Clustering techniques in object bases: A survey

Abstract

It is widely acknowledged that clustering is a cornerstone for the performance of database management systems. In particular, object-oriented databases have special properties which make clustering even more important for them than for conventional database models. In this paper, a survey is presented for the state of the art in the field of clustering in object bases. Several design dimensions are discussed and used as a basis for comparing different systems. Moreover, a set of selection guidelines and evaluation criteria are proposed and finally, open questions and future research directions are outlined.