Maintaining a relationship between two different items of data

• US 20030233370A1
• Filed: 03/11/2003
• Published: 12/18/2003
• Est. Priority Date: 10/13/2000
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: MIOsoft Corporation
• Original Assignee: MIOsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Barabas, Albert B., Siepmann, Ernst M., Gulik, Mark D.A. van
• Granted Patent: US 7,587,428 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/2308 Concurrency control transaction processing G06F9/466
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/2329 using versioning
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/2365 Ensuring data consistency and integrity
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/278 Data partitioning, e.g. horizontal or vertical partitioning
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/289 Object oriented databases
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99952 Coherency, e.g. same view to multiple users

Abstract

Data is stored persistently. At least two different items of the data are stored in two different non-conflicting regions or two different physical clusters. A relationship is maintained between the two different items of data. The relationship enables a process to reach any one of the data items from the other data item. Consistency of the relationship is maintained notwithstanding updates of either or both of the items.

Claims

1. A method comprising

storing data persistently,

storing at least two different items of the data in two different non-conflicting regions or two different physical clusters,

maintaining a relationship between the two different items of data, the relationship enabling a process to reach any one of the data items from the other data item, and

maintaining the consistency of the relationship notwithstanding updates of either or both of the items.

2. The method of claim 1 in which the stored data includes data items of the database that comprise objects in an object database.

3. The method of claim 1 in which the stored data includes data items that are provided as objects to an object-oriented application.

4. The method of claim 1 in which an object relational broker provides persistent storage of objects for an object-oriented application.

5. The method of claim 1 in which the data is stored in a relational database with object-oriented extensions.

6. The method of claim 1, 2, or 3 in which maintaining the consistency of the relationship includes maintaining and making available information about temporarilyincomplete states of the relationship between the two items.

7. The method of claim 6 in which the incompleteness of the states is communicated to processes that seek to update at least one of the two items.

8. The method of claim 1, 2, or 3 in which the data is stored in an object database.

9. The method of claim 1, 2, or 3 in which the data is accessed from an object-oriented application.

10. The method of claim 1, 2, or 3 in which the two data items are stored in two different clusters and the consistency of the relationship is guaranteed by maintaining relationship roles associated respectively with the two items.

11. The method of claim 1, 2, or 3 in which there are more than two data items and the relationshipsare binary, ternary, or N-ary.

12. The method of claim 1, 2, or 3 in which there are more than two data items and the relationships are one-to-one or one-to-many or many-to-many.

13. The method of claim 1, 2, or 3 in which the relationships are bi-directional.

14. The method of claim 1, 2, or 3 in which the relationship is maintained by representing the relationship by roles, each of the roles being associated with one of the data items.

15. The method of claim 1, 2, or 3 in which the relationship is established by concurrent processing with respect to the two items.

16. The method of claim 1, 2, or 3 in which the relationship is created by creating a set of role objects, one for each of the data items for which the relationship is to be created, the role objects including pointers to one another.

17. The method of claim 16 in which the creations of the role objects are synchronized.

18. The method of claim 16 in which the role objects include replicated information about data items with which the data item associated with the role object has the relationship.

19. The method of claim 16 in which the role object includes a version number that is incremented each time the associated data item is updated.

20. The method of claim 19 also including sending messages among the role objects to keep replicated data and version number information current among the role objects.

21. The method of claim 19 in which role objects of relationships store version numbers of the other role objects with which they have relationships.

22. The method of claim 19 in which the role objects which have relationships store information about missing versions for the other role objects with which they have relationships.

23. The method of claim 16 also including assuring that, when a relationship is deleted, the deletion is correct notwithstanding multiple pending delete requests from different objects in the relationship.