Abstract

We designed, implemented and evaluated a new concept for direct manipulation of databases, called dynamic queries, that allows users to formulate queries with graphical widgets, such as sliders. By providing a graphical visualization of the database and search results, users can find trends and exceptions easily. Eighteen undergraduate chemistry students performed statistically significantly faster usingadynamicqueries interface compared to two interfaces both providing form fillin as input method, one with graphical visualization output and one with all-textual output. The interfaces were used to expore the periodic table of elements and search on their properties. 1. INTRODUCTION Mostdatabasesystems require the user to create andformulate a complex query, whichpresumes that the user is familiar with the logical structure of the database [4]. The queries on a database are usually expressed in high level query languages (such as SQL,QUEL). This works well for many applications, but it ...

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