently with no user navigation required. This is known as navigationless access. Unfortunately, this difference in use has not yet been recognized and utilized. Even more of a concern is that database data processed as Markup data can produce incorrect results. By making this important distinction and limiting XML's database processing to fixed hierarchical processing allows its processing to operate navigationlessly. This also allows it to perform many advanced full hierarchical processing capabilities not possible or practical with user navigation.

SQL Hierarchical Data Structure Modeling

In the SQL Structure Definition in Figure 1, the Left Join operation preserves the left side argument over the right side. This means node A can exist even if there are no matching node B items, but node B can not exist without matching node A items. The SQL processing continues left to right defining the hierarchical structure. The ON clause specifies the link data points between nodes; this is why node C is linked to node B and not node A. Notice in the SQL Structure Definition that nodes B and D are both linked back to node A so that node A starts two separate pathways. Each ON clause only operates locally at its specific use point and downward because the left argument side is always preserved with Left Outer Joins. The SQL WHERE clause does not have this local narrow range of effect; its global effect allows it to filter the entire hierarchical structure. SQL WHERE clause filtering can be added to the end of the SQL Structure Definition below. The ON clause filtering is the same as XPath filtering and the SQL WHERE clause is the same as the XQuery WHERE Filtering operation.

The SQL Structured Definition shown in Figure 1 can be specified in an SQL Query to be directly processed by the SQL processor. The Hierarchical Structure is defined by the Left Join syntax and its hierarchical operation is specified by the associated semantics. The SQL Structure Definition can also be named and defined in an SQL view for easy use and reuse. This is shown later in Figure 4.

Figure 1 Hierarchical Data Modeling Produces Hierarchical Rowset

Interpreting Hierarchical Rowsets

Figure 1 also demonstrates a number of the most basic hierarchical processing attributes produced in ANSI SQL. These attributes are hierarchical data preservation from the left join and variable length path creation with nulls inserted in the rowset to keep them aligned properly. This is shown in the Structured Rowset above where the two sibling legs BC and DE are independently represented at different variable lengths. The shortened null terminated legs show that hierarchical preservation is also working; otherwise they would be totally missing.

Mapping SQL to Hierarchical Processing at a Conceptual Level

In mapping SQL to and from hierarchical processing, relational tables and XML elements are treated as nodes. Relational columns, XML element strings and XML element attributes are treated as fields in data nodes. Figure 2 below demonstrates SQL's high level hierarchical processing using SQL’s SELECT, FROM, WHERE syntax and their intuitive hierarchical structured operations. These are: input data and its hierarchical SQL modeled structure specified by the FROM clause; output data selection specified by the SELECT clause which indicates the hierarchically related nodes to be returned and their data and order; and the data filtering specified in the WHERE clause which hierarchically filters the data following its modeled hierarchical structure. These operations used together will hierarchically process the input data and automatically produce a hierarchical structured XML correctly representing the processed results.

Figure 2: SQL Hierarchical Query Specification and Operation Overview

In Figure 2 you can notice that the SQL user can continue to use the same SQL, but visualize the data structures as hierarchical and the operation as being performed hierarchically at a high conceptual level to produce hierarchical structures. These will be automatically converted to its hierarchical XML structure unless overridden. The Query Result Structure in Figure 2 demonstrates the hierarchical operation of node promotion. Notice that the unselected nodes are removed from query result.

Querying Multipath Hierarchical Data Structures

The examples used so far have used multipath processing where queries reference multiple pathways in the accessed hierarchical structure. The processing of these multipath queries is not generally possible today because they require special hierarchical processing to get correct hierarchical results.

The ON clause covered earlier is a linear single path qualification that is used during structure definition and creation where it can control only the path it is on. The WHERE clause data filtering and data qualification is logically applied after the entire structure has been created and can affect the entire structure such that data qualification based on one path can affect data qualification on another Path. This is because every node is related to every other node in a hierarchical structure. This full nonlinear hierarchical qualification is not designed or made up. It is standard processing for nonlinear hierarchical processing based on naturally occurring hierarchical principles. These principles have been utilized as far back as the original hierarchical databases. And now with relational databases they are automatically performed naturally when the data is modeled hierarchically proves their inherent technology is correct. XML database products today are lacking this level of principled hierarchical processing.

This hierarchical data filtering is a new capability for the XML industry. Figure 3 indicates how it works. You can notice how the relational rowset and its associated hierarchical structure are related. In this example, the WHERE clause is pointing to node C in the Data Qualification Flow diagram to demonstrate the data filtering directions taking off from node C in different directions. If this node is selected for output, all of its associated node occurrences are also qualified, up, down, and around as shown by the arrows in the Data Qualification flow. This happens automatically because the entire row is qualified. Notice how the unqualified row is not output. The darker cells are qualified and output.

Figure 3: WHERE Clause Data Multipath Qualification Flow

Joining Structures Hierarchically

Figure 4 below represents the processing of a query that is invoked by a query dynamically joining two hierarchical structures represented by their view names RDBV and XMLV. In the same way that the hierarchical data modeling was performed a node at time using Left Outer Joins in Figure 1 to define hierarchical structures, hierarchical structures defined in SQL views can also be joined by Left Outer Joins producing a hierarchical superstructure. In this example, the left Relational structure is joined over the right XML structure linked by its ON clause join criteria at a high conceptual level as demonstrated in Figure 4. The ON clause takes on added importance by unambiguously specifying the link points in each structure being hierarchically joined. This is shown by the diagram of the joined structures to the right of the SQL Processor box in Figure 4. The X node box in this diagram is dashed indicating it is not selected for output and will be removed from output.

The ON clause was introduced in SQL-92 to replace the WHERE clause’s join use for a more precise join control geared more for local control at the join point. The ON clause operates during structure creation while the WHERE clause operates after structure creation affecting the entire structure hierarchically as a whole. This is a huge difference between the WHERE and ON operation not generally realized and enables much of SQL's hierarchical capabilities.

This example in Figure 4 also demonstrates a heterogeneous join of structures by hierarchically joining a relational structure over an XML Structure. Non relational structures such as XML and legacy hierarchical structures such as IBM's IMS require their own view definition to capture their specific set of metadata needed for their processing. This is indicated in the XML Definition Processing box in this example. This information is used in the Service Request for XML box when XML access is needed by the SQL Processor. The XML Definition Process will also automatically generate a standard SQL hierarchical view that specifies the non relational structure's structure as a standard SQL hierarchical structure view as shown. This allows the joined heterogeneous structures to be hierarchical joined seamlessly using standard SQL sequence of Left Outer Joins.

Figure 4: SQL Multi Structure Heterogeneous Hierarchical Join

In this example the relational view is a logical view and the XML view is a physical view. The relational logical view is constructed while the XML physical view is already constructed and is just defined recording its structure information. Joining and processing physical and logical structures does not present an impedance mismatch problem because they both follow the same set of hierarchical processing principles and rules.


In the implementation of the prototype that proved the capability of the design modeled in Figure 4, the SQL processor's hierarchical rowset results were converted to an XML hierarchical structure as shown. This design kept the ANSI SQL processor unmodified, proving that it could indeed operate fully hierarchically beyond current XML processors hierarchical capabilities. This design could be improved in efficiency if the external processing additions shown were integrated directly into the SQL processor. The ANSI SQL Hierarchical XML Processor prototype can be tested at www.adatinc.com/demo.html.

» See All Articles by Columnist Michael M. David

The Network for Technology Professionals


About Internet.com

Legal Notices, Licensing, Permissions, Privacy Policy.
Advertise | Newsletters | E-mail Offers