Managing changes to XML schema design styles in a temporal and multi-version XML environment

In temporal and multi-version XML environments, several research works have focused on changes to traditional aspects of XML schemas like element/attribute declarations and simple/complex type definitions. However, advanced aspects of XML schemas have been either considered only to a limited extent, like XML namespaces or not studied at all, like XML schema design styles. In this paper, we deal with this last aspect and propose, in the temporal and multi-version τXSchema (temporal XML schema) framework, an approach for: 1) easily specifying changes to the design styles of an XML schema through the use of a high-level schema change operation based on our previously proposed StyleVolution approach; 2) correctly propagating the possible effects to the underlying XML document instances through the transparent management of the schema and document versions; 3) dealing with the interaction between design styles and conventional schema changes, by means of a semi-automated conflict resolution.