Interoperable Database Systems (DS-5), Volume 25

Preface (D.K. Hsiao, E.J. Neuhold, R. Sacks-Davis). The Promise of Distributed Computing and the Challenges of Legacy Information Systems (M.L. Brodie). An Object-Oriented Integration Framework for Building Heterogeneous Database Systems (M. Hartig, K.R. Dittrich). Large Multidatabases: Issues and Directions (A. Bouguettaya, R. King). Translating Relational Schema with Constraints into OODB Schema (L.-L. Yan and T.-W. Ling). Translation of Extended Entity-Relationship Database Model into Database Model (J.R. Getta). Interoperability between Database Models (Z. Tari). O*SQL: A Language for Object Oriented Multidatabase Interoperability (W. Litwin). Coordination of Data and Knowledge Base Systems under Distributed Environment (Q. Chen, Y. Kambayashi). Knowledge-Based Integration of Heterogeneous Databases (P. Fankhauser, E.J. Neuhold). Representation and Translation of Queries in Heterogeneous Databases with Schematic Discrepancies (G. Dong, K. Ramamohanarao). Overcoming Schematic Discrepancies in Interoperable Databases (F. Saltor, M.G. Castellanos, M. Garcia-Solaco). Canonical Security Modeling for Federated Databases (G. Pernul). Achieving Incremental Consistency among Autonomous Replicated Databases (S. Ceri, M.A.W. Houtsma, A.M. Keller, P. Samarati). A Mechanism and Experimental System for Function-Based Sharing in Federated Databases (D. Fang, J. Hammer, D. McLeod). Cooperation between Autonomous Operation Services and Object Database Systems in a Heterogeneous Environment (H.-J. Schek, A. Wolf). So Far (Schematically) Yet So Near (Semantically) (A. Sheth, V. Kashyap). Object Identification in Multidatabase Systems (W. Kent, R. Ahmed, J. Albert, M. Ketabchi, M.-C. Shan). Managing Interdependencies among Objects in Federated Databases (Q. Li, D. McLeod).

The proliferation of databases within organizations have made it imperative to allow effective sharing of information from these disparate database systems. In addition, it is desirable that the individual systems must maintain a certain degree of autonomy over their data in order to continue to provide for their existing applications and to support controlled access to their information. Thus it becomes necessary to develop new techniques and build new functionality to interoperate these autonomous database systems and to integrate them into an overall information system. Research into interoperable database systems has advanced substantially over recent years in response to this need.

The papers presented in this volume cover a wide spectrum of both theoretical and pragmatic issues related to the semantics of interoperable database systems. Topics covered include techniques to support the translation between database schema and between database languages; object oriented frameworks for supporting interoperability of heterogeneous databases, knowledge base integration and techniques for overcoming schematic discrepancies in interoperable databases. In addition, there are papers addressing issues of security transaction processing, data modelling and object identification in interoperable database systems.

It is hoped the publication will represent a valuable collective contribution to research and development in the field for database researchers, implementors, designers, application builders and users alike.