A Data Model for Heterogeneous Data Sources

The information has been and still is a significant factor supporting decision making. In E-Business, distributed information needs to be integrated or inter operated to provide the unique view of information from disparate sources. The integration of data sources when the relevant databases have been designed dependently does not create heterogeneity problems. However, when databases have been designed independently, there are heterogeneity problems such as different terminology, data types, units of measurement, domains, scopes, and so on. Heterogeneous data integration requires a data model which is capable of describing data, schemas and contexts. This complexity suggests the need for a new data model having characteristics appropriate for supporting a mediated approach for the integration of databases and legacy systems. This paper presents the Mediated Data Model (MDM), a data model which is designed for describing data, schemas and contexts in the mediated approach for the integration of database and legacy systems. Its main feature is its ability to describe or represent heterogeneous data both schematically and semantically.