The current invention relates to a data mining technology for determining
association rules within a multitude of N transactions each transaction
comprising up to p different items. According to the invention a sample
size n of the multitude of N transactions is determined based on
precision requirements. The sample size n is chosen such, that it is at
least in the order of magnitude of an estimated sample size n*. Finally
association rules are computed based on a sample of the multitude of N
transactions with sample size n according to any methodology for mining
of association rules using the association rules as estimated association
rules of the multitude of N transactions.