A temporal framework for managing retroactive and delayed updates: An application to the payroll information system of the Greek public sector

Retroactive and delayed updates cause many problems in the maintenance of information systems which deal with accounting, banking, payroll and other applications. In this paper the authors propose a framework, called TempRuleD, that could manage these problems effectively. This framework is a temporal database, which uses rules, and is based on a generic time management kernel called TGS. TGS has been developed at N.C.S.R. ‘Demokritos’ and is based on a multiroot graph that supports storing, indexing and fast retrieval of time references. The applicability and the expected benefits of the proposed framework are discussed for the payroll information system of Greek public sector organizations. Such a system usually requires many updates and calculations with retroactive and delayed data and rules.