Database Research Directions -- Four Position Papers: (1) Laguna Beach Report (2) Object Oriented Database Systems Manifesto (3) Third Generation Database System Manifesto (4) Database Systems Achievements and Opportunities

This compendium of papers profiles the views of senior database researchers as they debate what to do next, now that the relational model is well established. The papers are collected here as a public service, since there is no other easy way for readers to get them all. None has ever been published in a widely available journal. It is inappropriate for me to comment here on the papers. To summarize their overall message: • There is pride in the accomplishments of database research. It has made major contributions both to theory and practice. • There is unanimity that current database technology, although a great advance over the past, is inadequate for the demands of current and future business and scientific applications. Consequently, considerable research and experimentation is still needed. • Several research issues recur in each paper: (1) user interfaces and data display, (2) support for complex objects and for data types such as time, image, and geometry, (3) extensible database systems, (4) active databases (rules, constraints, procedures, and triggers), (5) parallel algorithms for dabase processing, (6) algorithms and techniques to store and process very large databases (petabytes), (7) techniques to access heterogeneous databases, and, (8) a generalized transaction model. Jim Gray, Tandem Computers Inc., September 1990. Future Directions in DBMS Research