Modularity and Orthogonality in Object-Relational DBMS Design

Modern software design concepts ask for modularity, orthogonality and the use of small reactive components, often implemented in a scripting technology. In contrast, today‘s DBMS are fairly monolithic systems with little flexibility due to complex class hierarchies and strong typing. Here we present results from a prototype development which makes schemas and visualizations first class objects in the database, including meta-schema and meta-visualizations. Advantages, like openness and extensibility, as well as disadvantages, like added overhead and loss in performance, are addressed.