The Active Use of Constraints in the Design of Object - Oriented Database Applications

本研究旨在研究一种工具，该工具利用约束知识来支持面向对象数据库应用程序的用户视图开发和更新传播语义。非正式地说，面向对象的数据库系统是一个将语义建模中的抽象使用与编程语言概念（如抽象数据类型）结合起来作为保护数据语义的手段的系统。建议的数据库设计支持工具将通过一种称为约束分析的方法积极利用数据语义。通过约束分析，在设计阶段明确数据约束的作用，以支持用户视图和数据库更新操作的规范。然而，使用约束分析作为设计工具，假设数据将在一个由复杂的约束实施系统支持的数据库环境中访问，该系统既执行固有的模式约束，也执行使用约束语言表达的显式约束。所提出的研究的预期结果是开发一个具有约束管理和执行功能的面向对象数据库系统，该系统允许数据约束在数据库软件规范中规划一个不可分割的部分。

This research is directed at the investigation of a tool that makes use of knowledge about constraints to support the development of user views and update propagation semantics for object-oriented database applications. Informally, an object-oriented database system is a system that combines the use of abstraction in semantic modeling with programming language concepts such as abstract data types as a means of protecting the semantics of data. The proposed database design support tool will actively make use of data semantics through an approach known as constraint analysis. Using constraint analysis, the effects of data constraint are made explicit in the desing phase to support the specification of user views and database update operations. The use of constraint analysis as a design tool, however, assumes that data will be accessed in a database environment supported by a sophisticated contraint enforcement system that enforces both inherent schema constraints and explicit constraints expressed using a constraint language. An expected result of the proposed research is the development of an object-oriented database system with a constraint management and enforcement facility that allows data constraints to plan an integral part in the specification of database software.