Data processing: database and file management or data structures – Database design – Data structure types
Patent
1996-09-25
1999-05-18
Kulik, Paul V.
Data processing: database and file management or data structures
Database design
Data structure types
707 2, 707 10, 39520031, 39520046, G06F15/173;13/362
Patent
active
059059842
DESCRIPTION:
BRIEF SUMMARY
FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to methods and systems for accessing data and for maintaining access structures in a computer-based data processing system.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
In most computer applications there is a need to manage and access data describing or representing properties or conditions of a real or an imaginary object. A database system, which essentially is a computerized record-keeping system, is an example in which objects or occurences are described by means of items of information stored in the database. An object could e.g. be a person or an enterprise with a number of characteristics, and typically there is a number of different parties interested in different aspects of that object. Similar examples are databases within corporate networks, wherein different departments are interested in different aspects of the activity, such as finance, production, sales and storage.
In the case of a person being described, the interested parties may e.g. be a hospital, a bank and the tax authorities, each having a separate database specialized for their specific needs. Now, the person may be described by such characteristics as name, identification number, blood group, income and debts. Some of these particulars are static, e.g. blood group, and others are variable, e.g. income and debts. In this example the hospital would be primarily interested in recording name, identification number and blood group, while the bank would record name, identification number, income and debts and the tax authorities would record name, identification number and income.
It is clear that there is an overlap between the different databases, and it is typically uncertain who is the one responsible for the maintainance of each item of information, with a great risk of inconsistency as a disadvantegeous consequence. Sometimes the parties need to communicate information between their databases, whereby data may be exchanged via e.g. file systems, which requires a common standard regarding operating systems and communications means, something which is not so easily achieved. In general, each database is individually designed according to the owner's needs and view of the object and has a unique set of associations within the database. In state of the art databases, e.g. SQL interpreting relational databases, a database model has to be choosen and fixed, and is thereafter in practice statically storing associations and data items in a user specific way. Recent development in the usage of multimedia, where a number of different data presentation techniques are used simultaneously, for example sound, images and movement of a simulation device, has shown that state of the art access control is inadequate for this mixture of information.
In this text the term database is used in a broad sense, referring to any computer-based system in which data items or signals are occurring, stored and processed in some way. Firstly, there is the common database concept in the above example, and secondly, any data processing system which handles previously stored data and newly recorded data, such as signals read out or sampled from an apparatus, constitutes a kind of database. An example of the latter is the case in which a periferal device, e.g. a printer, is coupled to a computer network. In order to utilize the printer it is necessary to combine data describing the printer parameters with information about the current condition of the printer. In state of the art data processing systems and methods there is no natural way to handle information of different nature, such as parameters and time dependent signals, in a conform manner.
There are some previously known methods for handling certain time dependent data in a database, for example a method for the storage of multi-versioned data with retrieval based on searched query, which is disclosed in the U.S. Pat. No. 5,317,729. This method is, however, directed to version control of engineering changes to a product design in a database allowing multiple users to
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Homere Jean R.
Kulik Paul V.
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