Performance Evaluation of Active Database Management

Systems Using the BEAST Benchmark

Andreas Geppert Mikael Berndtsson Daniel Lieuwen J?rgen Zimmermann University of Zurich1 University of Sk?vde Lucent Technologies/ University of Darmstadt Bell Labs Innovations
Email: [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected]

Technical Report 96.01
Department of Computer Science
University of Zurich
February 1996

Abstract
This paper presents the first comparative performance study of object-oriented active database management systems by using the BEAST benchmark. BEAST stresses the performance-critical components of active systems: event detection, event composition, rule retrieval, and rule firing. For event detection both method invocation events and transactional events are taken into account; this also shows some performance contributions of the passive part of an ADBMS. Four systems, namely ACOOD, Ode, REACH, and SAMOS, have passed the benchmark tests of BEAST. The interpretation of the performance measurements shows several achievements in the area of active database technology, but also indicates tradeoffs (e.g. between performance and functionality). Finally, it helps to identify possible optimizations and open issues in designing and implementing active database systems.

Keywords: active database systems, database benchmarks

1 Introduction

In recent years, active database management systems (ADBMSs) [e.g., 28, 6] have become a hot topic of database research, and restricted ADBMS-functionality is already offered by some commercial systems [e.g., 24, 25]. An ADBMS implements ?reactive behavior? since it is able to detect situations in the database and beyond and to perform corresponding actions specified by the user and/or DB-administrator. Applications using reactive behavior do not require ?polling? techniques in order to detect relevant situations. Additionally, an ADBMS covers more application semantics than a passive DBMS because the implementation of situation detection and subsequent reactions is migrated from the application programs into the ADBMS.

As for any system, ADBMSs should implement their functionality efficiently. Indeed, performance issues have recently been considered as one of the most important topics to be addressed to meet the requirements of applications and potential users [27]. Furthermore, performance aspects also play a crucial role from a system point of view:

1. Contact author?s address: Institut f?r Informatik, Universit?t Z?rich, Winterthurerstr. 190, CH-8057 Zurich, Switzerland. Fax: +41-1-363 0035