SchenQL: in-depth analysis of a query language for bibliographic metadata

Abstract

Information access to bibliographic metadata needs to be uncomplicated, as users may not benefit from complex and potentially richer data that may be difficult to obtain. Sophisticated research questions including complex aggregations could be answered with complex SQL queries. However, this comes with the cost of high complexity, which requires for a high level of expertise even for trained programmers. A domain-specific query language could provide a straightforward solution to this problem. Although less generic, it can support users not familiar with query construction in the formulation of complex information needs. In this paper, we present and evaluate SchenQL, a simple and applicable query language that is accompanied by a prototypical GUI. SchenQL focuses on querying bibliographic metadata using the vocabulary of domain experts. The easy-to-learn domain-specific query language is suitable for domain experts as well as casual users while still providing the possibility to answer complex information demands. Query construction and information exploration are supported by a prototypical GUI. We present an evaluation of the complete system: different variants for executing SchenQL queries are benchmarked; interviews with domain-experts and a bipartite quantitative user study demonstrate SchenQL’s suitability and high level of users’ acceptance.

SchenQL: A query language for bibliographic data with aggregations and domain-specific functions

“…SchenQL [9] describes both the underlying domain-specific query language and the graphical user interface. We extend its previously presented functional range.…”

“…We extend and redefine SchenQL [9], but all previously described functionality remains (a hidden) part of it. On top of that, we add significant extensions that comprise more and more powerful aggregations, more and more powerful functions (that were previously called filters), and a modified syntax that resembles natural language even more.…”

“…The SchenQL GUI is an updated form of the SchenQL GUI [9]. The search interface supports query construction with a suggestion and auto-completion feature (shown in Figure 1).…”

“…Results of queries are transmitted back through the API to the front-end where they are used to populate the result tables and detail views of the GUI (see Figure 4). As data source for our system, we combine the dblp XML dump from 1st October 2021 9 with Semantic Scholar data [1] from October 2021 for citation information as well as AMiner Open Academic Graph 2.1 [13,14,16] data for identifying automatically generated keywords of publications; abstracts are taken from both collections.…”

“…To help users access bibliographic metadata more easily, we extend our domain-specific query language and user interface SchenQL [9]. It focuses on aggregation of data and bibliographic functions, such as RELATED KEYWORDS TO "DLs" or PUBLICATIONS WITH HIGHEST CORERANK METRIC.…”