Database Reference
In-Depth Information
Object Databases
The previous decade has witnessed the advancement of several so-called object database
management systems (ODBMS) and universal database management systems (UDBMS).
This Chapter discusses such systems under the following subheadings:
•
Introduction
•
Overview of Object Oriented Database Management Systems
•
Challenges to Object Oriented Database Management Systems
•
Hybrid Approaches
•
Summary and Concluding Remarks
23.1 Introduction
Object Technology (OT) has been dominating the software engineering industry in recent
times. For better or worse, there has been a heightened interest and indulgence in object-
oriented methodologies (OOM). Full treatment of OT and OOM is better handled in another
course on the subject. However, for completeness, a brief introduction is made here.
OT provides obvious advantages to application programming, with benefits of
encapsulation, polymorphism and complexity (information) hiding, code reusability,
etc (Figure
23-1
summarizes the commonly mentioned advantages). By contrast, an
OO approach to database design may or may not bring significant benefits, depending
on the situation. Data structure encapsulation may or may not be desirable; besides,
the principle of encapsulation often contradicts the principle of data independence in
database design.
