Axiomatization of approximate exclusion

TL;DR

This paper introduces and axiomatizes approximate exclusion atoms within team semantics, providing a completeness theorem, an implication algorithm, and applications to database exclusion dependencies.

Contribution

It formalizes approximate exclusion atoms in team semantics, proves their axiomatizability and completeness, and offers an efficient implication decision procedure.

Findings

Axiomatization of approximate exclusion atoms established.

Completeness theorem for usual exclusion atoms proved.

Polynomial time algorithm for implication problems provided.

Abstract

We define and axiomatize approximate exclusion atoms in the team semantic setting. A team is a set of assignments, which can be seen as a mathematical model of a uni-relational database, and we say that an approximate exclusion atom is satisfied in a team if the corresponding usual exclusion atom is satisfied in a large enough subteam. We consider the implication problem for approximate exclusion atoms and show that it is axiomatizable for consequences with a degree of approximation that is not too large. We prove the completeness theorem for usual exclusion atoms, which is currently missing from the literature, and generalize it to approximate exclusion atoms. We also provide a polynomial time algorithm for the implication problems. The results also apply to exclusion dependencies in database theory.