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02 / THE LANDSCAPE

Systems directory

Explore research engines alongside commercial AI-in-SQL platforms. Select up to three profiles to compare their approaches.

These systems have different goals and maturity levels. Comparison describes documented approaches; it does not rank performance.
Research engine2024

LOTUS

Semantic Operators: A Declarative Model for Rich, AI-based Data Processing

Natural-language specifications for filtering, joining, sorting and aggregation, with optimized implementations evaluated against a reference algorithm.

Semantic operatorsQuality constraintsCascades
Research engine2024

UQE

UQE: A Query Engine for Unstructured Databases

A SQL-like language for reasoning over images, conversations and reviews, combining foundation models with sampling and execution optimization.

SQLMultimodalSampling
Research engine2024

Palimpzest

A Declarative System for Optimizing AI Workloads

Turns declarative AI analytics into executable plans that trade off output quality, runtime and model cost.

PipelinesModel selectionCost models
Research engine2024

DocETL

DocETL: Agentic Query Rewriting and Evaluation for Complex Document Processing

Rewrites complex document workflows by decomposing tasks and data, using agents to propose and evaluate better execution plans.

DocumentsRewritingEvaluation
Research engine2023

SUQL

SUQL: Conversational Search over Structured and Unstructured Data with Large Language Models

Composes structured queries with free-text answering and summarization, supporting conversational access to hybrid knowledge sources.

SQLHybrid dataConversational search
Research engine2026

Sema

Sema: A High-performance System for LLM-based Semantic Query Processing

Integrates semantic expressions into SQL and combines logical rewrites with adaptive reordering, fusion and prompt batching.

SQLDuckDBAdaptive execution
Research engine2026

NousDB

NousDB - A Fast Query Engine for Semantic Analytics

A DataFusion-based engine using semantic algebra, token histograms and context-aware batching to optimize AI analytics.

DataFusionBatchingCost models
Research engine2026

JEVDB

Prune First, Decide Fast: Scalable Semantic Query Processing with JEVDB

Uses decision models for semantic operations, escalates uncertain cases to generative models and prunes semantic-join candidates.

Semantic joinsCascadesCandidate pruning
Research engine2025

FlockMTL

Beyond Quacking: Deep Integration of Language Models and RAG into DuckDB

Adds model-backed scalar and aggregate functions, with PROMPT and MODEL schema objects plus batching and caching optimizations.

SQLDuckDBRAG
Research engine2026

iPDB

iPDB -- Optimizing Semantic SQL Queries

Supports in-database ML and LLM inference through a relational predict operator and optimizations across semantic SQL operations.

SQLInferenceQuery optimization
Industry platform2026

BigQuery

BigQuery generative AI functions

Managed AI functions bring generation, filtering, classification and scoring into SQL over structured and unstructured data.

SQLMultimodalManaged inference
Industry platform2026

Snowflake Cortex

Snowflake Cortex AI Functions / AISQL

SQL-callable AI functions support classification, filtering, extraction, summarization and aggregation inside the Snowflake platform.

SQLManaged inferenceSemantic operators
Industry platform2026

Databricks

Databricks ai_query

The ai_query function invokes a model-serving endpoint from SQL and parses the response for real-time or batch inference workflows.

SQLModel servingBatch analytics