Translating Relational Database Schemas into Object-based Schemas: University Case Study

In this paper, we present a solution for translating an existing relational database (RDB) schema with recent patents into relatively newer database (i.e., object-oriented and object-relational database) schemas, based on available standards. The solution is more beneficial compared to the existing approaches as it generates two different and equivalent target schemas based on the user choice. The main aim of the proposed method is to enrich the source RDB semantically with metadata information, which may have not been obviously represented in it. An enriched common data model is then produced, which preserves all necessary characteristics of target models to be mapped into any of the target schemas. A prototype has been designed in order to translate RDBs into target schemas realizing the concepts and algorithms of the approach. An experiment has been conducted, results of which have been very encouraging, and validating the feasibility, efficiency and correctness of the proposed solution.