Database sharing: an efficient mechanism for supporting concurrent processes

Abstract

The advent of transaction-oriented data processing systems has offered a number of new challenges to designers of database management systems. Requisites for efficient transaction processing include (1) a multiprogramming system oriented toward maximizing throughput subject to the response-time requirement of the interactive environment, and (2) an integrated database with centralized access control. An integrated database implies the elimination of redundant data processing. Such is necessary (though not sufficient) to achieve acceptable performance in transaction processing. The necessity of an efficient, responsive multiprogramming system is, of course, obvious. But efficiency in the transaction environment necessitates certain system provisions peculiar to the environment. One of these is the provision for the shared use of data. Time-sharing systems, while they generally provide for shared procedures, do not generally provide elaborate facilities for data sharing, since users typically do not require access to files other than their own. In the transaction environment, typified by a number of users operating on a single integrated database, elaborate provisions for database sharing are required.