To Weave the Web

The paper discusses the issue of views in the Web context. We introduce a set of languages for managing and restructuring data coming from the World Wide Web. We present a specific data model, called the ARANEUS Data Model, inspired to the structures typically present in Web sites. The model allows us to describe the scheme of a Web hypertext, in the spirit of databases. Based on the data model, we develop two languages to support a sophisticate view definition process: the first, called ULIXES, is used to build database views of the Web, which can then be analyzed and integrated using database techniques; the second, called PENELOPE, allows the definition of derived Web hypertexts from relational views. This can be used to generate hypertextual views over the Web.