OMS Connect: supporting multidatabase and mobile working through database connectivity

The authors present a general model of database connectivity for the controlled sharing and migration of information across databases as supported in the object-oriented database management system OMS Connect. A database may connect to one or more other databases, thereby enabling remote data to be viewed, processed and copied within the local database in such a way that consistency of the user working space can be maintained. Further the objects of the remote database may be extended locally with attributes and methods and additional classifications. Importantly, operation of the local database is not dependent on such a connection and remote objects may be replicated locally with explicit synchronisation points, thus making the system suitable for mobile computing.