TRENDS IN DATABASE TECHNOLOGY - Database Design and Development: An Essential Guide for IT Professionals - page 638

Complex Operators In addition to providing advanced functions, complex oper-
ators such as the following are also provided:
• Rotate(image, angle) returns image
• Crop (image, rectange) returns image
Create Your Own In an ORDBMS, you can create a new base data type and
define your own functions and operators.
Complex Objects ORDBMS provides for complex objects. These objects may be
composed by putting together base and user-defined data types.
Inheritance Inheritance consists of data inheritance and function inheritance. As
with base type extension and complex objects, inheritance allows you to define new
data types.
Rules In ORDBMS, the rule system is much more flexible, with the general
form “on event, do action.” Thus the rule system demands the ORDBMS to watch
for a given event and execute the appropriate action just before or just after the
event.
Managing Large Objects Facilities are available to define and manage very large
objects including audio, video, and text.
BLOB (binary large object)
CLOB (character large object)
NCLOB (fixed-width multibyte CLOB)
BFILE (binary file stored outside the database)
SQL-3: Object-Relational Support
Support features include the following:
SQL-3 provides for user-defined data types, constructors for data types, and user-
defined functions and routines and also offers support for large objects and database
triggers. In SQL-3, two types of objects exist: (1) row type whose instances are tuples
in tables and (2) abstract data type indicative of any general type used as components
of rows.
DATABASES FOR DECISION SUPPORT
The database system in an organization functions as a hub around which all busi-
ness activities take place. Do you need to process an order from a customer? Do
you want check inventory? Do you need to calculate the price? Do you have to
check the customer's credit status? Do you want to arrange for the shipping?
Do you need to bill the customer and send an invoice? Where do you get the infor-
mation for all these processes? Databases, particularly relational databases, drive
the day-to-day business of many organizations.