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Encyclopedia of Database Systems pp 3931–3935Cite as

Temporal Constraints

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Definition

Temporal constraints describe relationships among variables that refer somehow to time. A set of temporal constraints can be stored in a temporal database, which is queried by temporal queries during problem solving. For example, a set of temporal constraints may form some requirements, all of which must be satisfied during some scheduling problem.

Most interesting temporal constraints derive from references to time in natural language. Such references typically compare two time points, two sets of time points, or two time intervals. The literature on temporal constraints and this entry focus on the study of these types of comparative or binary constraints.

Historical Background

The seminal work on temporal intervals is by Allen [1]. Difference Bounded Matrices (see the section on Scientific Fundamentals) were introduced by Dill [3]. A graph representation of difference constraints and efficient constraint satisfaction problem-based solutions for consistency of difference...

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Recommended Reading

  1. Allen JF. Maintaining knowledge about temporal intervals. Commun ACM. 1983;26(11):832–43.

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  2. Dechter R, Meiri I, Pearl J. Temporal constraint networks. Artif Intell. 1991;49(1–3):61–95.

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  3. Dill DL. Timing assumptions and verification of finite-state concurrent systems. In: Proceedings of the Automatic Verification Methods for Finite State Systems; 1989. p. 197–212.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Lincoln, NE, USA

    Peter Revesz

Authors
  1. Peter Revesz
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Correspondence to Peter Revesz .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Georgia Institute of Technology College of Computing, Atlanta, GA, USA

    Ling Liu

  2. University of Waterloo School of Computer Science, Waterloo, ON, Canada

    M. Tamer Özsu

Section Editor information

  1. University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ, USA

    Richard T. Snodgrass

  2. Aalborg University, Aalborg Øst, Denmark

    Christian S. Jensen

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Revesz, P. (2018). Temporal Constraints. In: Liu, L., Özsu, M.T. (eds) Encyclopedia of Database Systems. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-8265-9_391

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