OLE DB: a component DBMS architecture

Abstract

The article describes an effort at Microsoft whose primary goal is to enable applications to have uniform access to data stored in diverse DBMS and non DBMS information containers. Applications continue to take advantage of the benefits of database technology such as declarative queries, transactional access, and security without having to transfer data from its place of origin to a DBMS. Our approach consists of defining an open, extensible collection of interfaces that factor and encapsulate orthogonal, independently reusable portions of DBMS functionality. These interfaces define the boundaries of DBMS components arch as record containers, and query processors that enable uniform, transactional access to data among such components. The proposed interfaces extend Microsoft's OLE Component Object Model (COM) with database functionality, hence these interfaces are collectively referred to as OLE DB. The OLE DB functional areas include data access and updates (rowsets), query processing, catalog information, notifications, transactions, security, and distribution. The article presents an overview of the OLE DB approach and its areas of componentization.