Extending the logical update view with transaction support

TL;DR

This paper proposes an extension to the logical update view in Prolog to support transactions, enhancing database consistency in multi-threaded and server applications, with implementation in SWI-Prolog's RDF store.

Contribution

It introduces a transaction support extension to the generation-based implementation of the logical update view in Prolog, addressing consistency issues in dynamic databases.

Findings

Implementation of generation-based transactions in SWI-Prolog RDF store

Discussion on semantics and interface for transactional support

Enhanced database consistency in multi-threaded environments

Abstract

Since the database update view was standardised in the Prolog ISO standard, the so called logical update view is available in all actively maintained Prolog systems. While this update view provided a well defined update semantics and allows for efficient handling of dynamic code, it does not help in maintaining consistency of the dynamic database. With the introduction of multiple threads and deployment of Prolog in continuously running server applications, consistency of the dynamic database becomes important. In this article, we propose an extension to the generation-based implementation of the logical update view that supports transactions. Generation-based transactions have been implemented according to this description in the SWI-Prolog RDF store. The aim of this paper is to motivate transactions, outline an implementation and generate discussion on the desirable semantics and interface prior to implementation.