Advances in conceptual modeling

Peter P. S. Chen

The objective of the workshops associated with the ER'99 18th International Conference on Conceptual Modeling is to give participants access to high level presentations on specialized, hot, or emerging scientific topics. Three themes have been selected in this respect: — Evolution and Change in Data Management (ECDM'99) dealing with han­ dling the evolution of data and data structure, — Reverse Engineering in Information Systems (REIS'99) aimed at exploring the issues raised by legacy systems, — The World Wide Web and Conceptual Modehng (WWWCM'99) which ana­ lyzes the mutual contribution of WWW resources and techniques with con­ ceptual modeling. ER'99 has been organized so that there is no overlap between conference ses­ sions and the workshops. Therefore participants can follow both the conference and the workshop presentations they are interested in. I would like to thank the ER'99 program co-chairs, Jacky Akoka and Mokrane Bouzeghoub for having given me the opportunity to organize these workshops. I would also like to thank Stephen Liddle for his valuable help in managing the evaluation procedure for submitted papers and helping to prepare the workshop proceedings for publication. August 1999 Jacques Kouloumdjian Preface for ECDM'99 The first part of this volume contains the proceedings of the First International Workshop on Evolution and Change in Data Management, ECDM'99, which was held in conjunction with the 18th International Conference on Conceptual Modehng (ER'99) in Paris, France, November 15-18, 1999.