QTune: A Query-Aware Database Tuning System with Deep Reinforcement Learning

Summary: QTune uses query featurization and a Double-State DDPG actor–critic model to jointly exploit SQL features and database state for configuration tuning. It supports query-, workload-, and cluster-level tuning across three DBMSs, outperforming prior methods. (summarized by gpt-5.6-luna on Jul 24 2026)

Paper ID: h721a64cdd90a0a40
Venue: VLDB
Year: 2019
Pagerank: 0.00018310278
Overall Rank: 437 | 97.07%
DOI: 10.14778/3352063.3352129
PDF: Download (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0)

Incoming Non-self Citations Over Time

Authors

1. Guoliang Li (Tsinghua University)
2. Xuanhe Zhou (Tsinghua University)
3. Shifu Li (Huawei)
4. Bo Gao (Huawei)

BibTeX Citation

@article{li_vldb19,
        title = {{QTune: A Query-Aware Database Tuning System with Deep Reinforcement Learning}},
        author = {Li, Guoliang and Zhou, Xuanhe and Li, Shifu and Gao, Bo},
        journal = {PVLDB},
        series = {{VLDB} '19},
        volume = {12},
        number = {12},
        pages = {2118--2130},
        doi = {10.14778/3352063.3352129},
        url = {https://doi.org/10.14778/3352063.3352129},
        year = {2019}
}

Incoming Citations (Sorted by Pagerank)

Showing 50 of 89 citing papers.

Rank	Citing Paper	Year	Venue	Pagerank
462	An End-to-End Learning-based Cost Estimator	2020	VLDB	0.00017836105
1,245	DB-BERT: A Database Tuning Tool that "Reads the Manual"	2022	SIGMOD	0.0001136308
1,289	An Inquiry into Machine Learning-based Automatic Configuration Tuning Services on Real-World Database Management Systems	2021	VLDB	0.00011159167
1,659	D-Bot: Database Diagnosis System using Large Language Models	2024	VLDB	9.9625133e-05
1,699	Black or White? How to Develop an AutoTuner for Memory-based Analytics	2020	SIGMOD	9.8403606e-05
2,227	GPTuner: A Manual-Reading Database Tuning System via GPT-Guided Bayesian Optimization	2024	VLDB	8.8007923e-05
2,393	A Learned Query Rewrite System using Monte Carlo Tree Search	2022	VLDB	8.5298464e-05
2,686	Cost-based or Learning-based? A Hybrid Query Optimizer for Query Plan Selection	2022	VLDB	8.1300913e-05
2,721	ResTune: Resource Oriented Tuning Boosted by Meta-Learning for Cloud Databases	2021	SIGMOD	8.0931221e-05
2,770	Facilitating Database Tuning with Hyper-Parameter Optimization: A Comprehensive Experimental Evaluation	2022	VLDB	8.0343719e-05
2,837	Query Performance Prediction for Concurrent Queries using Graph Embedding	2020	VLDB	7.9495917e-05
2,908	AI Meets Database: AI4DB and DB4AI	2021	SIGMOD	7.8716173e-05
3,052	LlamaTune: Sample-Efficient DBMS Configuration Tuning	2022	VLDB	7.704739e-05
3,479	LOGER: A Learned Optimizer towards Generating Efficient and Robust Query Execution Plans	2023	VLDB	7.2665349e-05
3,487	HUNTER: An Online Cloud Database Hybrid Tuning System for Personalized Requirements	2022	SIGMOD	7.2603973e-05
3,588	Make Your Database System Dream of Electric Sheep: Towards Self-Driving Operation	2021	VLDB	7.1841858e-05
3,648	UDO: Universal Database Optimization using Reinforcement Learning	2021	VLDB	7.1366536e-05
3,672	Leaper: A Learned Prefetcher for Cache Invalidation in LSM-tree based Storage Engines	2020	VLDB	7.1084283e-05
3,680	openGauss: An Autonomous Database System	2021	VLDB	7.1016555e-05
3,779	HTAP Databases: What is New and What is Next	2022	SIGMOD	7.0234898e-05
3,964	MB2: Decomposed Behavior Modeling for Self-Driving Database Management Systems	2021	SIGMOD	6.889374e-05
4,080	Towards Dynamic and Safe Configuration Tuning for Cloud Databases	2022	SIGMOD	6.8151596e-05
4,113	Automatic Database Configuration Debugging using Retrieval-Augmented Language Models	2025	SIGMOD	6.7964307e-05
4,240	LEON: A New Framework for ML-Aided Query Optimization	2023	VLDB	6.7064546e-05
4,485	LearnedSQLGen: Constraint-aware SQL Generation using Reinforcement Learning	2022	SIGMOD	6.5771335e-05
4,686	LOCAT: Low-Overhead Online Configuration Auto-Tuning of Spark SQL Applications	2022	SIGMOD	6.4690725e-05
4,690	Learned Cardinality Estimation for Similarity Queries	2021	SIGMOD	6.4667478e-05
4,708	PreQR: Pre-training Representation for SQL Understanding	2022	SIGMOD	6.4559477e-05
4,743	Machine Learning for Databases	2021	VLDB	6.4379536e-05
5,080	DBPA: A Benchmark for Transactional Database Performance Anomalies	2023	SIGMOD	6.2830313e-05
5,188	Database Workload Characterization with Query Plan Encoders	2022	VLDB	6.2346845e-05
5,284	An Efficient Transfer Learning Based Configuration Adviser for Database Tuning	2024	VLDB	6.1963031e-05
5,438	Eraser: Eliminating Performance Regression on Learned Query Optimizer	2024	VLDB	6.1278045e-05
5,715	Detect, Distill and Update: Learned DB Systems Facing Out of Distribution Data	2023	SIGMOD	6.0178585e-05
5,850	Modeling Shifting Workloads for Learned Database Systems	2024	SIGMOD	5.9697921e-05
5,950	DEX: Scalable Range Indexing on Disaggregated Memory	2024	VLDB	5.934065e-05
5,973	Towards instance-optimized data systems	2021	VLDB	5.9281867e-05
6,033	Efficient and Effective Similar Subtrajectory Search with Deep Reinforcement Learning	2020	VLDB	5.9076539e-05
6,123	Learning to Optimize LSM-trees: Towards A Reinforcement Learning based Key-Value Store for Dynamic Workloads	2023	SIGMOD	5.8771312e-05
6,408	A Unified Transferable Model for ML-Enhanced DBMS	2022	CIDR	5.7921918e-05
6,453	Towards General and Efficient Online Tuning for Spark	2023	VLDB	5.7790502e-05
6,732	A Unified and Efficient Coordinating Framework for Autonomous DBMS Tuning	2023	SIGMOD	5.6921776e-05
7,072	E2ETune: End-to-End Knob Tuning via Fine-tuned Generative Language Model	2025	VLDB	5.6053987e-05
7,372	ADOPT: Adaptively Optimizing Attribute Orders for Worst-Case Optimal Join Algorithms via Reinforcement Learning	2023	VLDB	5.5385404e-05
7,499	DBMind: A Self-Driving Platform in openGauss	2021	VLDB	5.5077884e-05
7,507	On the Efficiency of K-Means Clustering: Evaluation, Optimization, and Algorithm Selection	2021	VLDB	5.5050635e-05
7,909	CAMAL: Optimizing LSM-trees via Active Learning	2024	SIGMOD	5.4266123e-05
7,915	Tastes Great! Less Filling! High Performance and Accurate Training Data Collection for Self-Driving Database Management Systems	2022	SIGMOD	5.4258674e-05
7,981	The Holon Approach for Simultaneously Tuning Multiple Components in a Self-Driving Database Management System with Machine Learning via Synthesized Proto-Actions	2024	VLDB	5.4117272e-05
8,009	A Spark Optimizer for Adaptive, Fine-Grained Parameter Tuning	2024	VLDB	5.4063491e-05

Outgoing Citations (Sorted by Pagerank)

Showing 7 of 7 cited papers.

Citations counted here include only citations to other VLDB/SIGMOD/CIDR/PODS papers in this database.

Rank	Cited Paper	Year	Venue	Pagerank
78	Automatic Database Management System Tuning Through Large-scale Machine Learning	2017	SIGMOD	0.00036675568
314	An End-to-End Automatic Cloud Database Tuning System Using Deep Reinforcement Learning	2019	SIGMOD	0.00021276452
322	Tuning Database Configuration Parameters with iTuned	2009	VLDB	0.00021034201
462	An End-to-End Learning-based Cost Estimator	2020	VLDB	0.00017836105
555	SageDB: A Learned Database System	2019	CIDR	0.0001650754
781	Self-tuning Database Technology and Information Services: from Wishful Thinking to Viable Engineering	2002	VLDB	0.00014019939
6,400	Human-in-the-loop Data Integration	2017	VLDB	5.7962311e-05

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