DBMS and Server Architectures

This chapter illustrates architectural options for servers. It emphasizes on architecture of database management systems (DBMS) and of selected parallel databases. The chapter explores the applications characteristics and the option of architecture with respect to scalability. DBMS has a privileged relationship with data storage that is divided into two areas: data management and the caching of data. Three major classes of architecture in the area of system disk interconnect include: share everything, share nothing, and shared disks architecture approach. These three models reflect different perspectives on load balancing and data sharing. Each of the models has their own benefits and their usage depends upon the specific requirement. Both shared disks and share nothing architectures depend on the node-disk interconnect and the operating system (OS) and certain operating systems do not support the concept of shared disks. However, if the OS imposes an undesired model, it is possible to layer the desired architecture on top by partitioning (converting shared disks to share nothing) or converting share nothing to shared disks with the help of Remote I/O.