SIERRA : a visual query interface for property graphs

Abstract

It is undeniable that graphs have been indispensable in our everyday lives. The need for graphs in our world today is quickly rising as data is becoming increasingly connected. Graphs provide a visual representation of data and how various entities are related to each other. Unlike regular data, graph data revolves around 2 entities: nodes and relationships. Under the property graph model, nodes and relationships are both able to take on properties in the form of key-value pairs. Graph databases such as Neo4j are different from traditional relational databases in that they permanently store relationships, allowing querying of relationships to be faster by several orders of magnitude. Additionally, graph databases do not have fixed schema and data can be added to existing databases easily. Although traditional relational databases have been extremely popular in the past, the constantly evolving needs of users means that we may require more flexible and dynamic schema. As graph databases become more prevalent, the need to be able to efficiently execute queries also increases. However, many users are deterred by the steep learning curves of learning a new querying language, causing them to be able to make full use of graph databases. Therefore, a usable and effective visual graph querying interface will serve to fulfil this unmet need. In this project, an interface called SIERRA is developed. Numerous functionalities are implemented in SIERRA to aid users to performing graph queries of varying level of complexity, according to the user’s needs. This report will provide a comprehensive introduction of SIERRA, including its development process.