The Beckman Report on Database Research

A GROUP OF database researchers meets periodically to discuss the state of the field and its key directions going forward. Past meetings were held in 1989,6 1990,11 1995,12 1996,10 1998,7 2003,1 and 2008.2 Continuing this tradition, 28 database researchers and two invited speakers met in October 2013 at the Beckman Center on the University of California-Irvine campus for two days of discussions. The meeting attendees represented a broad cross-section of interests, affiliations, seniority, and geography. Attendance was capped at 30 so the meeting would be as interactive as possible. This article summarizes the conclusions from that meeting; an extended report and participant presentations are available at http://beckman.cs.wisc.edu.