This volume, the 34th issue of Transactions on Large-Scale Data- and Knowledge-Centered Systems, constitutes a special issue consisting of seven papers on the subject of Consistency and Inconsistency in Data-Centric Applications. The volume opens with an invited article on basic postulates for inconsistency measures. Three of the remaining six papers are revised, extended versions of papers presented at the First International Workshop on Consistency and Inconsistency, COIN 2016, held in conjunction with DEXA 2016 in Porto, Portugal, in September 2016. The other three papers were selected from submissions to a call for contributions to this edition. Each of the papers highlights a particular subtopic. However, all are concerned with logical inconsistencies that are either to be systematically avoided, or reasoned with consistently, i.e., without running the danger of an explosion of inferences.

This, the 24th issue of Transactions on Large-Scale Data- and Knowledge-Centered Systems, contains extended and revised versions of seven papers presented at the 25th International Conference on Database and Expert Systems Applications, DEXA 2014, held in Munich, Germany, in September 2014. Following the conference, and two further rounds of reviewing and selection, six extended papers and one invited keynote paper were chosen for inclusion in this special issue. Topics covered include systems modeling, similarity search, bioinformatics, data pricing, k-nearest neighbor querying, database replication, and data anonymization.

The LNCS journal Transactions on Large-Scale Data- and Knowledge-Centered Systems focuses on data management, knowledge discovery, and knowledge processing, which are core and hot topics in computer science. Since the 1990s, the Internet has become the main driving force behind application development in all domains. An increase in the demand for resource sharing (e.g., computing resources, services, metadata, data sources) across different sites connected through networks has led to an evolution of data- and knowledge-management systems from centralized systems to decentralized systems enabling large-scale distributed applications providing high scalability. This, the 43rd issue of Transactions on Large-Scale Data- and Knowledge-Centered Systems, contains five revised selected regular papers. Topics covered include classification tasks, machine learning algorithms, top-k queries, business process redesign and a knowledge capitalization framework.

The LNCS journal Transactions on Large-Scale Data- and Knowledge-Centered Systems focuses on data management, knowledge discovery, and knowledge processing, which are core and hot topics in computer science. Since the 1990s, the Internet has become the main driving force behind application development in all domains. An increase in the demand for resource sharing across different sites connected through networks has led to an evolution of data- and knowledge-management systems from centralized systems to decentralized systems enabling large-scale distributed applications providing high scalability. Current decentralized systems still focus on data and knowledge as their main resource. Feasibility of these systems relies basically on P2P (peer-to-peer) techniques and the support of agent systems with scaling and decentralized control. Synergy between grids, P2P systems, and agent technologies is the key to data- and knowledge-centered systems in large-scale environments. This, the 41st issue of Transactions on Large-Scale Data- and Knowledge-Centered Systems, contains seven revised, extended papers selected from the 4th International Conference on Future Data and Security Engineering, FDSE 2017, which was held in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, in November/December 2017. The main focus of this special issue is on data and security engineering, as well as engineering applications.

This, the 37th issue of Transactions on Large-Scale Data- and Knowledge-Centered Systems, contains five revised selected regular papers. Topics covered include data security in clouds, privacy languages, probabilistic modelling in linked data integration, business intelligence based on multi-agent systems, collaborative filtering, and prediction accuracy.

The LNCS journal Transactions on Large-Scale Data- and Knowledge-Centered Systems focuses on data management, knowledge discovery, and knowledge processing, which are core and hot topics in computer science. Since the 1990s, the Internet has become the main driving force behind application development in all domains. An increase in the demand for resource sharing across different sites connected through networks has led to an evolution of data- and knowledge-management systems from centralized systems to decentralized systems enabling large-scale distributed applications providing high scalability. This, the 47th issue of Transactions on Large-Scale Data- and Knowledge-Centered Systems, constitutes a special issue focusing on Digital Ecosystems and Social Networks. The 9 revised selected papers cover topics that include Social Big Data, Data Analysis, Cloud-Based Feedback, Experience Ecosystems, Pervasive Environments, and Smart Systems.

The LNCS journal Transactions on Large-Scale Data- and Knowledge-Centered Systems focuses on data management, knowledge discovery, and knowledge processing, which are core and hot topics in computer science. Since the 1990s, the Internet has become the main driving force behind application development in all domains. An increase in the demand for resource sharing across different sites connected through networks has led to an evolution of data- and knowledge-management systems from centralized systems to decentralized systems enabling large-scale distributed applications providing high scalability. Current decentralized systems still focus on data and knowledge as their main resource. Feasibility of these systems relies basically on P2P (peer-to-peer) techniques and the support of agent systems with scaling and decentralized control. Synergy between grids, P2P systems, and agent technologies is the key to data- and knowledge-centered systems in large-scale environments. This volume, the 26th issue of Transactions on Large-Scale Data- and Knowledge-Centered Systems, focuses on Data Warehousing and Knowledge Discovery from Big Data, and contains extended and revised versions of four papers selected as the best papers from the 16th International Conference on Data Warehousing and Knowledge Discovery (DaWaK 2014), held in Munich, Germany, during September 1-5, 2014. The papers focus on data cube computation, the construction and analysis of a data warehouse in the context of cancer epidemiology, pattern mining algorithms, and frequent item-set border approximation.

The LNCS journal Transactions on Large-Scale Data and Knowledge-Centered Systems focuses on data management, knowledge discovery, and knowledge processing, which are core and hot topics in computer science. Since the 1990s, the Internet has become the main driving force behind application development in all domains. An increase in the demand for resource sharing (e.g., computing resources, services, metadata, data sources) across different sites connected through networks has led to an evolution of data- and knowledge-management systems from centralized systems to decentralized systems enabling large-scale distributed applications providing high scalability. This, the 52nd issue of Transactions on Large-Scale Data and Knowledge-Centered Systems, contains 6 fully revised selected regular papers.

The LNCS journal Transactions on Large-Scale Data- and Knowledge-Centered Systems focuses on data management, knowledge discovery, and knowledge processing, which are core and hot topics in computer science. Since the 1990s, the Internet has become the main driving force behind application development in all domains. An increase in the demand for resource sharing across different sites connected through networks has led to an evolution of data- and knowledge-management systems from centralized systems to decentralized systems enabling large-scale distributed applications providing high scalability. Current decentralized systems still focus on data and knowledge as their main resource. Feasibility of these systems relies basically on P2P (peer-to-peer) techniques and the support of agent systems with scaling and decentralized control. Synergy between grids, P2P systems, and agent technologies is the key to data- and knowledge-centered systems in large-scale environments. This, the 20th issue of Transactions on Large-Scale Data- and Knowledge-Centered Systems, presents a representative and useful selection of articles covering a wide range of important topics in the domain of advanced techniques for big data management. Big data has become a popular term, used to describe the exponential growth and availability of data. The recent radical expansion and integration of computation, networking, digital devices, and data storage has provided a robust platform for the explosion in big data, as well as being the means by which big data are generated, processed, shared, and analyzed. In general, data are only useful if meaning and value can be extracted from them. Big data discovery enables data scientists and other analysts to uncover patterns and correlations through analysis of large volumes of data of diverse types. Insights gleaned from big data discovery can provide businesses with significant competitive advantages, leading to more successful marketing campaigns, decreased customer churn, and reduced loss from fraud. In practice, the growing demand for large-scale data processing and data analysis applications has spurred the development of novel solutions from both industry and academia.

The LNCS journal Transactions on Large-Scale Data- and Knowledge-Centered Systems focuses on data management, knowledge discovery, and knowledge processing, which are core and hot topics in computer science. Since the 1990s, the Internet has become the main driving force behind application development in all domains. An increase in the demand for resource sharing across different sites connected through networks has led to an evolution of data- and knowledge-management systems from centralized systems to decentralized systems enabling large-scale distributed applications providing high scalability. Current decentralized systems still focus on data and knowledge as their main resource. Feasibility of these systems relies basically on P2P (peer-to-peer) techniques and the support of agent systems with scaling and decentralized control. Synergy between grids, P2P systems, and agent technologies is the key to data- and knowledge-centered systems in large-scale environments. This special issue contains extended and revised versions of 4 papers, selected from the 25 papers presented at the satellite events associated with the 17th East-European Conference on Advances in Databases and Information Systems (ADBIS 2013), held on September 1-4, 2013 in Genoa, Italy. The three satellite events were GID 2013, the Second International Workshop on GPUs in Databases; SoBI 2013, the First International Workshop on Social Business Intelligence: Integrating Social Content in Decision Making; and OAIS 2013, the Second International Workshop on Ontologies Meet Advanced Information Systems. The papers cover various topics in large-scale data and knowledge-centered systems, including GPU-accelerated database systems and GPU-based compression for large time series databases, design of parallel data warehouses, and schema matching. The special issue content, which combines both theoretical and application-based contributions, gives a useful overview of some of the current trends in large-scale data and knowledge management and will stimulate new ideas for further research and development within both the scientific and industrial communities.