A repository is a shareddatabaseof information aboutengineeredartifacts.Wedefinea repository manager to be a databaseapplication that suPports checkout/checkin, version and configuration management,notification, context management,and workflow control. Since the main value of a repositoryis in thetoolsthatuse it, wediscusstechnicalissuesof integratingtools with repositories. We also discuss how to implement a repositorymanagerby layering it on a DBMS, focusing especially on issues of programming interface, performance, distribu- ,; tion,andinteroperability. 1 IntrGduction Metadata managementis a growing part of the database business, driven by many trends in information technology. For example, Business process re-engineering has gotten the attention of executivesof most large enterprises.This leadsto the developmentof large processmodelsand information models,which aremetadataandneedtobe Itunaged. Information technology departments are buying computer-aided software engineering (CASE...
Philip A. Bernstein, Umeshwar Dayal