XML Data Storage

Joe Carroll Russell Gibbons

Agenda
What is XML Storage of XML Benefits of XML Databases Problems with XML Databases Discussion

What is XML
XML (Extensible Markup Language) is a W3C initiative that allows information and services to be encoded with meaningful structure and semantics that computers and humans can understand. XML is great for information exchange, and can easily be extended to include user-specified and industry-specified tags. www.orafaq.com/glossary/faqglosx.htm

Storage of XML
Character Relational (shredded) Native XML

Character
Storage options

Large character fields in DBMS Flat files .xml files

Fast insert & retrieval Poor search

Relational
Data still stored as character Portions of the data extracted into additional relational tables Increased parse time Increased search capabilities

Native XML
Exclusive XML DBMS

Sedna Timber
DB2 Oracle

Integrated XML DBMS

Native XML Benefits

XML messages stored in their original format Documents can be transformed straight from the database via XPath or XSLT. Increased search capabilities for documents that must be stored as XML.

Native XML Problems

Same problems as hierarchical databases

Many-to-many relationships Referential Integrity

Difficult to handle within legacy applications. Increased CPU consumption.

Discussion

References
[1] Shalaka Natu, John Mendonca, Digital Asset Management Using A Native XML Database Implementation, CITC4 03, October 16-18, 2003, Lafayette, Indiana, USA. [2] Matthias Nicola, Jasmi John, XML Parsing: A Threat to Database Performance, CIKM 03, November 3-8, 2003, New Orleans, Louisiana, USA. [3] Mattias Nicola, Bert van der Linden, Native XML Support in DB2 Universal Database, Proceedings of the 31st VLDB Conference, Trondheim, Norway, 2005. [4] Native XML data store overview, http://publib.boulder.ibm.com/infocenter/db2luw/v9/topic/com.ibm.db 2.udb.apdv.embed.doc/doc/c0022308.htm [5] Use XML databases to empower Java Web services, http://www.javaworld.com/javaworld/jw-12-2004/jw-1206-xml.html