Architecture of distributed data base systems

Research and development over the last twenty years has culminated in the widespread use of data base management system (DBMS) software. As usage has grown, the desire to link and integrate separate data bases has resulted in substantial effort being directed towards the design of distributed data base systems. This paper presents the major architectures which have emerged for distributed data base systems. The architectures are compared and evaluated. Sixteen distributed data base management system (DDBMS) projects have been surveyed and classified according to the architectures. The various projects represent widely differing stages of effort: academic research, industrial testbeds, and commercial prototypes. The survey reviews important features of the DDBMSs. It does not attempt a qualitative performance comparison. The focus is instead on identification of overall architectural characteristics. The usefulness of the survey lies in the summary information which it imparts on current research, and in the classification scheme for generic distributed data base architectures which it provides.