E-Book, Englisch, 382 Seiten
Sun / Henstock / Zhang Getting Started with the Graph Query Language (GQL)
1. Auflage 2025
ISBN: 978-1-83620-400-8
Verlag: De Gruyter
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 0 - No protection
A complete guide to designing, querying, and managing graph databases with GQL
E-Book, Englisch, 382 Seiten
ISBN: 978-1-83620-400-8
Verlag: De Gruyter
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 0 - No protection
Graph Query Language is becoming the go-to standard for graph databases, especially with its support for interconnected analytics and GenAI capabilities. This book comes from a team of industry veterans who know exactly how to break down the fundamental GQL concepts, graph terms, definitions, catalog systems, and everything that matters in actual work.
You'll get to grips with graph data types, value expressions, graph matching patterns, and modifying statements through practical GQL examples.
Once you've got the basics down, you'll tackle advanced GQL topics such as path modes, complex path matching patterns, shortest path queries, composite statements, session and transaction commands, and procedures. You'll also learn to create extensions and understand the design of graph databases to solve industry issues. The authors cover techniques like property graphs to help you optimize your graph queries and offer insights into the future of GQL and graph technology.
By the end of this book, you'll confidently query and update graph data, run graph algorithms, create visualizations, and apply your learnings to a real-world use case of money flow analysis for assessing bank client behaviors and detecting transaction risks.
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Weitere Infos & Material
Preface
Over the past several decades, the world of data has evolved dramatically—from the structured era of relational databases to the expansive realms of big data and fast data. Today, we are entering a new phase: the age of deep and connected data. As data volumes grow and analytics become increasingly interdependent, traditional database systems are being reimagined. Graph technology has emerged as a powerful solution, offering new possibilities for modeling and querying complex relationships.
Before the standardization of Graph Query Language (GQL), the graph database landscape was fragmented. Popular query languages such as Cypher (Neo4j), Gremlin (Apache TinkerPop), GSQL (TigerGraph), UQL (Ultipa), and AQL (ArangoDB) each introduced unique features tailored to specific platforms. While these innovations advanced the field, they also created challenges for users—requiring time and effort to learn multiple proprietary syntaxes.
The introduction of GQL (ISO/IEC 39075) marks a pivotal moment in database history. As the second standardized database query language—following SQL’s release in 1986 (ANSI) and 1987 (ISO)—GQL provides a unified, vendor-neutral syntax for querying graph databases. This standardization fosters interoperability, reduces learning curves, and accelerates adoption across industries.
This book begins with the evolution of graph databases and query languages, setting the stage for a comprehensive understanding of GQL. You’ll explore its syntax, structure, data types, and clauses, and gain hands-on experience through practical examples. As you progress, you’ll learn how to write efficient queries, optimize performance, and apply GQL to real-world scenarios such as fraud detection.
By the end of this journey, you’ll have a solid grasp of GQL, be equipped to implement a graph-based solution with GQL, and gain insight into the future direction of graph technology and its growing role in data ecosystems.
Who this book is for
As GQL emerges as a new standard for querying graph databases, its relevance is expanding across nearly every industry. This book is designed for a wide range of professionals who work with data and seek to harness the power of graph-based systems. Whether you’re a developer, engineer, data analyst, database administrator (DBA), data engineer, or data scientist, you’ll find valuable insights and practical guidance in these pages. GQL opens new possibilities for modeling and analyzing complex, interconnected data. As such, this book serves as both an introduction and a deep dive into the language, helping readers of all backgrounds understand and apply GQL effectively in real-world scenarios.
Note: Some features covered in this book may not work as expected with the current versions of GQL Playground and the cloud. These features are planned for future releases. The book includes them to provide a comprehensive guide to GQL and its evolving capabilities.
What this book covers
, , traces the journey from relational databases to NoSQL, and ultimately to the emergence of GQL, which promises to redefine how we query and manage complex, interconnected data in the digital age.
, , introduces the key concepts of GQL and graph theory. The foundational knowledge covered here will enhance your understanding of the remaining sections of the book.
, , takes you on a journey to acquiring practical experience in interacting with graph data using GQL. You will learn how to formulate and execute GQL queries against a graph database, which is essential for querying, manipulating, and analyzing graph-structured data.
, , explores the fundamentals of GQL, uncovering the power of GQL statements and learning how to match data and return results tailored to your needs.
, , explores expressions and operators to be able to filter nodes and relationships, compute metrics over graph structures, construct dynamic labels, and transform properties on the fly.
, , introduces a variety of essential functions for effective data manipulation and analysis.
, , delves into more advanced usages of GQL that allow for more sophisticated graph queries and operations.
, , delves into session management, exploring the creation, modification, and termination of sessions. This chapter presents a detailed overview of the session context, commands for setting session parameters, and resetting and closing sessions.
, , delves into the specifics of initiating transactions using the commands, detailing the syntax, usage, and conditions.
, , overviews conformance to the GQL standard, including required capabilities, optional features, and implementation-defined and implementation-dependent elements.
, , explores GQL extensions provided by Ultipa Graph Database, including operations such as additional options to create a graph, constraints, and index operations, as well as access controls.
, , provides hands-on practice by tackling a common issue with GQL, identifying suspicious transactions in bank accounts.
, , explores local Terraform automation processes and implementing a CI/CD pipeline to apply Terraform configuration automatically.
, , provides definitions of key terms and a comprehensive list of required and optional GQL features, along with additional resources for further learning.
Download the example code files
The code bundle for the book is hosted on GitHub at https://github.com/PacktPublishing/Getting-Started-with-the-Graph-Query-Language-GQL. We also have other code bundles from our rich catalog of books and videos available at https://github.com/PacktPublishing. Check them out!
Download the color images
We also provide a PDF file that has color images of the screenshots/diagrams used in this book. You can download it here: https://packt.link/gbp/9781836204015.
Conventions used
There are a number of text conventions used throughout this book.
: Indicates code words in text, database table names, folder names, filenames, file extensions, pathnames, dummy URLs, user input, and Twitter/X handles. For example: “ mode excludes paths that contain duplicate edges, such as the path, where the edge is traversed more than once.”
A block of code is set as follows:
When we wish to draw your attention to a particular part of a code block, the relevant lines or items are set in bold:
Bold: Indicates a new term, an important word, or words that you see on the screen. For instance, words in menus or dialog boxes appear in the text like this. For example: “In this case, the results are generated by computing the Cartesian product of the result sets from the individual patterns.”
Warnings or important notes appear like this.
Tips and tricks appear like this.
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