JPH02166560A - Object control method - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To improve the operability of an object by defining a class object which uses an instance as a class at production of an instance object (instance) of the class object (class) and setting a general-purpose hierarchical link between class objects. CONSTITUTION:Each instance of a class object is automatically defined as a class object. A link is automatically set between the defined class and an original class. At the same time, the propriety of the link is inquired to a class definer and therefore the link definition can be corrected. Then the instance object groups of the class object are sorted into categories, and the class object can be defined based on the sorting result. In this case, the instance group which is not coincident with a designated category can be automatically defined as a dummy class object. Thus the object operating load is reduced for the definer of the class objects and the object operability is improved.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION [Field of Industrial Application] The present invention relates to an object-oriented database management system, and particularly to an object management method suitable for managing classes and instances.

[Conventional technology]

Research and development of object-oriented database management systems is actively underway. These are discussed in, for example, the literature ``Journal of the Information Processing Society of Japan VoQ, 28. & 6 (1987) J.

[Problem to be solved by the invention]

The conventional method described above requires defining each necessary class and the links between classes in advance, which poses a problem in the operability of class objects.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION An object of the present invention is to simplify object operations, improve their operability, and reduce the management and operation loads of class/object definers.

[Means to solve the problem]

The above purpose is to provide a class definition means that automatically defines each instance of a class object as a class object, and an interclass link definition means that automatically sets the relationship between the class defined above and the original class. and,
Inquire about the validity of this link definition to the class/object definer, and specify at this time the means to modify the above link definition, the means to categorize the instances/objects of the class object, and the means to define the class object based on that. This is achieved by automatically defining instances that do not match the specified categories as dummy class objects.

[Effect]

Automatically define each instance of a class object as a class object. Automatically establish a link between the class defined in this way and the original class.

Also, ask the class definer about the validity of this link,
The above link definition can be modified. Furthermore, the instances and objects of the class object are classified into categories.

A class object can be defined based on this, and instances that do not match the specified category are treated as dummy objects.
Can be automatically defined as a class object.

The above method reduces the object operation load on the class object definer.

〔Example〕

An embodiment of the present invention will be described below with reference to FIGS. 1 to 10.

(1) Configuration of Embodiment FIG. 10 shows the overall configuration of an embodiment to which the present invention is applied. FIG. 10 shows a schematic configuration of a multimedia DBMS (database management system) and a computer system including the multimedia DBMS. In particular, the multimedia DBMS 206 includes a system control unit 207, a processing request analysis optimization processing unit 2
08. Object management section 209. It consists of a media-oriented data operation execution processing section 210.

The present invention relates to an object management method in the object management section 209 in this.

(2) The behavior class object definition process of the embodiment will be explained using FIGS. 1 to 3 and FIG. 7.

(i) First, a class object is defined using a class object definition command (100).

Assume that the region class object in FIG. 1 has been defined.

(ii) Create an instance object of the above class object (101).

It is assumed that prefecture objects, municipal objects, river basins, etc. in FIG. 1 have been created.

(iii) Check whether class objectization is specified for the above instance object creation (102).

(tv) If class objectization is specified, class object definition is automatically performed (103).

The system automatically defines prefecture class objects, municipality class objects, river basin class objects, etc. in FIG. 1.

(v) 1 which is an emulsifying hierarchical link between the original class object and the automatically defined class object;
A sa or ako (a-kind-of) link is automatically set (104).

Is-a links are automatically set between the prefecture class and the region class, the municipality class and the region class, and the river basin class and the region class in FIG. 2, respectively.

(vt) An older link is automatically set between the automatically defined classes and objects (105).

An older link is set between the prefecture class and the municipality class, the municipality class and the river basin class, and the prefecture class and the river basin class in FIG. 2, respectively.

(vfi) Inquires of the class/object definer about the semantics of the link between the class/objects for which the older link has been set (106).

(Width) Modify the older link based on the instructions of the class object definer (107).

A part-of link aggregation hierarchical link) is set for the prefecture class object, the municipality class object, the municipality class object, the river basin class object, etc. in FIG.

Next, the class and instance object creation process will be explained using FIGS. 4 to 6, and FIGS. 8 and 9.

(i) Define a class object (102)
.

Assume that the region class object shown in FIG. 4 has been defined.

(n) Create an instance object of the above class (109).

Assume that each instance in FIG. 4 has been created.

(in) Category classification is performed on the above instance group (110).

The prefecture category and municipality category in FIG. 4 are set, and instances that do not fall under these categories are classified as dummy categories.

(iv) Define a class object corresponding to the above category classification (112).

The prefecture class, municipality class, and dummy class in FIG. 5 are defined.

(v) Automatically generate an emulsified hierarchical link (is-a link) between the class object and the original class object (113).

In Figure 5, there is an i between the prefecture class and region class, the municipality class and region class, and the dummy class and region class
Automatically create s-a links.

(vi) Create a group of instances of the original class object as instances of the class object defined by category classification (114).

Instances of the prefecture class, municipality class, and dummy class in FIG. 5 are moved from the region class and set.

(vti) Next, an instance of the original class object is generated according to the category classification (115).

Prefecture objects, city/town/village objects, dummy objects, etc. are generated as instances of the region class in FIG. 5.

(vii) Repeat the above process as many times as necessary (116)
.

The dummy classes, etc. in FIG. 6 are reorganized. In other words, the dummy class in Figure 5 is divided into the river basin class and the dummy class.
Reorganize into a class and perform the above steps.

The object management method described above improves the operability of object definitions, etc., and reduces the operational load.

〔Effect of the invention〕

According to the present invention, an emulsification hierarchy of class objects can be automatically defined, relationships between other classes and creation and management of instances are simplified, and operational management loads such as object definitions are reduced.

This has the effect of improving object operability.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

1 to 6 are explanatory diagrams showing object configuration examples, FIGS. 7, 8, and 9 are object definition flowcharts of an embodiment of the present invention, and FIG. 10 is an illustration of an embodiment of the present invention. FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing the system configuration. 202... Computer system, 206... Multimedia DBMS, 209... Object management section. Agent Patent Attorney Katsuma Ogawa/'-ゝ゛・(- [Instance 1 Figure 7

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. In an object-oriented database management system, when an instance object (hereinafter sometimes abbreviated as an instance) of a class object (hereinafter sometimes abbreviated as a class) is created, the instance is An object characterized by automatically defining a class object as a class, and automatically setting a generalized hierarchical link (is-a link) between the class object and the automatically defined class object. Management method. 2. The object management method according to claim 1, characterized in that a definition link is automatically set between the defined classes and objects to indicate that they are similar in meaning. 3. The object management method according to claim 1, further comprising inquiring a class/object definer about the automatically set definition link and prompting the definer to set link information intended by the definer. 4. The object management method according to claim 1, further comprising categorizing instances of class objects and defining new classes based on the classification. 5. The object management method according to claim 4, characterized in that a class is defined for a group of instances that do not fall under the category classification as instances of a dummy class object. 6. The object management method according to claim 5, characterized in that a generalized hierarchical link is automatically set between a class defined by classifying instances into categories and the original class. 7. The object management method according to claim 5, characterized in that an instance of the original class object is set as an instance of each class object defined by categorization. 8. The object management method according to claim 5, characterized in that the instances of the dummy class object are categorized and a new class is defined based on this.