Methods and apparatus for effective and efficient usage of summary tables in a computer system including a database. In a computer system it is common for a database to include one or more summary tables which have pre-generated aggregations of data from one or more original, detailed database tables. In order to achieve the benefits of summary tables, they must be accessed when appropriate. Thus, information regarding the available summary database tables, including summary bitmaps for all the summary tables, is maintained in the metadata of a computer system. This information is updated whenever a summary table is created. The summary bitmaps are a main key for determining if any summary table is responsive to a user query to the computer system. The summary bitmaps map to corresponding SQL statements, which are generated to access the respective summary tables in the database. Once an SQL statement for accessing a respective summary table is identified for a particular user query, that SQL statement is then incorporated in the executable SQL query that is thereafter executed.