In this paper, we propose a typology of the semantic transformations for XPath queries. We focus on two main areas. The first is structural transformation for XPath query, which can be semantically contracted, expanded or complemented using structural constraints. The second is semantic qualifier transformation where the predicates, specified by [ ], in an XPath query can be eliminated or transformed. We design a set of algorithms and implement a prototype system for evaluation. We adopt two

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... resentative off-the-shelf XML data management systems to validate the effectiveness of the semantic transformations. areas cover a wide range of advanced databases topics including XML databases, spatial and temporal databases and data warehousing, and semantic web and ontology. She is currently the Head of Data Engineering and Knowledge Management Laboratory at La Trobe University. Eric Pardede completed his Doctor of Philosophy in Computer Science and Master of Information Technology from La Trobe University. He has published his research works in various books, international journals and conference proceedings. Currently, he is a Lecturer in Software Engineering and Database