Understanding schema evolution as a basis for database reengineering

Software repositories can provide valuable information for facilitating software reengineering efforts. In recent years, many researchers have started to follow a holistic approach, considering diverse software artifacts and the links existing between them. However, when analyzing data-intensive systems, comparatively little attention has been devoted to the analysis of an important system artifact: the database. Even fewer approaches attempt to uncover facts about the evolution history of database schemas. We have developed a tool-supported method for analyzing and visualizing database schema history. This paper reports early results of applying and validating this method. We discuss our experiences to date and point out several novel research perspectives in this domain.