The EXODUS Optimizer Generator

Summary: EXODUS Optimizer Generator compiles algebraic transformation rules into an executable optimizer for an extensible DBMS, selecting operation methods via cost functions. A self-adapting search strategy leverages past experience to avoid exhaustive search, delivering near-exhaustive plan quality with substantially reduced search time. (summarized by gpt-5-nano on Feb 09 2026)

Paper ID: ha5633644f52e190a
Venue: SIGMOD
Year: 1987
Pagerank: 0.00031320165
Overall Rank: 118 | 99.22%
DOI: 10.1145/38713.38734

Incoming Non-self Citations Over Time

Authors

1. Goetz Graefe (University of Wisconsin)
2. David J. DeWitt (University of Wisconsin)

BibTeX Citation

@inproceedings{graefe_sigmod87,
        title = {{The EXODUS Optimizer Generator}},
        author = {Graefe, Goetz and DeWitt, David J.},
        series = {{SIGMOD} '87},
        booktitle = {Proceedings of the {ACM} {SIGMOD} International Conference on Management of Data},
        publisher = {Association for Computing Machinery},
        doi = {10.1145/38713.38734},
        url = {https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/38713.38734},
        year = {1987}
}

Incoming Citations (Sorted by Pagerank)

Showing 5 of 55 citing papers.

Rank	Citing Paper	Year	Venue	Pagerank
10,368	Efficient Enumeration of Recursive Plans in Transformation-based Query Optimizers	2024	VLDB	5.0064651e-05
10,514	Dialect-Agnostic SQL Parsing via LLM-Based Segmentation	2026	SIGMOD	4.9605343e-05
11,434	GRewriter: Practical Query Rewriting with Automatic Rule Set Expansion in GaussDB	2025	VLDB	4.9605343e-05
11,815	Asymptotically Better Query Optimization Using Indexed Algebra	2023	VLDB	4.9605343e-05
13,483	Concepts for a Database System Compiler	1988	PODS	4.9605343e-05

Outgoing Citations (Sorted by Pagerank)

Showing 13 of 13 cited papers.

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

Rank	Cited Paper	Year	Venue	Pagerank
1	Access Path Selection in a Relational Database Management System	1979	SIGMOD	0.0023948467
16	The Functional Data Model and the Data Language DAPLEX	1979	SIGMOD	0.00059778867
34	The Design Of Postgres	1986	SIGMOD	0.00049063803
55	GAMMA - A High Performance Dataflow Database Machine	1986	VLDB	0.00040385073
97	The Database Language GEM	1983	SIGMOD	0.00034172656
150	Making Smalltalk a Database System	1984	SIGMOD	0.00028835071
297	Object and File Management in the EXODUS Extensible Database System	1986	VLDB	0.0002187415
537	Optimizing the Performance of a Relational Algebra Database Interface	1975	SIGMOD	0.00016731368
633	A Rule-Based View of Query Optimization	1987	SIGMOD	0.00015365563
638	LDL: A Logic-Based Data-Language	1986	VLDB	0.0001531355
772	Access Paths in the "Abe" Statistical Query Facility	1982	SIGMOD	0.00014078923
957	Programming Constructs for Database System Implementation in EXODUS	1987	SIGMOD	0.00012838854
4,667	Translating Aggregate Queries into Iterative Programs	1986	VLDB	6.4623007e-05

Semantically Similar Papers

#	Overall Rank	Paper	Year	Venue
1	144	Optimization of Nonrecursive Queries	1986	VLDB
2	2,351	Extending the Search Strategy in a Query Optimizer	1991	VLDB
3	646	Exploiting Statistics on Query Expressions for Optimization	2002	SIGMOD
4	5,223	Exact Cardinality Query Optimization with Bounded Execution Cost	2019	SIGMOD
5	3,218	Implementing an Interpreter for Functional Rules in a Query Optimizer	1988	VLDB
6	2,557	An Architecture For Query Optimization	1982	SIGMOD
7	259	An Overview of Query Optimization in Relational Systems	1998	PODS
8	633	A Rule-Based View of Query Optimization	1987	SIGMOD
9	1,380	Experiences Building the Open OODB Query Optimizer	1993	SIGMOD
10	479	Dynamic Query Evaluation Plans	1989	SIGMOD