Combining Object-Oriented Application Development and Relational Database Technology

A lot of companies try to gain first experiences in object-oriented application development. Benefits of this approach are widely recognized today. To get full advantage out of this new paradigm an object-oriented database system (OODBS) for permanent storage of data would be highly desirable. Contrary to relational database systems, however, there are neither any accepted standards or guidelines for 'good' object-oriented database schemas nor for object-oriented data manipulation languages. Another problem is that OODBS are sold through rather small companies exposing a potential buyer to non neglectable risks of investment. We show how object-oriented application developement and state of the art relational database technology may be combined. For that purpose we present a compiler to generate relational database schemes from application programs that are written in C++. The compiler also produces necessary load and save methods. Altogether we believe that our approach is of practical significance since it combines the benefits of object-oriented application development with the advantages of relational database technology.