Storage Solutions for Big Data Systems: A Qualitative Study and Comparison

Big data systems development is full of challenges in view of the variety of application areas and domains that this technology promises to serve. Typically, fundamental design decisions involved in big data systems design include choosing appropriate storage and computing infrastructures. In this age of heterogeneous systems that integrate different technologies for optimized solution to a specific real world problem, big data system are not an exception to any such rule. As far as the storage aspect of any big data system is concerned, the primary facet in this regard is a storage infrastructure and NoSQL seems to be the right technology that fulfills its requirements. However, every big data application has variable data characteristics and thus, the corresponding data fits into a different data model. This paper presents feature and use case analysis and comparison of the four main data models namely document oriented, key value, graph and wide column. Moreover, a feature analysis of 80 NoSQL solutions has been provided, elaborating on the criteria and points that a developer must consider while making a possible choice. Typically, big data storage needs to communicate with the execution engine and other processing and visualization technologies to create a comprehensive solution. This brings forth second facet of big data storage, big data file formats, into picture. The second half of the research paper compares the advantages, shortcomings and possible use cases of available big data file formats for Hadoop, which is the foundation for most big data computing technologies. Decentralized storage and blockchain are seen as the next generation of big data storage and its challenges and future prospects have also been discussed

A Syntactical Reverse Engineering Approach to Fourth Generation Programming Languages Using Formal Methods

Fourth-generation programming languages (4GLs) feature rapid development with minimum configuration required by developers. However, 4GLs can suffer from limitations such as high maintenance cost and legacy software practices. Reverse engineering an existing large legacy 4GL system into a currently maintainable programming language can be a cheaper and more effective solution than rewriting from scratch. Tools do not exist so far, for reverse engineering proprietary XML-like and model-driven 4GLs where the full language specification is not in the public domain. This research has developed a novel method of reverse engineering some of the syntax of such 4GLs (with Uniface as an exemplar) derived from a particular system, with a view to providing a reliable method to translate/transpile that system's code and data structures into a modern object-oriented language (such as C\#). The method was also applied, although only to a limited extent, to some other 4GLs, Informix and Apex, to show that it was in principle more broadly applicable. A novel testing method that the syntax had been successfully translated was provided using 'abstract syntax trees'. The novel method took manually crafted grammar rules, together with Encapsulated Document Object Model based data from the source language and then used parsers to produce syntactically valid and equivalent code in the target/output language. This proof of concept research has provided a methodology plus sample code to automate part of the process. The methodology comprised a set of manual or semi-automated steps. Further automation is left for future research. In principle, the author's method could be extended to allow the reverse engineering recovery of the syntax of systems developed in other proprietary 4GLs. This would reduce time and cost for the ongoing maintenance of such systems by enabling their software engineers to work using modern object-oriented languages, methodologies, tools and techniques

Designing object-oriented interfaces for medical data repositories

Thesis (S.B. and M.Eng.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, 1999.Includes bibliographical references (leaves 113-116).by Patrick J. McCormick.S.B.and M.Eng

‘Enhanced Encryption and Fine-Grained Authorization for Database Systems

The aim of this research is to enhance fine-grained authorization and encryption so that database systems are equipped with the controls necessary to help enterprises adhere to zero-trust security more effectively. For fine-grained authorization, this thesis has extended database systems with three new concepts: Row permissions, column masks and trusted contexts. Row permissions and column masks provide data-centric security so the security policy cannot be bypassed as with database views, for example. They also coexist in harmony with the rest of the database core tenets so that enterprises are not forced to compromise neither security nor database functionality. Trusted contexts provide applications in multitiered environments with a secure and controlled manner to propagate user identities to the database and therefore enable such applications to delegate the security policy to the database system where it is enforced more effectively. Trusted contexts also protect against application bypass so the application credentials cannot be abused to make database changes outside the scope of the application’s business logic. For encryption, this thesis has introduced a holistic database encryption solution to address the limitations of traditional database encryption methods. It too coexists in harmony with the rest of the database core tenets so that enterprises are not forced to choose between security and performance as with column encryption, for example. Lastly, row permissions, column masks, trusted contexts and holistic database encryption have all been implemented IBM DB2, where they are relied upon by thousands of organizations from around the world to protect critical data and adhere to zero-trust security more effectively

Recent Developments in Data Warehousing

Data warehousing is a strategic business and IT initiative in many organizations today. Data warehouses can be developed in two alternative ways -- the data mart and the enterprise-wide data warehouse strategies -- and each has advantages and disadvantages. To create a data warehouse, data must be extracted from source systems, transformed, and loaded to an appropriate data store. Depending on the business requirements, either relational or multidimensional database technology can be used for the data stores. To provide a multidimensional view of the data using a relational database, a star schema data model is used. Online analytical processing can be performed on both kinds of database technology. Metadata about the data in the warehouse is important for IT and end users. A variety of data access tools and applications can be used with a data warehouse - SQL queries, management reporting systems, managed query environments, DSS/EIS, enterprise intelligence portals, data mining, and customer relationship management. A data warehouse can be used to support a variety of users - executive, managers, analysts, operational personnel, customers, and suppliers. Data warehousing concepts are brought to life through a case study of Harrah\u27s Entertainment, a firm that became a leader in the gaming industry with its CRM business strategy supported by data warehousing

Compare and Contrast ERP: PeopleSoft vs Workday

Shared by the same founder David Duffield, two major enterprise resource planning (ERP) software systems, PeopleSoft and Workday are competing for keeping and increasing their share in the global market. Focusing on PeopleSoft and Workday, this research explores how they are both similar and different in regard to their functions, architecture, deployment and updates, new features, customization, user interface, training and reporting. Additionally, following the current trend of customers switching from PeopleSoft to Workday, some pros and cons of that have been identified and illustrated based on use cases. Finally, an outlook into the future is offered based on the author’s insight