WO1996007147A1 - X.500 system and methods - Google Patents

X.500 system and methods Download PDF

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Publication number
WO1996007147A1
WO1996007147A1 PCT/AU1995/000560 AU9500560W WO9607147A1 WO 1996007147 A1 WO1996007147 A1 WO 1996007147A1 AU 9500560 W AU9500560 W AU 9500560W WO 9607147 A1 WO9607147 A1 WO 9607147A1
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WIPO (PCT)
Prior art keywords
eid
entry
database
search
data
Prior art date
Application number
PCT/AU1995/000560
Other languages
French (fr)
Inventor
Richard Hans Harvey
Original Assignee
Datacraft Technologies Pty. Ltd.
Priority date (The priority date is an assumption and is not a legal conclusion. Google has not performed a legal analysis and makes no representation as to the accuracy of the date listed.)
Filing date
Publication date
Priority claimed from AUPM7842A external-priority patent/AUPM784294A0/en
Priority claimed from AUPM9586A external-priority patent/AUPM958694A0/en
Application filed by Datacraft Technologies Pty. Ltd. filed Critical Datacraft Technologies Pty. Ltd.
Priority to JP8508362A priority Critical patent/JPH10505690A/en
Priority to US08/793,575 priority patent/US6052681A/en
Priority to EP95930331A priority patent/EP0777883B1/en
Priority to DE69530595T priority patent/DE69530595T2/en
Priority to AT95930331T priority patent/ATE239257T1/en
Priority to AU33760/95A priority patent/AU712451B2/en
Publication of WO1996007147A1 publication Critical patent/WO1996007147A1/en
Priority to US09/827,738 priority patent/US8065338B2/en

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Classifications

    • H—ELECTRICITY
    • H04—ELECTRIC COMMUNICATION TECHNIQUE
    • H04L—TRANSMISSION OF DIGITAL INFORMATION, e.g. TELEGRAPHIC COMMUNICATION
    • H04L61/00—Network arrangements, protocols or services for addressing or naming
    • H04L61/45—Network directories; Name-to-address mapping
    • H04L61/4552—Lookup mechanisms between a plurality of directories; Synchronisation of directories, e.g. metadirectories
    • G—PHYSICS
    • G06—COMPUTING; CALCULATING OR COUNTING
    • G06F—ELECTRIC DIGITAL DATA PROCESSING
    • G06F16/00—Information retrieval; Database structures therefor; File system structures therefor
    • G06F16/20—Information retrieval; Database structures therefor; File system structures therefor of structured data, e.g. relational data
    • G06F16/28—Databases characterised by their database models, e.g. relational or object models
    • G06F16/284—Relational databases
    • G—PHYSICS
    • G06—COMPUTING; CALCULATING OR COUNTING
    • G06F—ELECTRIC DIGITAL DATA PROCESSING
    • G06F16/00—Information retrieval; Database structures therefor; File system structures therefor
    • G06F16/20—Information retrieval; Database structures therefor; File system structures therefor of structured data, e.g. relational data
    • G06F16/28—Databases characterised by their database models, e.g. relational or object models
    • G06F16/284—Relational databases
    • G06F16/288—Entity relationship models
    • G—PHYSICS
    • G06—COMPUTING; CALCULATING OR COUNTING
    • G06F—ELECTRIC DIGITAL DATA PROCESSING
    • G06F16/00—Information retrieval; Database structures therefor; File system structures therefor
    • G06F16/20—Information retrieval; Database structures therefor; File system structures therefor of structured data, e.g. relational data
    • G06F16/28—Databases characterised by their database models, e.g. relational or object models
    • G06F16/289—Object oriented databases
    • H—ELECTRICITY
    • H04—ELECTRIC COMMUNICATION TECHNIQUE
    • H04L—TRANSMISSION OF DIGITAL INFORMATION, e.g. TELEGRAPHIC COMMUNICATION
    • H04L61/00—Network arrangements, protocols or services for addressing or naming
    • H04L61/45—Network directories; Name-to-address mapping
    • H04L61/4505—Network directories; Name-to-address mapping using standardised directories; using standardised directory access protocols
    • H04L61/4517—Network directories; Name-to-address mapping using standardised directories; using standardised directory access protocols using open systems interconnection [OSI] directories, e.g. X.500
    • H—ELECTRICITY
    • H04—ELECTRIC COMMUNICATION TECHNIQUE
    • H04L—TRANSMISSION OF DIGITAL INFORMATION, e.g. TELEGRAPHIC COMMUNICATION
    • H04L61/00—Network arrangements, protocols or services for addressing or naming
    • H04L61/45—Network directories; Name-to-address mapping
    • H04L61/4505—Network directories; Name-to-address mapping using standardised directories; using standardised directory access protocols
    • H04L61/4523—Network directories; Name-to-address mapping using standardised directories; using standardised directory access protocols using lightweight directory access protocol [LDAP]
    • Y—GENERAL TAGGING OF NEW TECHNOLOGICAL DEVELOPMENTS; GENERAL TAGGING OF CROSS-SECTIONAL TECHNOLOGIES SPANNING OVER SEVERAL SECTIONS OF THE IPC; TECHNICAL SUBJECTS COVERED BY FORMER USPC CROSS-REFERENCE ART COLLECTIONS [XRACs] AND DIGESTS
    • Y10—TECHNICAL SUBJECTS COVERED BY FORMER USPC
    • Y10S—TECHNICAL SUBJECTS COVERED BY FORMER USPC CROSS-REFERENCE ART COLLECTIONS [XRACs] AND DIGESTS
    • Y10S707/00—Data processing: database and file management or data structures
    • Y10S707/99931—Database or file accessing
    • Y—GENERAL TAGGING OF NEW TECHNOLOGICAL DEVELOPMENTS; GENERAL TAGGING OF CROSS-SECTIONAL TECHNOLOGIES SPANNING OVER SEVERAL SECTIONS OF THE IPC; TECHNICAL SUBJECTS COVERED BY FORMER USPC CROSS-REFERENCE ART COLLECTIONS [XRACs] AND DIGESTS
    • Y10—TECHNICAL SUBJECTS COVERED BY FORMER USPC
    • Y10S—TECHNICAL SUBJECTS COVERED BY FORMER USPC CROSS-REFERENCE ART COLLECTIONS [XRACs] AND DIGESTS
    • Y10S707/00—Data processing: database and file management or data structures
    • Y10S707/99931—Database or file accessing
    • Y10S707/99933—Query processing, i.e. searching
    • Y—GENERAL TAGGING OF NEW TECHNOLOGICAL DEVELOPMENTS; GENERAL TAGGING OF CROSS-SECTIONAL TECHNOLOGIES SPANNING OVER SEVERAL SECTIONS OF THE IPC; TECHNICAL SUBJECTS COVERED BY FORMER USPC CROSS-REFERENCE ART COLLECTIONS [XRACs] AND DIGESTS
    • Y10—TECHNICAL SUBJECTS COVERED BY FORMER USPC
    • Y10S—TECHNICAL SUBJECTS COVERED BY FORMER USPC CROSS-REFERENCE ART COLLECTIONS [XRACs] AND DIGESTS
    • Y10S707/00—Data processing: database and file management or data structures
    • Y10S707/99931—Database or file accessing
    • Y10S707/99933—Query processing, i.e. searching
    • Y10S707/99934—Query formulation, input preparation, or translation
    • Y—GENERAL TAGGING OF NEW TECHNOLOGICAL DEVELOPMENTS; GENERAL TAGGING OF CROSS-SECTIONAL TECHNOLOGIES SPANNING OVER SEVERAL SECTIONS OF THE IPC; TECHNICAL SUBJECTS COVERED BY FORMER USPC CROSS-REFERENCE ART COLLECTIONS [XRACs] AND DIGESTS
    • Y10—TECHNICAL SUBJECTS COVERED BY FORMER USPC
    • Y10S—TECHNICAL SUBJECTS COVERED BY FORMER USPC CROSS-REFERENCE ART COLLECTIONS [XRACs] AND DIGESTS
    • Y10S707/00—Data processing: database and file management or data structures
    • Y10S707/99941—Database schema or data structure
    • Y10S707/99942—Manipulating data structure, e.g. compression, compaction, compilation
    • Y—GENERAL TAGGING OF NEW TECHNOLOGICAL DEVELOPMENTS; GENERAL TAGGING OF CROSS-SECTIONAL TECHNOLOGIES SPANNING OVER SEVERAL SECTIONS OF THE IPC; TECHNICAL SUBJECTS COVERED BY FORMER USPC CROSS-REFERENCE ART COLLECTIONS [XRACs] AND DIGESTS
    • Y10—TECHNICAL SUBJECTS COVERED BY FORMER USPC
    • Y10S—TECHNICAL SUBJECTS COVERED BY FORMER USPC CROSS-REFERENCE ART COLLECTIONS [XRACs] AND DIGESTS
    • Y10S707/00—Data processing: database and file management or data structures
    • Y10S707/99951—File or database maintenance
    • Y10S707/99952—Coherency, e.g. same view to multiple users
    • Y10S707/99954—Version management

Definitions

  • the present invention is directed to application of X.500 to a relational database, a database design and use of the database to perform X.500 services. Particularly, the present invention is directed to implementation using a RDBMS (Relational Database Management System). The present invention is also directed to table structure and methods of operation of a database application.
  • PRIOR ART X.500 is the International Standard for Electronic Directories [CCITT89].
  • X.500 is applicable to information systems where the data is fairly static (e.g. telephone directory) but may need to be distributed (e.g. across organisations or countries), extensible (e.g. store names, addresses, job titles, devices etc.), object oriented (i.e. to enforce rules on the data) and/or accessed remotely.
  • Relational Database Management System
  • RDBMS RDBMS
  • RDBMS data integrity, consistency, concurrency, indexing mechanisms, query optimisation, recovery, roll-back, security. They also provide many tools for performance tuning, import/export, backup, auditing and application development.
  • RDBMS are the preferred choice of most large scale managers of data. They are readily available and known to be reliable and contain many useful management tools. There is a large base of RDBMS installations and therefore a large amount of existing expertise and investment in people and procedures to run these systems, and so data managers are looking to use this when acquiring new systems.
  • Most relational database products support the industry standard SQL (Structured Query Language).
  • SQL Structured Query Language
  • Object Oriented systems which provide data extensibility and the ability to handle arbitrarily complex data items.
  • X.500 and it's associated standards provide a framework and a degree of functionality that enables this to be achieved. The fact that X.500 is an international standard means that data connectivity can be achieved across corporations and between different countries.
  • the problem is to address the need of data managers and implement X.500 with all the flexibility of object-oriented systems but using an SQL product so that it can achieve the scalability and performance inherent in relational systems coupled with the stability, robustness, portability and cost- effectiveness of current SQL products.
  • Figure 1 shows an abstract from the "GOSIPNews" issue No. 4, dated April 1994 (Source: “Interoperability Products” distributed in Australia by the Centre for Open Systems) and which lists X.500 products currently available. None of these products use a SQL database as an underlying data store, and none of these products therefore address successfully the market need of implementing X.500 using an SQL RDBMS.
  • An object of the present inventions is to address the problem of implementing X.500 in a RDBMS which supports SQL or any other relational language.
  • the present application seeks to disclose a number of inventions related to the implementation of X.500 standards in a RDBMS which supports SQL or any other relational language.
  • the scope of the present invention is outlined in this specification, including the claims.
  • SQL is the most popular relational language and although it is only one form of relational language, the intent of the present invention is to have application to any other form of relational language, not just SQL.
  • the X.500 standard in no way dictates how the directory is to be implemented, only its capabilities and behaviour.
  • One key to solving the implementation problem is the realization that X.500 defines a fixed set of services (e.g. Add, Modify, Search etc.) that can operate on arbitrary data.
  • problems associated with the prior art may be alleviated by a unique approach, by what may be described as inverting relational theory modelling from a data modelling approach to a service modelling approach. That is, from the problem of: processing arbitrary queries on a fixed set of data to the present approach of processing arbitrary data using a fixed set of queries/services.
  • Each service is modelled (instead of each data type) and the relationships between each service defined (instead of the relationships between each data type).
  • X.500 services enables benefits of RDBMS to be exploited.
  • Kanji Kanji which may have various collating sequences. Single, double or other byte character sets may also be supported.
  • X.500 requirements and functionality and functionality and SQL.
  • the X.500 standard has a particular structure by nature, whereas SQL is designed to operate on relational structured tables.
  • tables will consist of a number of columns and each column contains data relating to a particular data type (see Table B1 ).
  • the different data types that can be stored is limited to the columns of the table.
  • the data types are also limited to the types supported by the database (e.g. string, numeric, money, date).
  • the database may also store data of a form not understood by the database per se, but understood by the application e.g. binary data.
  • Table B1 Employee Table If a new data type needs to be added (e.g. mobile) then a new column will have to be added to the table. This can cause problems if data table changes are not easy to implement. Also if the new data type is not well used (e.g. less than 1% of the organisation) then significant redundant data storage may result. See Table B2.
  • one invention in the application of X.500 resides in overcoming the extensibility by representing the X.500 attributes of the prior art: empl # name age salary as described above, as type syntax value, the latter representation being an extensible representation and is thus adapted to implementation with SQL.
  • the latter representation is known as meta-data.
  • the meta-data "value" may be binary.
  • the prior art has had difficulty in implementing X.500 as it has not been structured for extensibility, object oriented and hierarchy which are requirements of X.500.
  • the conceptual design resides in providing at least one of: 1. Attribute table, where extensibility is addressed by allowing the definition of a new attribute type in this table by adding a row to the table;
  • Hierarchy table which defines the relationship between the objects.
  • Yet further inventions reside in addressing problems of data tolerance by providing in the present X.500 system for the replacement of the 'value' column of the object table with value 'norm' and value 'raw' columns and/or replacing the RDN column in the hierarchy table with 'name norm' and 'name raw' columns.
  • the difficulty in prior art of accommodating aliases is addressed in the present X.500 system by providing an 'alias' column in the hierarchy table.
  • the 'alias' column is flagged to indicate that, that entry is an alias.
  • A-EID provides information about where the alias points.
  • Still further refinement may be provided by replacing the 'parent' column in the hierarchy table with 'parent' and 'path' columns.
  • the 'path' addresses the problem of implementing X.500 search, with aliases and subtrees.
  • the 'path' has at least two unique properties: a) to determine the absolute position in the hierarchy; and b) it is used to determine if an entry is in a given subtree by its prefix. 1 CONOFPTUAI METHOD
  • a number of unique methods of interrogating the conceptual design are disclosed in the detailed description following, including: a) mapping the X.500 services into a sequence of SQL statements; b) the search strategy is to apply the filter over the search area using the path or parent columns, and/or; c) in dealing with aliases during navigation - where an alias points is cached in the A.EID column; d) in dealing with alias during search - find the unique set of base objects which define areas of the tree that need to be searched, and then apply b) above to each area of the tree.
  • a further invention is realized by using the attribute table for incoming data to find the AID from the X.500 object ID and outgoing data read from the database, vice versa.
  • filter and subtree searches can be provided by a single pass resolution and using the path column.
  • One invention is to utilize a 'path' field to simultaneously apply an arbitrary filter over an arbitrary subtree.
  • the complications of aliases is handled by applying the above method to a uniquely resolved subtree.
  • the logical design is based on a service decomposition of the conceptual design, though the realization that X.500 service components are independent.
  • the advantages accruing from this include:
  • Management - smaller tables are easier to manage, e.g. faster to update indexes, collect statistics, audit, backup, etc.
  • Reduced I/O - speed improvements due to smaller rows means more rows per page and thus operations perform less l/O's.
  • one method resides in caching the attribute table.
  • no SQL statements are issued to the database.
  • conversions are performed in memory. This provides a substantial speed advantage.
  • search results the present system utilizes set orientation queries of SQL to avoid 'row at a time' processing.
  • search results may be assembled in parallel in memory.
  • New tables and new columns are introduced to overcome column width and key size restrictions and to achieve space optimisations.
  • the principle design addresses the basic problem of representing the extensible, object oriented and hierarchical nature of X.500 in relational tables.
  • the principle table design can be represented by a single table as shown in Table 1 below.
  • object parent type syntax value name name name name
  • tables will consist of a number of columns and each column contains data relating to a particular data type (see Table 1.1a).
  • the table is self descriptive, i.e. the relations between data items is implied by being on the same row (this is the basis of relational theory). name surname title phone
  • the table will be sparse (e.g. if a given person does not have a mobile then that row/column entry will be NULL).
  • the data types are limited to the types supported by the database (e.g. string, numeric, money, date, etc.).
  • the solution is to treat the data types as generic.
  • the present invention adopts the method of representing arbitrary attributes (e.g. XOM [X/OPEN Object Management] API [Application Programming Interface]) as a type, syntax, value combination (see Table 1.1c) type syntax value
  • Object Oriented X.500 defines objects (e.g. people, organizations, etc.) which may contain an arbitrary number of "attributes”. Since many objects must appear in the table a mechanism is required to distinguish each object. An "object name” column is added to the table for this purpose (see Table 1.2a). object name type syntax value
  • a method of representing hierarchical systems is to use a parent/child combination (see Table 1.3a) parent child car engine car fuel system
  • X.500 defines its objects to be hierarchical.
  • the relationships between objects follow a tree structure where each object has a parent object and each parent can have zero or more children. This relationship can be represented in a general PROPERTY table by the addition of a "parent name" column, which is used to store the name of the parent object (see Table 1.3b).
  • object name parent name type syntax value
  • Section 1 it was shown that a single Property Table could represent the extensible, object oriented and hierarchical nature of X.500 (see Table 2a).
  • object parent type syntax value name name name
  • Table 2a - Property Table With reference to Figure 2A in this section it will be shown that full X.500 functionality can be represented by using three tables as shown below (see Table 2b and Figure 2A). Hierarchy Table
  • the Property Table ( Figure 2A) can be decomposed into separate tables that reflect the hierarchical, object oriented and extensible nature of X.500, preferably as follows; a Hierarchy Table which defines the structural relationship between objects. an Object Table which defines the attribute values within each object, an Attribute Table which defines the different attribute types. These tables result from a process called functional decomposition. To address the problem of correlating the relationships between tables, arbitrary numeric identifiers are introduced.
  • the EID or "entry identifier” correlates each object with its hierarchy information.
  • the AID or "attribute identifier” correlates each value in the object table with its attribute information.
  • the design is considered very efficient because the repeating groups in the Property table (type-syntax and object name-parent name) have been removed. Also, for SQL, the joining columns are simple integers.
  • X.500 attributes have a protocol identifier which is transferred when any data is communicated between end systems. These identifiers are internationally defined and are called OBJECT IDENTIFIERS (e.g. 2.5.4.4 means a surname string). Thus an "Objectld" column can be added to the Attribute table so that conversions between X.500 object identifiers and the internal attribute identifiers can be performed.
  • X.500 allows an attribute to have an arbitrary number of values (e.g. the mobile phone could be treated just as a second telephone number).
  • a "value identifier" or VID is introduced to identify values within an attribute in the Object Table.
  • the Distinguished Values combine to form a Relative Distinguished Name (RDN) which names the entry.
  • RDN Relative Distinguished Name
  • the "Name" column in the Hierarchy table stores the RDN. This is an optimization that negates the need for the RDN to be constructed from the distinguished values in the Object table.
  • An entry is uniquely named by a Distinguished Name (DN) which consists of all the RDN's of the of its ancestors down from the root and the RDN of the object itself.
  • DN Distinguished Name
  • An innovation is to add a "path" column to the Hierarchy table which defines the absolute position of the entry in the tree as a list of EID's. The path has three important properties;
  • X.500 also has the concept of 'aliases'.
  • An alias object effectively points to another entry and thus provides an alternate name for that entry. Thus an "alias" flag is added to the Hierarchy Table.
  • the alias value must be read from the Object Table. This alias DN must be resolved to where the alias points before Navigation of the original entry can continue.
  • An innovation is to use an "aliased EID" column or A_EID to store "where" the alias "points to”. This removes the need to repeatedly navigate through an alias.
  • Every X.500 attribute has a (internationally defined) syntax.
  • X.500 attribute syntaxes define how each attribute should be treated. In all string syntaxes (e.g. Printable, Numeric etc.) superfluous spaces should be ignored. In some syntaxes the case is not important (e.g. Case Ignore String and Case Ignore List) and so the names "Chris Masters", “Chris MASTERS” and " ChRis MaSTeRS " are considered identical.
  • the syntax rules can be applied to create a normalized form (e.g. "CHRIS MASTERS"). If this normalized form is stored in the database, then any variations in input form are effectively removed, and exact matching can be used (which is necessary when using SQL).
  • a normalized form e.g. "CHRIS MASTERS”
  • Both the normalized data and "raw” data are stored in the database.
  • the "raw” data is necessary so that users can retrieve the data in exactly the same format as it was originally input.
  • the "Name” column in the Hierarchy Table becomes the “NameRaw” and a “NameNorm” column is added.
  • the "Value” column in the Object Table becomes the “ValueRaw” and a “ValueNorm” column is added.
  • Each name in the diagram represents an object entry in the database.
  • the triangle represents an alias entry, and the dotted line represents the connection between the alias entry and the object that it points to.
  • the numbers next to each entry are the entry EID's.
  • entry “1" has an RDN with a value of "Datacraft”
  • entry “11” has an RDN with a value of "Sales”
  • entry “20” has an RDN with a value of "Network Products”
  • entry “31” has an RDN with a value of "Alana Morgan”.
  • the DN of entry “31” is made up of a sequence of RDN's, namely, ""Datacraft”, “Sales”, “Network Products”, “Alana Morgan”.
  • the alias entry "Datacraft/Networks” points to the entry "Datacraft”, “Sales”, “Network Products”.
  • the navigate process would find the alias entry, then find the DN of the object pointed to by the alias and then navigate from the root to the object entry returning an EID of "20" and a path of "1.11.20.”.
  • Table 3b Entry Tree Listed below are sample tables which show how data is stored. The
  • Hierarchy table (Table 3c) shows how the entries for the example hierarchy are stored.
  • the Attribute table (Table 3e) shows attributes which are contained in the entry "Datacraft/Sales/Network Products/Chris Masters”.
  • the Object table (Table 3d) shows how the values of these attributes are stored.
  • Table 3c Sample Hierarchy Table
  • Any data supplied by an X.500 service is supplied as a list of Objectld's and their associated values. These must be converted into AID'S (using the Attribute table) and normalized values (using the Object table) for use by the X.500 application.
  • the database returns data as AID'S and Raw Values, which must then be converted into Objectld's and their associated values in the X.500 result.
  • Each X.500 service supplies a Distinguished Name which is converted into an EID for use by the X.500 application.
  • the application processes a service it returns one or more EID's. These EID's can then be translated back into Distinguished Names in the X.500 result.
  • All X.500 services rely on navigating the directory tree. To navigate to a particular entry, the following procedure is performed: • Given the DN for the entry, locate the entry in the hierarchy table which has an RDN equal to the first RDN in the DN.
  • Selected attributes to be read can be supplied. Only the values of these attributes (if they are present in the entry) will be returned.
  • 'Types only' can be selected as a read option, in which case no values will be returned. All types present in the entry, or those selected, will be returned.
  • Compare returns a 'matched' or 'not matched' result.
  • a raw value is input but the compare is performed using the normalized value. Navigate to the required entry.
  • Navigate to the required parent entry Store the EID of the parent. Add a new EID to the Hierarchy table and add rows to the Object table for each value in the new entry.
  • the search service allows an arbitrary complex filter to be applied over a portion of the Directory Information Tree (the search area).
  • the Search area is the part of the tree that is covered by the scope of the search (base-object-only, one-level or whole-subtree).
  • One technique for resolving searches is to apply the filter and then to see if any matching entries are in the search area.
  • a filter is applied to the entire tree and EID's for all rows matching the filter are returned.
  • step search up through the hierarchy to see if the entry is a subordinate of the base object (i.e. the entry has a parent/grandparent/... that is the base object). If the number of matches is large and the subtree small this is very inefficient.
  • This technique doesn't cope with aliases as an alias is not a parent of the object that it points to and many aliases may point to a single object.
  • a second strategy is to obtain a list of all EID's in the search area and then apply the filter to these EID's. If an alias is resolved that points outside of the original search area then the subtree pointed to by the alias is expanded and the EID's in that subtree are added to the list. The filter is then applied to the set of expanded EID's. This is very poor if the search area is large.
  • An innovation is to simultaneously apply the filter over the search area (instead of sequentially as in the two methods described above). This is called single pass resolution. This method is considered to provide considerable performance improvement over the above methods because the rows that are retrieved are those that satisfy both the filter and scope requirements of the search.
  • the path When performing a subtree search the path is used to expand the search area.
  • the "path" of each entry is a string of numbers (e.g. "1.10.50.222.” which indicates that entry 222 has a parent of 50, a grandparent of 10 and a great grandparent of 1 ).
  • the path has the unique property that the path of an entry is a prefix of the path of all entries that are subordinate to the entry. That is the path of an entry forms the prefix of the paths of all entries in the subtree below the entry.
  • Base Object Search Navigate to the base object.
  • a filter criteria eg, telephone prefix - "727”.
  • the alias When an alias is discovered during navigation the alias must be resolved. That is, the object that the alias points to must be obtained.
  • the A_EID column of the Hierarchy table If the A_EID is 0 then the object that the alias points to must be obtained from the Object table and this object must then be navigated to and the resultant EID stored in the A_EID column. If this is done successfully then the remainder of the path can be navigated.
  • the EID of the aliased object By storing the EID of the aliased object in the A_EID column of the Hierarchy table it is possible to avoid navigating to aliased objects. This can save time, especially if the aliased object is at a low level of the hierarchy.
  • Aliases are dereferenced during a search if the "search-aliases" flag in the search argument is set.
  • the performance of the search service while dereferencing aliases becomes a two step process. Firstly, define the search area and then apply the filter to the entries within the search area. Aliases dereferenced as part of the search service can expand the search area to which the filter is applied. They also restrict the search area in that any dereferenced aliases are excluded from the search area. Aliases and OneLevel Search
  • aliases are being dereferenced as part of a one level search and an alias entry is found then the alias must be resolved (using the Object table or the A_EID ). The aliased object is then added to the search area to which the filter is applied. In a oneLevel search where aliases are found the search area will consist of non-alias entries directly subordinate to the base object and all dereferenced aliases.
  • aliases are being dereferenced as part of a whole subtree search and an alias entry is found then the alias must be resolved (using the Object table or the A_EID) and this EID must then be treated as another base object, unless it is part of an already processed sub tree.
  • the "Path" column can be used to find alias entries within a subtree join. If an alias entry is found that points outside of the current subtree then the subtree pointed to by the alias can also be searched for aliases.
  • One property of the hierarchical tree structure is that each subtree is uniquely represented by a unique base object (i.e. subtrees do not overlap).
  • Performance improvements in conventional relational design can be achieved because assumptions can be made about the data - the data is essentially fixed at the time an application is designed. In X.500, none of the data types are known. However performance improvements can still be made because assumptions can be made about the services - these are known at the time the X.500 application is designed.
  • each table can be organised around the major service relationships (instead of around the major data relationships in conventional relational design). It shall be shown that the above tables can be decomposed into a number of smaller and more efficient tables as shown below.
  • One innovation in achieving X.500 performance is to decompose the tables around primary service relationships and derive secondary services via joins. This process is called service decomposition.
  • the following considerations are made: (1 ) Columns that have strong relationships are preferred to be kept together (to avoid unnecessary joins); (2) If the number of significant rows in a given column is independent of the other related columns, then that given column is a candidate for a separate table. (3) If a column is only used for locating information (input) or only used for returning results (output) then it is a candidate for its own table. (4) If a column is used as a key for more than one service then it is preferred to be a primary key and therefore in its own table (each table can have only one primary key). (5) Keys are preferred to be unique or at least strong (non-repetitious).
  • a first level analysis of column usage is s IOW ⁇ in Table 4.1.
  • the Hierarchy table contains the following columns: I EJD I Parent Path I Alias A_EID NameNorm NameRaw
  • the Hierarchy Table contains information about objects and their parents, their names, their absolute positions in the hierarchy and if they are aliases.
  • This table can therefore be split into four tables: DIT, NAME, TREE and ALIAS.
  • DIT Directory Information Tree
  • RDN Relative Distinguished Name
  • RDN's are returned for a List (in conjunction with a given Parent) or as part of a full Distinguished Name (Read, Search).
  • Read, Search the NAME table has information required for returning names (the raw RDN).
  • TREE table has information about an entry's Path (the sequence of EID's down from the root).
  • Table 4.2d - TREE Table Alias information is cached so that every time an alias is encountered during Navigate it does not have to be repeatedly resolved. Thus the ALIAS table only contains entries that are aliases. It is also used during OneLevel Search (in conjunction with the DIT Parent column) and Subtree Search (in conjunction with the Path column) to determine if there are any aliases in the search area.
  • the Object table contains the following columns:
  • This table can therefore be split into two tables: SEARCH and ENTRY.
  • the Search Table is used to resolve filters in the Search service. It is also used to find values during Compare, Modify and ModifyRDN.
  • the Search table contains one row for each attribute value of each entry. Only the normalised values are stored in this table.
  • the Entry table is used to return values in Reads and Searches.
  • the Entry table contains one row for each attribute value for each entry.
  • the RAW value is the value exactly as initially supplied when the entry was added or modified.
  • the Attribute table is essentially the same as the Conceptual Design. In practice the "type" field is only descriptive, since any incoming/outgoing X.500 Object Identifier gets converted to/from the internal attribute identifier, AID. Thus this column has been renamed DESC to signify that it is a description field.
  • Performance when using SQL is achieved because the RDBMS is able to satisfy the query using a relevant index. This means that every query that has a condition (the "where" clause in SQL) is preferred to have an associated index
  • Table 4.5 Table indexes for the Logical Design
  • the table design means that many queries can be handled without joins, giving substantial performance improvement.
  • the joins that are considered necessary are listed below:
  • Search / Aliases / Subtree - for finding all the aliases in a subtree (TREE joined with ALIAS). • Search / Aliases / OneLevel - for finding all the aliases under a given object (DIT joined with ALIAS).
  • joins are first level joins (i.e. between only two tables). It is preferable not to use higher order joins. 4.6 Input/Output Performance
  • Each of the fragmented tables is preferred to have their own (independent) primary key which enables them to cluster data according to how it is used.
  • the primary key may dictate the "storage structure".
  • NORM i.e. type, value
  • all the data of the same type e.g. surname
  • similar values e.g. Harvey, Harrison
  • Table 5a displays a small hierarchy tree which includes an alias reference.
  • Table 5b The corresponding Table contents are shown in Table 5b.
  • All X.500 services rely on navigating the directory tree.
  • the purpose of tree navigation is to retrieve the EID of the entry corresponding to the supplied Distinguished Name. Navigation begins from the root of the tree and continues down the tree until all the RDN's in a DN have been resolved (verified). This process is known as a "Tree Walk".
  • the DIT Table is the primary table used for tree navigation. Referring to the example hierarchy tree, resolution of the DN "Datacraft / Sales / Network Products / Peter Evans" involves the following processes:
  • a DN can contain an alias, which is effectively another DN. Aliases complicate the tree walk process because the tree walk cannot continue until the alias is resolved. This requires a separate tree walk for the alias. As an example, consider the DN "Datacraft / Networks / Peter Evans".
  • the EID for this row is 10. At this stage we discover that this entry is an alias.
  • the Alias Table is checked to see if the EID of the alias has been cached. If this is the first time an attempt has been made to resolve this alias then the A_EID column in the Alias
  • the DN of the aliased object must be determined. This is stored in the "aliasedObjectName" attribute of the alias entry.
  • the DN of the alias is "Datacraft / Sales / Network
  • Tree Table stores the list of the EID's which identify a "Path" to the object.
  • DN can be constructed from the RAW RDN values stored in the Name Table. Entry Information Selection
  • EIS EntrylnformationSelection
  • Entry Information is a return parameter for Read and Search. It always contains the Distinguished Names of selected entries and, optionally, attributes and/or values as specified in the EIS argument of the request.
  • Common Arguments contain information such as service controls (time limit and size limit), the DN of the requestor of the service and security information.
  • Common Results contain information such as security parameters, the DN of the performer of the service and an alias dereferenced flag.
  • a Read operation is used to extract information from an explicitly identified entry.
  • Attribute Table and then return selected types and/or values for the matching EID .
  • the DIT table uses the DIT table to perform a Tree Walk traversing EID's 1 , 1 1 , 20 and 32 for the normalised RDN's DATACRAFT, SALES, NETWORK PRODUCTS, PETER EVANS.
  • the EID of the selected object is 32.
  • a Compare operation is used to compare a value (which is supplied as an argument of the request) with the value(s) of a particular attribute type in a particular object entry.
  • AttributeValueAssertion The attribute type and value to be compared
  • the EID of the selected object is 32.
  • DN of the selected object (returned if an alias is dereferenced) subordinates
  • a list of RDN's for the subordinate entries (aliases, indicated by an alias flag, are not dereferenced) partialOutcomeQualifier
  • An indication that an incomplete result was returned eg, a time limit or size limit restriction.
  • Method • Perform a tree walk using the DIT table, resolving aliases if necessary.
  • the Search Service is the most complex of all X.500 services. Search arguments indicate where to start the search (baseObject), the scope of the search (subset), the conditions to apply (filter) and what information should be returned (selection). In addition, a flag is passed to indicate whether aliases should be dereferenced (searc Aliases).
  • the possible values for subset are baseObject, oneLevel and wholeSubtree. Base object indicates that the search filter will only be applied to attributes and values within the base object. OneLevel indicates the Search filter will be applied to the immediate subordinates of the base object. Whole subtree indicates the Search filter will be applied to the base object and all of its subordinates.
  • Argument Description baseObject The Distinguished Name of the baseObject subset baseObject, oneLevel or wholeSubtree filter search conditions searchAliases a flag to indicate whether aliases among subordinates of the base object should be dereferenced during the search. selection EIS as for READ. The attributes and values to be returned.
  • DN of the selected object (returned if an alias is dereferenced) entries Attributes & values (as defined in selection) for the entries which satisfy the filter.
  • partialOutcomeQualifier An indication that an incomplete result was returned, eg, a time limit or size limit restriction.
  • Method Obtain the EID for the base object DN using a TreeWalk. The EID of the base object is "11".
  • An AddEntry operation is used to add a leaf entry either an object entry or an alias entry) to the Directory Information Tree.
  • Argument Description object The Distinguished Name of the entry to be added entry A set of attributes to add
  • the EID of the base object is "12".
  • a RemoveEntry operation is used to remove a leaf entry (either an object entry or an alias entry) from the Directory Information Tree.
  • the ModifyEntry operation is used to perform a series of one or more of the following modifications to a single entry: add a new attribute remove an attribute add attribute values remove attribute values • replace attribute values modify an alias X.500 definition
  • For the selected object perform one or more of the following actions: Add Value, Delete Value, Add Attribute, Delete Attribute
  • Attribute Values For the Entry Table and the Search Table, if the attribute exists, delete it.
  • the ModifyRDN operation is used to change the Relative Distinguished Name of a leaf entry (either an object entry or an alias entry) from the Directory Information Tree.
  • Each X.500 service consists of 3 parts; ARGUMENT, RESULT and
  • Version 3 provides a full coverage of errors for the X.500 standard.
  • Time Limit and Size Limit form part of Service Controls. They can be optionally set to some finite limit and included in the Common Arguments. Time Limit indicates the maximum elapsed time, in seconds, within which the service shall be provided. Size Limit (only applicable to List and Search) indicates the maximum number of objects to be returned. If either limit is reached an error is reported. For a limit reached on a List or a Search, the result is an arbitrary selection of the accumulated results. Abandon
  • the Logical methods include a number of optimizations that enhance performance. These methods are outlined below.
  • the Attribute table can be cached. This means that (apart from initial loading of the attributes) no SQL statements need to be issued to the database when decoding or encoding the attributes. In the present X.500 system attribute conversions are performed in memory. This provides a substantial speed advantage.
  • Query validation is performed in memory where possible. This avoids database rollbacks which are time and system consuming. For example when adding an entry each attribute is validated before any attempt is made to add the entry. If an error is found then no SQL calls need to be issued. Optimise Query Handling
  • search results may be assembled in parallel in memory.
  • the tables that store raw data store the data in ASN.1 format. This provides an efficient means of transfering data into or out of the database. Database Techniques
  • the physical design results from a process called physical transformation of the logical design.
  • the physical design represents a preferred realization or embodiment of the logical design.
  • Figure 2B and the tables below show one form of the physical design. New columns and tables are highlighted by double borders. DIT
  • This table holds the highest EID value that has been used in the database.
  • the inclusion of the INFO table enables the next EID to be obtained without any calculation of the maximum EID being performed by the database. This provides improved efficiency in adding entries to the database. More importantly the inclusion of the INFO table removes contention problems which may occur when multiple DSA's are adding entries at the same time.
  • Shadow Keys Three tables have had shadow keys added. These are: a) The NORMKEY column in the SEARCH table. b) The RDNKEY column in the DIT table. c) The LEV1 , LEV2, LEV3 and LEV4 columns in the TREE table. Each of these shadow key columns is a shortened version of a larger column. They have been added to shorten the indexes on each table. This gives improved performance for any queries that use the indexes and it also improves disk space usage as small indexes take up less space than large indexes.
  • Some types of attribute values do not need to be normalised e.g. integer, boolean, date. Instead of storing them twice (SEARCH. NORM and ENTRY.RAW) they can be stored just once in a hybrid table called the SENTRY table. This reduces table sizes and increases storage efficiency at the cost of having to search two tables and retrieve from two tables.
  • OCLASS Object Identifiers
  • the second option has a number of advantages. Firstly, the inclusion of a BLOB table prevents the ENTRY table from becoming excessively large. Generally most entries will be less than a few hundred characters in length, so the length of the RAW field in the ENTRY table can accordingly be reduced to cater for those entries and the RAW field in the BLOB table can be increased to a value approaching the maximum record size. This will make storage more efficient, i.e. reduce the amount of unused bytes in each column of each table and reduce the number of fragments needed for each entry in the BLOB table. It also means that each value will have only one entry in the ENTRY table and that the ENTRY and SEARCH tables maintain their one-to-one correlation. Secondly the use of a BLOB table enables the application to make use of any database support for Binary Large Objects, (e.g. 64K Binary Columns). 6.3 Functional Extensibility FLAGS Columns
  • FLAGS column(s) are preferred to be added. These column(s) have been added to provide extensibility to the design. Specific values can be added to the flags as new functionality is required, without changing the table structure. Note: a) In the SEARCH table, the DISTING field may be absorbed into the FLAGS field. b) In the DIT table, the ALIAS field may be absorbed into the FLAGS field.
  • the FLAGS column(s) may also provide a "summary" function for each of the tables. This means that the nature of an entry can be determined to some extent by checking the value of the FLAGS field. For example, a flag can be set, in the DIT table, when an entry is a leaf. Checking this flag is much simpler than checking for children of the entry.
  • the FLAGS column can also be used to store security information, whether an alias points inside its parents sub-tree, whether a value is a BLOB, etc.
  • the present invention is considered to provide enhanced performance over prior art implementations. Performance can be appraised in many ways, including: aliases; size (use of relational theory); complexity (use of query optimiser and search method(s)); extensibility (use of meta-data); and substantially without degrading efficiency (use of disk based model) and reliability (use of RDBMS).
  • the present invention is considered unique in its ability to claim performance improvement in all areas noted above. 7.2 Test results Performance testing of the present invention has been carried out, with the objectives of:
  • LIST level 1 4 hems 0.05 0.05 0.05 0.05 0.05 0.05 level 3 4 hems 0.06 0.06 0.06 0.06 0.06 0.06 level 4 100 items 0.22 0.23 0.23 0.24 0.23 0.24
  • RENAME level 5 100 sisters 0.15 0.16 0.15 0.16 0.16 0.15
  • Timings measured at DSA console (ie does not include network overheads) All numbers are in units of seconds and "K" means 1 ,000's.
  • a set of directories was constructed ranging from 1 K to 200K entries with varying depth and width of the hierarchy, and a corresponding test plan was produced. The tests were performed a number of times to ensure consistency. The following conclusions can be drawn from these results;
  • Reading an object via an alias in test, showed no appreciable decrease in performance and in some cases reading an object via an alias was in fact faster than reading the object directly. This is due to the reduced navigation required when an alias points "down" to an object that is deeper in the tree structure than the alias entry.

Abstract

The present invention addresses the problem of implementing X.500 using an SQL product. The present application discloses an application of X.500 to a relational database, a database design and use of the database to perform X.500 services. Particularly, the disclosure relates to implementation using an RDBMS (Relational DataBase Management System). One invention disclosed resides around service modelling, the processing of arbitrary data using a fixed set of queries/services. Another invention resides in the implementation of a disk based model using relational queries to satisfy X.500 services and enables benefits of RDBMS to be exploited. Further, the invention provides an SQL based X.500 application that can perform at subsecond speed and is relatively unaffected by the size of database, DIT shape, type of data or complexity of service, including aliases.

Description

X.500 SYSTEM AND METHODS FIELD
The present invention is directed to application of X.500 to a relational database, a database design and use of the database to perform X.500 services. Particularly, the present invention is directed to implementation using a RDBMS (Relational Database Management System). The present invention is also directed to table structure and methods of operation of a database application. PRIOR ART X.500 is the International Standard for Electronic Directories [CCITT89].
These standards define the services, protocols and information model of a very flexible and general purpose directory. X.500 is applicable to information systems where the data is fairly static (e.g. telephone directory) but may need to be distributed (e.g. across organisations or countries), extensible (e.g. store names, addresses, job titles, devices etc.), object oriented (i.e. to enforce rules on the data) and/or accessed remotely. Relational Database Management System
(RDBMS) provide facilities for applications to store and manipulate data. Amongst the many features that they offer are data integrity, consistency, concurrency, indexing mechanisms, query optimisation, recovery, roll-back, security. They also provide many tools for performance tuning, import/export, backup, auditing and application development.
RDBMS are the preferred choice of most large scale managers of data. They are readily available and known to be reliable and contain many useful management tools. There is a large base of RDBMS installations and therefore a large amount of existing expertise and investment in people and procedures to run these systems, and so data managers are looking to use this when acquiring new systems. Most relational database products support the industry standard SQL (Structured Query Language). There has also been a move towards Object Oriented systems which provide data extensibility and the ability to handle arbitrarily complex data items. In addition, many corporations and government departments have large numbers of database applications which are not interconnected. Data managers are looking for solutions which enable them to integrate their data, and to simplify the management of that data. X.500 and it's associated standards provide a framework and a degree of functionality that enables this to be achieved. The fact that X.500 is an international standard means that data connectivity can be achieved across corporations and between different countries.
The problem, therefore, is to address the need of data managers and implement X.500 with all the flexibility of object-oriented systems but using an SQL product so that it can achieve the scalability and performance inherent in relational systems coupled with the stability, robustness, portability and cost- effectiveness of current SQL products.
There have been a number of attempts of solving the above problem and over a considerable period of time. None of the attempts have resulted in a product which has proven to be commercially accepted by the market, and thus in the market place there is a long felt need yet to be addressed.
Figure 1 shows an abstract from the "GOSIPNews" issue No. 4, dated April 1994 (Source: "Interoperability Products" distributed in Australia by the Centre for Open Systems) and which lists X.500 products currently available. None of these products use a SQL database as an underlying data store, and none of these products therefore address successfully the market need of implementing X.500 using an SQL RDBMS.
The Proceedings of IFIP WG6.6 International Symposium (ISBN: 0444 889 167) have published a paper presented by Francois Perruchond, Cuno Lanz, and Bernard Plattner and entitled "A Relational Data Base Design for an X.500 Directory System Agent". The Directory System disclosed, as with many prior art systems, is relatively slow in operation, particularly where the database is relatively extensive and is incomplete in its implementation of X.500, such as aliases, subsearch and entry information. Another attempt is disclosed in the proceedings of IREE, ISBN 0909 394
253, proceedings April 22-24, 1991 by C.M.R. Leung. In that disclosure, there is described a database scheme in which a single entry table holds detailed information about each directory object, and is also incomplete in its implementation of X.500.
This approach has been discredited by a number of text books and knowledge in the art, such as "Object-Oriented Modeling and Design" by J. Rumbaugh, et al, 1991 , ISBN 0-13-630054-5, in which at paragraph 17.3.8 it is clearly stated that "putting all entities in the one table is not a good approach to relational database design". SUMMARY OF INVENTIONS
An object of the present inventions is to address the problem of implementing X.500 in a RDBMS which supports SQL or any other relational language.
The present application seeks to disclose a number of inventions related to the implementation of X.500 standards in a RDBMS which supports SQL or any other relational language. The scope of the present invention is outlined in this specification, including the claims.
In this document, at the time of filing, SQL is the most popular relational language and although it is only one form of relational language, the intent of the present invention is to have application to any other form of relational language, not just SQL.
These inventions can be related to the following headings:
1. Principle Design
2. Conceptual Design
3. Conceptual Method(s) 4. Logical Design
5. Logical Method(s)
6. Physical Design
7. Example Implementation
The X.500 standard in no way dictates how the directory is to be implemented, only its capabilities and behaviour. One key to solving the implementation problem is the realization that X.500 defines a fixed set of services (e.g. Add, Modify, Search etc.) that can operate on arbitrary data. It has been discovered that problems associated with the prior art may be alleviated by a unique approach, by what may be described as inverting relational theory modelling from a data modelling approach to a service modelling approach. That is, from the problem of: processing arbitrary queries on a fixed set of data to the present approach of processing arbitrary data using a fixed set of queries/services.
Each service is modelled (instead of each data type) and the relationships between each service defined (instead of the relationships between each data type). Implementation of service modelling using relational queries to satisfy
X.500 services enables benefits of RDBMS to be exploited.
The benefits of this approach are many. A summary is illustrated in Figure 3. Some of the benefits include: relatively fast starting time. * the ability to reduce memory requirements relative to memory resident systems. the ability to base X.500 on any SQL database and thereby protect the investment in products, expertise and procedures in managing existing systems. • the ability to achieve performance relatively independent of size and relatively independent of the complexity of the data type. Every data type is treated generically. Every data type has an index on it. The result of indexing gives the ability to efficiently search the directory without caching large portions of directory into memory. Unlike the prior art where either only one index can be used to satisfy one given query or large portions of information is system intensively cached and searched in memory. the ability to support different languages (e.g. Spanish, Hebrew and
Kanji) which may have various collating sequences. Single, double or other byte character sets may also be supported. using a disk based model to minimise I/O and efficiently retrieve I/O. the ability to service complex X.500 searches. the ability to create X.500 databases of far greater size than previously possible, without compromising performance or robustness. The databases can be small or large (250,000, 1 million or more entries). an optimal table design minimises wastage of disk space. • the ability to leverage off hundreds of man years of relational database developments and use "industrial strength" databases with proven reliability, integrity, security and tools for developing high performance applications.
Based on this unique approach, the following disclosure will detail a number of inventions in an order with reference to Figures 2A and 2B, which illustrates schematically an overview of the present X.500 system. The table and column, names, order of columns and numeric values disclosed are given on an arbitrary basis in the overview. The number of columns disclosed represent a preferred operable requirement. Additional columns do not alter the use of the table as herein contemplated. PRINCIPLE DESIGN
The X.500 prior art attempts at implementation have been unable to overcome the relatively basic structural and operational differences between the
X.500 requirements and functionality and SQL. The X.500 standard has a particular structure by nature, whereas SQL is designed to operate on relational structured tables.
For a typical relational database application, the nature of data is well known, i.e. tables will consist of a number of columns and each column contains data relating to a particular data type (see Table B1 ). The different data types that can be stored is limited to the columns of the table. The data types are also limited to the types supported by the database (e.g. string, numeric, money, date). The database may also store data of a form not understood by the database per se, but understood by the application e.g. binary data.
Name Surname Title Phone
Chris MASTERS Sales Manager 03 727-9456 Alana MORGAN Sales Support 03 727-9455
Table B1 : Employee Table If a new data type needs to be added (e.g. mobile) then a new column will have to be added to the table. This can cause problems if data table changes are not easy to implement. Also if the new data type is not well used (e.g. less than 1% of the organisation) then significant redundant data storage may result. See Table B2.
Name Surname Title Phone Mobile
Chris MASTERS Sales Manager 03 727-9456 018 042671 Alana MORGAN Sales Support 03 727-9455
Table 32: Employee Table
In essence, one invention in the application of X.500 resides in overcoming the extensibility by representing the X.500 attributes of the prior art: empl # name age salary as described above, as type syntax value, the latter representation being an extensible representation and is thus adapted to implementation with SQL. The latter representation is known as meta-data. The meta-data "value" may be binary.
A further development based on the above principle design is the adaption of the 'principle design' to X.500. This adaption has been realized by the provision of a 'property table', in which object name and parent name is added to the 'principle design'. Further benefits accrue from the implementation disclosed above; including: a. independence of complexity of filter - the implementation disclosed may utilise a query optimiser provided in SQL, and therefore there is no need to replicate a query optimiser in each proprietary database to which the present invention is applied, b. independence of size - the implementation disclosed has the ability to be scaled, c. independence of depth of tree - the implementation disclosed has hierarchy comparability, d. performance - if index is put on the type column, then each and every type is indexed. Z, CONCEPTUAL DESIGN
The prior art has had difficulty in implementing X.500 as it has not been structured for extensibility, object oriented and hierarchy which are requirements of X.500.
This is addressed, in one form, by functionally decomposing the 'property table' and thus resulting in what is called the Conceptual Design. The conceptual design resides in providing at least one of: 1. Attribute table, where extensibility is addressed by allowing the definition of a new attribute type in this table by adding a row to the table;
2. Object table, which defines the attributes within each object; and/or
3. Hierarchy table, which defines the relationship between the objects.
In another invention, this problem is addressed by providing table structures in accordance with those disclosed in Figures 2A and 2B.
Yet further inventions reside in addressing problems of data tolerance by providing in the present X.500 system for the replacement of the 'value' column of the object table with value 'norm' and value 'raw' columns and/or replacing the RDN column in the hierarchy table with 'name norm' and 'name raw' columns.
Further, the difficulty in prior art of accommodating aliases is addressed in the present X.500 system by providing an 'alias' column in the hierarchy table. The 'alias' column is flagged to indicate that, that entry is an alias.
Further refinement may be provided by replacing the 'alias' column with alias and A-EID columns. The A-EID provides information about where the alias points.
Still further refinement may be provided by replacing the 'parent' column in the hierarchy table with 'parent' and 'path' columns.
The 'path' addresses the problem of implementing X.500 search, with aliases and subtrees. The 'path' has at least two unique properties: a) to determine the absolute position in the hierarchy; and b) it is used to determine if an entry is in a given subtree by its prefix. 1 CONOFPTUAI METHOD
A number of unique methods of interrogating the conceptual design are disclosed in the detailed description following, including: a) mapping the X.500 services into a sequence of SQL statements; b) the search strategy is to apply the filter over the search area using the path or parent columns, and/or; c) in dealing with aliases during navigation - where an alias points is cached in the A.EID column; d) in dealing with alias during search - find the unique set of base objects which define areas of the tree that need to be searched, and then apply b) above to each area of the tree.
A further invention is realized by using the attribute table for incoming data to find the AID from the X.500 object ID and outgoing data read from the database, vice versa.
Furthermore, for any incoming distinguished name, it is navigated to its appropriate EID, then each search is performed as required by X.500.
Still furthermore, for a search, filter and subtree searches can be provided by a single pass resolution and using the path column. One invention is to utilize a 'path' field to simultaneously apply an arbitrary filter over an arbitrary subtree. The complications of aliases is handled by applying the above method to a uniquely resolved subtree.
Yet another unique method is to store the "path" of each entry as a string. Each path will then be prefixed by the path of its parent entry. This is useful for the filter in the search service.
4. LOGICAL DESIGN
The logical design is based on a service decomposition of the conceptual design, though the realization that X.500 service components are independent. The advantages accruing from this include:
1. Reduces the number of indexes per table, as more tables are provided. It has been found that primary indexes are most efficient (speed, size) and secondary indexes may have large overheads (speed, size).
2. Enable data in tables to be clustered. Clustering occurs as a result of its primary key (storage structure) and thus data may be organised on disk around its key. E.g. for the 'search' table, surnames may be clustered together.
3. Management - smaller tables are easier to manage, e.g. faster to update indexes, collect statistics, audit, backup, etc.
4. Reduced I/O - speed improvements due to smaller rows, means more rows per page and thus operations perform less l/O's.
& LOGICAL ETHODS
A number of unique methods of interrogating the logical design tables are disclosed in the detailed description following.
In addition, one method resides in caching the attribute table. Thus, (with the exception of initial loading) no SQL statements are issued to the database. In the present X.500 system, conversions are performed in memory. This provides a substantial speed advantage.
Further, validation is performed in memory which avoids database roll¬ back. Roll-backs are time and system consuming. Still further, for the arbitrary filter, a dynamic SQL equivalent is built. This enables arbitrary complexity in X.500 searches.
Also for search results, the present system utilizes set orientation queries of SQL to avoid 'row at a time' processing. Thus search results may be assembled in parallel in memory. & PHYSICAL DESIGN
New tables and new columns are introduced to overcome column width and key size restrictions and to achieve space optimisations.
The following text is a disclosure of embodiments of the inventions outlined:
1. PRINCIPLE DESIGN
With reference to Figure 2A, the principle design addresses the basic problem of representing the extensible, object oriented and hierarchical nature of X.500 in relational tables. In this section it will be disclosed (with examples) that the principle table design can be represented by a single table as shown in Table 1 below. object parent type syntax value name name
Table 1 - X.500 Property Table Throughout this and the following sections all column names and their positions in each table are arbitrary. The intent is to define what they contain and how they are used. 1.1 Extensibility
For a typical relational database application, the nature of data is well known, i.e:, tables will consist of a number of columns and each column contains data relating to a particular data type (see Table 1.1a). The table is self descriptive, i.e. the relations between data items is implied by being on the same row (this is the basis of relational theory). name surname title phone
Chris MASTERS Sales Manager 03 727-9456
Alana MORGAN Sales Support 03 727-9455
.... Table 1.1a - Typical relational table
However, the above approach is not extensible because the number of different data types is limited to the number of columns of the table. If a new data type needs to be added (e.g. mobile phone number) then a new column will have to be added to the table (see Table 1.1 b). Any application accessing this table will need to be updated to explicitly query it. name surname title phone mobile
Chris MASTERS Sales Manager 03 727-9456 018 042671
Alana MORGAN Sales Support 03 727-9455
.... ....
Tab e 1.1 b - Relational table wit h an extra column
Other problems also exist in practice. If the new data type is not well used
(e.g. less than 1% of the organization has a mobile phone) then the table will be sparse (e.g. if a given person does not have a mobile then that row/column entry will be NULL). Also, the data types are limited to the types supported by the database (e.g. string, numeric, money, date, etc.).
The solution is to treat the data types as generic. The present invention adopts the method of representing arbitrary attributes (e.g. XOM [X/OPEN Object Management] API [Application Programming Interface]) as a type, syntax, value combination (see Table 1.1c) type syntax value
Name String Chris
Surname String MASTERS
Title String Sales Manager
Phone Numeric 03 727-9456
Mobile Numeric 018 042671
Table 1.1 c - Representing arbitrary attributes
1.2 Object Oriented X.500 defines objects (e.g. people, organizations, etc.) which may contain an arbitrary number of "attributes". Since many objects must appear in the table a mechanism is required to distinguish each object. An "object name" column is added to the table for this purpose (see Table 1.2a). object name type syntax value
Chris Masters Name String Chris
Chris Masters Surname String MASTERS
Chris Masters Title String Sales Manager
Chris Masters Phone Numeric 03 727-9456
Chris Masters Mobile Numeric 018 042671
Alana Morgan Name String Alana
Alana Morgan Surname String MORGAN
Alana Morgan Title String Sales Support
Alana Morgan Phone Numeric 03 727-9455
Table 1.2a - Representing objects with arbitrary values
The above method allows any number of attributes to be assigned (related) to an entry. These attributes could be of arbitrary complexity (e.g. a multi-line postal address could be handled). As the number of columns is fixed new attributes can be added to any object without having to redefine the application. If a new attribute is added then an application that reads the entry will get back an extra row. 1 .3 Hierarchical
A method of representing hierarchical systems (e.g. parts explosion) is to use a parent/child combination (see Table 1.3a) parent child car engine car fuel system
engine carburettor engine pistons
... carburettor fuel valve carburettor air valve
....
Table 1.3a - Parts explosion hierarchy
X.500 defines its objects to be hierarchical. The relationships between objects follow a tree structure where each object has a parent object and each parent can have zero or more children. This relationship can be represented in a general PROPERTY table by the addition of a "parent name" column, which is used to store the name of the parent object (see Table 1.3b). object name parent name type syntax value
Datacraft root Organization String Datacraft
Datacraft root Address Postal Address PO Box 353 Croydon VIC
Chris Masters Datacraft Name String Chris
Chris Masters Datacraft Surname String MASTERS
Chris Masters Datacraft Title String Sales Manager
Chris Masters Datacraft Phone Numeric 03 727-9456
Chris Masters Datacraft Mobile Numeric 018 042671
Alana Morgan Datacraft Name String Alana
Alana Morgan Datacraft Surname String MORGAN
Alana Morgan Datacraft Title String Sales Support
Alana Morgan Datacraft Phone Numeric 03 727-9455
Figure 1.3 b - X.500 Pr operty Table Note that the root of the tree has no parent. Thus, if both Chris and Alana work for Datacraft and Datacraft is a child of the root then we can say that Chris and Alana are children of Datacraft and that Datacraft is the parent of Chris and Alana. 2. CONCEPTUAL DESIGN
In Section 1 it was shown that a single Property Table could represent the extensible, object oriented and hierarchical nature of X.500 (see Table 2a). object parent type syntax value name name
Table 2a - Property Table With reference to Figure 2A in this section it will be shown that full X.500 functionality can be represented by using three tables as shown below (see Table 2b and Figure 2A). Hierarchy Table
EID Parent Path Alias A_EID NameNorm NameRaw
Object Table
EID AID VID Disting ValueNorm ValueRaw
Attribute Table
AID Type Syntax Objectld
Table 2b - Full Conceptual Design
The conceptual design addresses major problems with implementing full X.500 functionality in relational tables. As each major design issue is presented, examples are provided to illustrate the solution. 2.1 Functional Decomposition
The Property Table (Figure 2A) can be decomposed into separate tables that reflect the hierarchical, object oriented and extensible nature of X.500, preferably as follows; a Hierarchy Table which defines the structural relationship between objects. an Object Table which defines the attribute values within each object, an Attribute Table which defines the different attribute types. These tables result from a process called functional decomposition. To address the problem of correlating the relationships between tables, arbitrary numeric identifiers are introduced. The EID or "entry identifier" correlates each object with its hierarchy information. The AID or "attribute identifier" correlates each value in the object table with its attribute information.
The design is considered very efficient because the repeating groups in the Property table (type-syntax and object name-parent name) have been removed. Also, for SQL, the joining columns are simple integers.
Hierarchy Table
EI D Parent Name
1 0 0 Datacraft
30 10 Chris Masters
31 10 Alana Morgan
Object Table
EID AID Value
10 10 Datacraft
10 16 PO BOX 123 CROYDON
30 3 Chris
30 4 MASTERS
30 12 Sales Manager
30 20 03 727-9456
31 3 Alana
31 4 MORGAN
31 12 Sales Support
31 20 03 727-9455
Attribute Table
AID Type Syntax
3 Name string
4 Surname string
10 Organization string
12 Title string
16 Postal Address address string
20 Phone telephone string
Table 2.1 - Basic Conceptual Design 2.2 X.500 Attributes
X.500 attributes have a protocol identifier which is transferred when any data is communicated between end systems. These identifiers are internationally defined and are called OBJECT IDENTIFIERS (e.g. 2.5.4.4 means a surname string). Thus an "Objectld" column can be added to the Attribute table so that conversions between X.500 object identifiers and the internal attribute identifiers can be performed.
In addition, X.500 allows an attribute to have an arbitrary number of values (e.g. the mobile phone could be treated just as a second telephone number). Thus a "value identifier" or VID is introduced to identify values within an attribute in the Object Table.
Hierarchy Table
EID Parent Name
10 Datacraft
30 10 Chris Masters
31 10 Alana Morgan
Object Table
EID AID VID Value
10 10 Datacraft
10 1 6 PO Box 123 CROYDON
30 3 Chris
30 4 MASTERS
30 12 Sales Manager
30 20 03 727-9456
30 20 2 018 042671
31 3 Alana
31 4 MORGAN
31 12 Sales Support
31 20 03 727-9455 Attribute Table
AID Type Syntax Objectld
3 Name string 2.5.4.3
4 Surname string 2.5.4.4
10 Organization string 2.5.4.10
12 Title string 2.5.4.12
16 Postal Address address string 2.5.4.16
20 Phone telephone string 2.5.4.20
Table 2.2 - Conceptua Design with X.500 attributes
2.3 X.500 Names In X.500, each entry uses one or more of its attribute values
(Distinguished Values) for naming the entry. A "Disting" column is added to the Object Table to flag the distinguished values.
The Distinguished Values combine to form a Relative Distinguished Name (RDN) which names the entry. The "Name" column in the Hierarchy table stores the RDN. This is an optimization that negates the need for the RDN to be constructed from the distinguished values in the Object table.
An entry is uniquely named by a Distinguished Name (DN) which consists of all the RDN's of the of its ancestors down from the root and the RDN of the object itself. An innovation is to add a "path" column to the Hierarchy table which defines the absolute position of the entry in the tree as a list of EID's. The path has three important properties;
1 ) enables fast construction of DN's, (the EID list defines all the RDN's)
2) enables fast subtree searches (see Conceptual Methods),
3) it is independent of its DN (any of the RDN's in the DN can be renamed without affecting the path).
Hierarchy Table
EID Parent Path Name
10 0 10. Datacraft
30 10 10.30. Chris, MASTERS
31 10 10.31. Alana, MORGAN Object Table
EI D AID VID Disting Value
10 10 1 Datacraft
10 16 0 PO Box 123 CROYDON
30 3 1 Chris
30 4 1 MASTERS
30 12 0 Sales Manager
30 20 0 03 727-9456
30 20 2 0 018 042671
31 3 1 Alana
31 4 1 MORGAN
31 12 0 Sales Support
31 20 0 03 727-9455
Attribute Table
AID Type Syntax Objectld
3 Name string 2.5.4.3
4 Surname string 2.5.4.4
10 Organization string 2.5.4.10
12 Title string 2.5.4.12
16 Postal Address address string 2.5.4.16
20 Phone telephone string 2.5.4.20 Table 2.3 - Conceptual Design with X.500 attributes and names
2.4 X.500 Aliases
X.500 also has the concept of 'aliases'. An alias object effectively points to another entry and thus provides an alternate name for that entry. Thus an "alias" flag is added to the Hierarchy Table. When an alias is discovered during Navigation (i.e. the supplied DN contains an alias), then the alias value must be read from the Object Table. This alias DN must be resolved to where the alias points before Navigation of the original entry can continue.
An innovation is to use an "aliased EID" column or A_EID to store "where" the alias "points to". This removes the need to repeatedly navigate through an alias. Hierarchy Table
EI D Parent Path Alias A_EI D Name
10 0 10. 0 0 Datacraft
30 10 10.30. 0 0 Chris, MASTERS
31 10 10.31. 0 0 Alana, MORGAN
35 10 10.35. 1 31 Support Engineer
Object Table
EID AID VID Disting Value
10 1 0 1 Datacraft
10 16 0 PO Box 123 CROYDON
30 3 1 Chris
30 4 1 MASTERS
30 12 0 Sales Manager
30 20 0 03 727-9456
30 20 2 0 018 042671
31 3 1 Alana
31 4 1 MORGAN
31 1 2 0 Sales Support
31 20 0 03 727-9455
35 4 1 Support Engineer
35 7 0 Datacraft/Alana.Morgan
Attribute Table
AID Type Syntax Objectld
1 Alias Name Distinguished Name 2.5.4.1
3 Name string 2.5.4.3
4 Surname string 2.5.4.4
10 Organization string 2.5.4.10
12 Title string 2.5.4.12
16 Postal Address address string 2.5.4.16
20 Phone telephone string 2.5.4.20
Table 2.4 - Conceptual Desic n with X.500 attribute 9S, names and aliases 2.5 X.5QQ Data Tolerance
Every X.500 attribute has a (internationally defined) syntax. X.500 attribute syntaxes define how each attribute should be treated. In all string syntaxes (e.g. Printable, Numeric etc.) superfluous spaces should be ignored. In some syntaxes the case is not important (e.g. Case Ignore String and Case Ignore List) and so the names "Chris Masters", "Chris MASTERS" and " ChRis MaSTeRS " are considered identical.
In order to do comparisons (e.g. search for a particular value), the syntax rules can be applied to create a normalized form (e.g. "CHRIS MASTERS"). If this normalized form is stored in the database, then any variations in input form are effectively removed, and exact matching can be used (which is necessary when using SQL).
Both the normalized data and "raw" data are stored in the database. The "raw" data is necessary so that users can retrieve the data in exactly the same format as it was originally input. Thus the "Name" column in the Hierarchy Table becomes the "NameRaw" and a "NameNorm" column is added. Similarly, the "Value" column in the Object Table becomes the "ValueRaw" and a "ValueNorm" column is added.
Hierarchy Table
EID Parent Path Alias A_EID NameNorm NameRaw
10 0 10. 0 0 DATACRAFT Datacraft
30 10 10.30. 0 0 CHRIS, MASTERS Chris, MASTERS
31 10 10.31. 0 0 ALANA, MORGAN Alana, MORGAN
35 10 10.35. 1 31 SUPPORT ENGINEER Support Engineer
Object Table
EID AID VID Dieting ValueNorm ValueRaw
1 0 10 1 DATACRAFT Datacraft
10 16 0 PO BOX 123 CROYDON PO Box 123 CROYDON
30 3 1 CHRIS Chris
30 4 1 MASTERS MASTERS
30 12 0 SALES MANAGER Sales Manager
30 20 0 037279456 03 727-9456
30 20 2 0 018321435 018 042671
31 3 1 ALANA Alana
31 4 1 MORGAN MORGAN
31 12 0 SALES SUPPORT Sales Support
31 20 0 037279455 03 727-9455
35 4 1 SUPPORT ENGINEER Support Engineer
35 7 0 DATACRAFT / ALANA Datacraft/ Alana.Morgan MORGAN
Attribute Table
AID Type Syntax Objectld
1 Alias Name Distinguished Name 2.5.4.1
3 Name Case Ignore String 2.5.4.3
4 Surname Case Ignore String 2.5.4.4
10 Organization Case Ignore String 2.5.4.10
12 Title Case Ignore String 2.5.4.12
16 Postal Address Case Ignore List 2.5.4.16
20 Phone Telephone String 2.5.4.20 Table 2.5 - Full Conceptual Design
3. CONCEPTUAL METHODS
This section introduces the basic X.500 services and shows how the conceptual table design, shown in Table 3a or Figure 2A, is sufficient to implement X.500 services and their complexities. Hierarchy Table
EID Parent Path Alias A_EID NameNorm NameRaw Object Table
EID j AID VID Disting ValueNorm ValueRaw
Attribute Table
AID Type Syntax I Object ID
Table 3a Conceptual Table Design
The example hierarchy shown in Table 3b will be used to illustrate these services. Each name in the diagram represents an object entry in the database. The triangle represents an alias entry, and the dotted line represents the connection between the alias entry and the object that it points to. The numbers next to each entry are the entry EID's.
In the example, entry "1" has an RDN with a value of "Datacraft", entry "11" has an RDN with a value of "Sales", entry "20" has an RDN with a value of "Network Products" and entry "31 " has an RDN with a value of "Alana Morgan". The DN of entry "31" is made up of a sequence of RDN's, namely, ""Datacraft", "Sales", "Network Products", "Alana Morgan".
The alias entry "Datacraft/Networks" points to the entry "Datacraft", "Sales", "Network Products". When navigating to this entry the navigate process would find the alias entry, then find the DN of the object pointed to by the alias and then navigate from the root to the object entry returning an EID of "20" and a path of "1.11.20.".
Figure imgf000023_0001
Table 3b: Entry Tree Listed below are sample tables which show how data is stored. The
Hierarchy table (Table 3c) shows how the entries for the example hierarchy are stored. The Attribute table (Table 3e) shows attributes which are contained in the entry "Datacraft/Sales/Network Products/Chris Masters". The Object table (Table 3d) shows how the values of these attributes are stored.
EID Parent Path Alias A_EID NameNorm NameRaw
1 0 1 . 0 0 DATACRAFT [Datacraft]
10 1 1.10. 1 20 NETWORKS [Networks]
1 1 1 1.11. 0 0 SALES [Sales]
12 1 1.12. 0 0 MARKETING [Marketing]
20 1 1 1.1 1.20. 0 0 NETWORK [Network PRODUCTS Products]
30 20 1.1 1 .20.30. 0 0 CHRIS MASTERS [Chris Masters]
31 20 1.1 1 .20.31. 0 0 ALANA MORGAN [Alana Morgan]
32 20 1.11.20.32. 0 0 PETER EVANS [Peter Evans]
Table 3c: Sample Hierarchy Table
EI D AID VI D Disting ValueNorm ValueRaw
30 3 0 1 CHRIS [Chris]
30 4 0 1 MASTERS [Masters]
30 1 2 0 0 SALES MANAGER [Sales Manager]
30 20 0 0 03 727 9456 [(03) 727-9456]
30 20 1 0 018 042 671 [(018) - 042 671]
Table 3d: Sample Object Table
AID Type Syntax ObjectlD
3 commonName caselgnoreString 2.5.4.3
4 surname caselgnoreString 2.5.4.4
12 title caselgnoreString 2.5.4.12
20 telephoneNumber telephoneNumber 2.5.4.20
Table 3e: Sample Attribute Table Distinguished Names
For the entry shown in the sample Object Table (Table 3d) two of the attributes, commonName and surname, are distinguished values (or naming values) which combine to form the RDN for the entry. This RDN is stored in the Hierarchy Table. Multi-valued Attributes
In X.500, it is permissible for an attribute to be multi-valued. The VID column is used to distinguish between values for an attribute. In the sample Object Table, the telephoneNumber attribute is multi-valued. 3.1 Mapping Services to SQL
9.1.1 Attribute Types and Values
Any data supplied by an X.500 service is supplied as a list of Objectld's and their associated values. These must be converted into AID'S (using the Attribute table) and normalized values (using the Object table) for use by the X.500 application. The database returns data as AID'S and Raw Values, which must then be converted into Objectld's and their associated values in the X.500 result.
3.1.2 Navigation
Each X.500 service supplies a Distinguished Name which is converted into an EID for use by the X.500 application. When the application processes a service it returns one or more EID's. These EID's can then be translated back into Distinguished Names in the X.500 result.
All X.500 services rely on navigating the directory tree. To navigate to a particular entry, the following procedure is performed: • Given the DN for the entry, locate the entry in the hierarchy table which has an RDN equal to the first RDN in the DN.
Store the EID.
Recursively, locate the entry which has an RDN equal to the next RDN in the DN and a parent equal to the stored EID. Navigate to the entry "Datacraft/Sales/Network Products/Peter Evans". This will result in a number of select statements, with each returned EID being used as the value of the PARENT in the next statement. select EID from HIERARCHY where PARENT = 0 and RDN = "DATACRAFT" select EID from HIERARCHY where PARENT = 1 and RDN = "SALES" select EID from HIERARCHY where PARENT = 11 and RDN = "NETWORK PRODUCTS" select EID from HIERARCHY where PARENT = 20 and RDN = "PETER EVANS" 3.1.3 Read
Selected attributes to be read can be supplied. Only the values of these attributes (if they are present in the entry) will be returned.
'Types only' can be selected as a read option, in which case no values will be returned. All types present in the entry, or those selected, will be returned.
Navigate to the entry to be read. Store the EID. In the Object Table, read the values of all rows which match the stored EID.
Example
Read the entry "Datacraft/HQ/Network Products" and return all types and values.
Navigate to the entry (as in 3.1.2) and then; select AID, VALUERAW from OBJECT where EID = 20
3.1.4 Compare
Compare returns a 'matched' or 'not matched' result. A raw value is input but the compare is performed using the normalized value. Navigate to the required entry. Store the EID. In the Object Table, test for a matching value in all rows which match the stored EID and the specified AID.
(RUL-26)
Figure imgf000026_0001
Figure imgf000027_0001
Compare the telephone Number "03 727 9256" with the entry "Datacraft/Sales/Network Products/Chris Masters". Navigate to the entry and then; select VALUERAW from OBJECT where EID = 30 and AID = 20 and VALUENORM = "03 727 9456" If a value is selected then return "matched" else return "not matched". 3.1.5 List
Navigate to the required entry. Store the EID. In the Hierarchy Table, return the RDN's for all rows with a parent matching the stored EID.
Exam le
List from the entry "Datacraft/Sales". Navigate to the entry and then; select NAMERAW from HIERARCHY where PARENT = 11 2ΛA Add Entry
Navigate to the required parent entry. Store the EID of the parent. Add a new EID to the Hierarchy table and add rows to the Object table for each value in the new entry.
E∑aπmis.
Add a new entry under the entry "Datacraft/Sales/Network Products". Navigate to the entry and then; insert into OBJECT
(EID, AID, VID, DISTING, VALUENORM, VALUERAW) values (33, 3, 1, 1, EDWIN MAHER, Edwin Maher) and insert into HIERARCHY (EID, PARENT, PATH, ALIAS, A-EID, NAMENORM, NAMERAW) values (33, 20, 1.11.20.33..0 ,0 , EDWIN MAHER, Edwin Maher) 3.1.7 Remove Entry
Navigate to the required entry. Check that the entry is a leaf on the tree, (ie check that it has no subordinate entries on the tree). Store the EID. Remove the entry from the Hierarchy table. In the Object Table, remove all rows which match the stored EID. Exam le
Remove an entry (with EID = 33) under the entry "DatacraπVSales/Network Products".
Navigate to the entry and then; delete from OBJECT where EID = 33 and delete from HIERARCHY where EID = 33 2 fi Modify Entry
Navigate to the required entry. Store the EID. In the Object Table, Add, Remove or Modify rows matching the stored EID. Example
Modify the entry "Datacraft/Sales/Network Products/Alana Morgan". Add value - title = "Branch Manager".
Navigate to the entry and then; select EID, AID, VID, VALUENORM from OBJECT where EID = 31 Test the returned rows for an attribute of title. If none exist, the attribute can be added, otherwise the attribute must be checked to see if it can be multi-valued and whether it already exists. Insert into OBJECT
(EID, AID, VID, DISTING, VALUENORM, VALUERAW) values (31 ,12,1 ,0, BRANCH MANAGER, Branch Manager). 2 L2 Modify RDN
Navigate to the required entry. Check that the new name (RDN) does not exist in the current level of the subtree (i.e. that the new DN is distinct). Store the EID. Modify the entry in the Hierarchy and Object tables. Example
Modify the RDN of the entry "Datacraft/Sales/Network Products/Chris Masters" to "Christine Masters". Navigate to the entry and then; select EID from HIERARCHY where PARENT = 20 and VALUENORM = "CHRISTINE MASTERS" If no entries are returned then the new RDN may be inserted. First set the old RDN to be a non-distinguished value, update OBJECT set DISTING = 0 where EID = 30 and VALUENORM = "CHRIS" and update HIERARCHY set NAMENORM = "CHRISTINE MASTERS" and set NAMERAW = "Christine Masters" where EID = 30 and insert into OBJECT
(EID, AID, VID, DISTING, VALUENORM, VALUERAW) values (30, 3, 1 , 1 , "CHRISTINE", "Christine")
3.2 Search Strategy
The most powerful and useful X.500 service is the search service. The search service allows an arbitrary complex filter to be applied over a portion of the Directory Information Tree (the search area). • A filter is a combination of one or more filter items connected by the operators AND, OR and NOT. For example; surname = "MASTERS" AND title = "SALES MANAGER" The Search area is the part of the tree that is covered by the scope of the search (base-object-only, one-level or whole-subtree).
One technique for resolving searches is to apply the filter and then to see if any matching entries are in the search area. In this case a filter is applied to the entire tree and EID's for all rows matching the filter are returned. Then, for each EID found, step search up through the hierarchy to see if the entry is a subordinate of the base object (i.e. the entry has a parent/grandparent/... that is the base object). If the number of matches is large and the subtree small this is very inefficient. This technique doesn't cope with aliases as an alias is not a parent of the object that it points to and many aliases may point to a single object.
A second strategy is to obtain a list of all EID's in the search area and then apply the filter to these EID's. If an alias is resolved that points outside of the original search area then the subtree pointed to by the alias is expanded and the EID's in that subtree are added to the list. The filter is then applied to the set of expanded EID's. This is very poor if the search area is large.
An innovation is to simultaneously apply the filter over the search area (instead of sequentially as in the two methods described above). This is called single pass resolution. This method is considered to provide considerable performance improvement over the above methods because the rows that are retrieved are those that satisfy both the filter and scope requirements of the search.
When performing a one level search the filter is applied to all entries that have a parent equal to the EID of the base object (for example; search where parent = 20 will apply the filter to entries 30, 31 and 32).
When performing a subtree search the path is used to expand the search area. The "path" of each entry is a string of numbers (e.g. "1.10.50.222." which indicates that entry 222 has a parent of 50, a grandparent of 10 and a great grandparent of 1 ). The path has the unique property that the path of an entry is a prefix of the path of all entries that are subordinate to the entry. That is the path of an entry forms the prefix of the paths of all entries in the subtree below the entry. Therefore when performing a subtree search we obtain the base object of the subtree and then apply the filter to all entries that have a path which is prefixed by the path of the base object (for example; to search for all entries under "Sales" we perform a search where PATH LIKE 1.11.%). Base Object Search: Navigate to the base object. Store the EID. In the Object Table, read nominated values from rows which match the stored EID where a filter criteria is satisfied, eg, telephone prefix - "727".
Example
Search from the base object "DatacraftJSales/Network Products" for an entry with surname = "MORGAN", using a "base-object-only" search.
Navigate to the base object and then; select AID, VALUERAW from OBJECT where EID = 20 and AID = 4 and NAMENORM = "MORGAN" One Level Search:
Navigate to the base object. Store the EID. Return the list of EID's which have a parent EID matching the stored EID (in Hierarchy table) and have values which satisfy the filter criteria (OBJECT table). In the Object Table, read nominated values for the returned EID's. Example
Search from the base object "Datacraft/Sales/Network Products" for an entry with surname = "MORGAN", using a "one-level-only" search. Navigate to the base object and then; select H.EID from HIERARCHY H, OBJECT O where PARENT = 20 and AID = 4 and NAMENORM = "MORGAN" and H.EID = O.EID then place the EID's returned into an EIDLIST and select AID, VALUERAW from OBJECT where EID in [EIDLIST] Subtree Search:
Navigate to the base object. Store the EID. Return the list of all EID's with a path like that of the base object (Hierarchy table) and have values which satisfy the filter criteria (OBJECT table). In the Object Table, read nominated values for the returned EID's.
Example
Search from the base object "Datacraft/Sales/Network Products" for an entry with surname = "MORGAN", using a "whole-subtree" search.
Navigate to the base object and then; select H.EID from HIERARCHY H, OBJECT O where PATH like "1.11.20.%" and AID = 4 and NAMENORM = "MORGAN" and H.EID = O.EID then place the EID's returned into an EIDLIST and select AID, VALUERAW from OBJECT where EID in [EIDLIST]
3.3 Aliases and Navigate Aliases are resolved during navigation if the "don't-dereference-alias" flag is not set and the service is not an update service (add, delete, modify, modifyRDN).
When an alias is discovered during navigation the alias must be resolved. That is, the object that the alias points to must be obtained. First we check the A_EID column of the Hierarchy table. If the A_EID is 0 then the object that the alias points to must be obtained from the Object table and this object must then be navigated to and the resultant EID stored in the A_EID column. If this is done successfully then the remainder of the path can be navigated. By storing the EID of the aliased object in the A_EID column of the Hierarchy table it is possible to avoid navigating to aliased objects. This can save time, especially if the aliased object is at a low level of the hierarchy.
3.4 Aliases and Search
Aliases are dereferenced during a search if the "search-aliases" flag in the search argument is set. The performance of the search service while dereferencing aliases becomes a two step process. Firstly, define the search area and then apply the filter to the entries within the search area. Aliases dereferenced as part of the search service can expand the search area to which the filter is applied. They also restrict the search area in that any dereferenced aliases are excluded from the search area. Aliases and OneLevel Search
If aliases are being dereferenced as part of a one level search and an alias entry is found then the alias must be resolved (using the Object table or the A_EID ). The aliased object is then added to the search area to which the filter is applied. In a oneLevel search where aliases are found the search area will consist of non-alias entries directly subordinate to the base object and all dereferenced aliases. Aliases and Subtree Search
If aliases are being dereferenced as part of a whole subtree search and an alias entry is found then the alias must be resolved (using the Object table or the A_EID) and this EID must then be treated as another base object, unless it is part of an already processed sub tree. When dereferencing aliases during a search the "Path" column can be used to find alias entries within a subtree join. If an alias entry is found that points outside of the current subtree then the subtree pointed to by the alias can also be searched for aliases. One property of the hierarchical tree structure is that each subtree is uniquely represented by a unique base object (i.e. subtrees do not overlap). When performing a subtree search we build up a list of base objects which define unique subtrees. If no aliases are found then the list will contain only one base object. If an alias is found that points outside of the subtree being processed then we add the aliased object to the list of base objects (unless one or more of the base objects are subordinate to the aliased object in which case the subordinate base object(s) are replaced by the aliased object). The search area will therefore consist of non-alias entries that have a path prefixed by the path of one of the base objects. 4. LOGICAL DESIGN
Whilst the Conceptual Design (see Table 4a) is sufficient to implement the X.500 functionality, further performance improvements can be made.
Hierarchy Table
EID Parent Path Alias A_EID NameNorm NameRaw Object Table
C EID AID VID Disting ValueNorm ValueRaw
Attribute Table
AID Type Syntax Objectld
Table 4a - Conceptual Design
Performance improvements in conventional relational design can be achieved because assumptions can be made about the data - the data is essentially fixed at the time an application is designed. In X.500, none of the data types are known. However performance improvements can still be made because assumptions can be made about the services - these are known at the time the X.500 application is designed.
With reference to Figure 2B, one innovative approach is to recognise that each table can be organised around the major service relationships (instead of around the major data relationships in conventional relational design). It shall be shown that the above tables can be decomposed into a number of smaller and more efficient tables as shown below.
DIT
EID PARENT ALIAS RDN
NAME
Figure imgf000034_0001
TREE
Figure imgf000034_0002
ALIAS
EID A_EID
SEARCH
EID AID VID DISTING NORM
ENTRY
EID AID VID RAW ATTR
AID SYNTAX DESC OBJECTID
Table 4b - Logical Design
4.1 Service Decomposition The practical reality for most RDBMS's is that big tables with many columns do not perform as well as smaller tables with fewer columns. The major reasons are to do with indexing options, I/O performance and table management (see Sections 4.5 and 4.6). This is why prior art relational design techniques aim to focus primary information into separate tables and derive secondary information via table joins (i.e. normalization and fragmentation techniques).
One innovation in achieving X.500 performance is to decompose the tables around primary service relationships and derive secondary services via joins. This process is called service decomposition. The following considerations are made: (1 ) Columns that have strong relationships are preferred to be kept together (to avoid unnecessary joins); (2) If the number of significant rows in a given column is independent of the other related columns, then that given column is a candidate for a separate table. (3) If a column is only used for locating information (input) or only used for returning results (output) then it is a candidate for its own table. (4) If a column is used as a key for more than one service then it is preferred to be a primary key and therefore in its own table (each table can have only one primary key). (5) Keys are preferred to be unique or at least strong (non-repetitious). A first level analysis of column usage is s IOWΠ in Table 4.1.
X.500 Table EID AID VID Value Value Parent Alias Name Name Path Service Norm Raw Norm Raw
Navigate H R S R S R
Read O S (S)/R R R R R
Compare O S S S
Ust H S R R
Search - O S/R S (S) (S) (S) filter
Search - S/R (S)/R R R R R result
Add H/O S
Remove H/O s
Modify O s S S S
Modify RDN H/O s S S S
Ta ble 4. 1 - Basic colum n usag e
Key to symbols in the above table: H - Hierarchy table O - Object table
S - Supplied value (used in the SQL for Searching the table) R - Returned value (value retrieved from the tables) ( ) - item may or may not be present depending on the options of the service. From the above information and further analysis, the Conceptual Design tables can be decomposed into a number of smaller tables as described in the following sections. 4.2 Hierarchy Table Decomposition
The Hierarchy table contains the following columns: I EJD I Parent Path I Alias A_EID NameNorm NameRaw
Table 4.2a - Hierarchy Table
The Hierarchy Table contains information about objects and their parents, their names, their absolute positions in the hierarchy and if they are aliases.
This table can therefore be split into four tables: DIT, NAME, TREE and ALIAS. The parent information is used for finding a given child or acting on entries that have a given parent. Finding a given child (e.g. Parent = 0, NameNorm = "DATACRAFT") is the basis for Navigation and update checking (checking for the existence of an object before an Add or ModifyRdn). Acting on entries that have a given parent is used during List or OneLevel Search. Thus the DIT (Directory Information Tree) table has information required for Navigation, but allows its PARENT column to be used by other services.
EID PARENT ALIAS RDN
Table 4.2b - DIT Table
An object is differentiated from its siblings via its Relative Distinguished Name (RDN). RDN's are returned for a List (in conjunction with a given Parent) or as part of a full Distinguished Name (Read, Search). Thus the NAME table has information required for returning names (the raw RDN).
EID RAW
Table 4.2c - NAME Table
An object's absolute position in the hierarchy is necessary for building DN's (from which the raw RDN's are retrieved) and for expanding subtrees during Search. Thus the TREE table has information about an entry's Path (the sequence of EID's down from the root).
EID PATH
Table 4.2d - TREE Table Alias information is cached so that every time an alias is encountered during Navigate it does not have to be repeatedly resolved. Thus the ALIAS table only contains entries that are aliases. It is also used during OneLevel Search (in conjunction with the DIT Parent column) and Subtree Search (in conjunction with the Path column) to determine if there are any aliases in the search area.
EID A_EID
Table 4.2e - ALIAS Table
4.3 Object Table Decomposition
The Object table contains the following columns:
EID AID VID Disting ValueNorm ValueRaw
Table 4.3a - Object Table
The Object Table essentially contains information for finding a particular value (e.g. AID = surname, ValueNorm = "HARVEY") and for retrieving values (e.g. AID = surname, ValueRaw = "Harvey"). This table can therefore be split into two tables: SEARCH and ENTRY.
The Search Table is used to resolve filters in the Search service. It is also used to find values during Compare, Modify and ModifyRDN. The Search table contains one row for each attribute value of each entry. Only the normalised values are stored in this table.
EID 1 AID VID 1 DISTING NORM
Table 4.3b- SEARCH Table
The Entry table is used to return values in Reads and Searches. The Entry table contains one row for each attribute value for each entry. The RAW value is the value exactly as initially supplied when the entry was added or modified.
EID I AID VID RAW
Table 4.3c- ENTRY Table 4.4 Attribute Table
The Attribute table is essentially the same as the Conceptual Design. In practice the "type" field is only descriptive, since any incoming/outgoing X.500 Object Identifier gets converted to/from the internal attribute identifier, AID. Thus this column has been renamed DESC to signify that it is a description field.
AID SYX DESC Objectld
Table 4.4 - ATTR Table
4.5 Index Selection
Performance when using SQL is achieved because the RDBMS is able to satisfy the query using a relevant index. This means that every query that has a condition (the "where" clause in SQL) is preferred to have an associated index
(otherwise the RDBMS has to resort to a table level scan). However in practical
RDMS's:
The number of indexes is restricted;
There may be a high overhead to maintain secondary indexes; • Composite indexes may be required to satisfy any one query. Thus, if performing a query across columns (e.g., type = surname and value = "SMITH") then separate indexes on type and value may not result in a fully indexed access. A composite index on both type and value may be required.
One innovation of the table decomposition in the previous sections is to maximise the use of primary indexes across tables. This reduces the number of secondary indexes (i.e. they become primary indexes on their own table).
Following is a list of the indexes for each of the six tables used in the logical design.
Table Primary Key Secondary Index
DIT PARENT, RDN EID
NAME EID
TREE PATH EID
SEARCH AID, NORM EID, AID, VID
ENTRY EID, AID, VID
ATTR (cached)
Table 4.5 - Table indexes for the Logical Design The table design means that many queries can be handled without joins, giving substantial performance improvement. The joins that are considered necessary are listed below:
List - for returning the RAW-RDNs under a given object (DIT joined with
NAME).
Search / Subtree - for finding EIDs that match a filter over a whole subtree
(where the base object is not the root) (TREE joined with SEARCH).
Search / OneLevel - for finding EIDs that match a filter one-level under the base object (DIT joined with SEARCH).
Search / Aliases / Subtree - for finding all the aliases in a subtree (TREE joined with ALIAS). • Search / Aliases / OneLevel - for finding all the aliases under a given object (DIT joined with ALIAS).
Note that the above joins are first level joins (i.e. between only two tables). It is preferable not to use higher order joins. 4.6 Input/Output Performance
An innovation of decomposing tables around services, which increases the number of tables, is that the new tables are much smaller than the
SUBSTITUTE SHEET (RULE 26 unfragmented tables. This can significantly reduce the amount of I/O for the following reasons: Row Size
By reducing the number of columns in any row, the row width will be shortened. This means that more rows will fit onto a page (where it is assumed that one disk I/O returns one "page" of information). In combination with clustering below, whenever a set of rows need to be retrieved, only one (or a few) page(s) may actually have to be read off the disk (e.g. when reading the attributes of an object, if the ENTRY table is keyed on EID, AID, VID then all the rows relating to that object will be together and will probably be on the same page). Clustering
Each of the fragmented tables is preferred to have their own (independent) primary key which enables them to cluster data according to how it is used. The primary key may dictate the "storage structure". Thus in the SEARCH table, if the primary key is on AID, NORM (i.e. type, value) then all the data of the same type (e.g. surname) and similar values (e.g. Harvey, Harrison) will be clustered in the same area of the disk. This means that during a Search (e.g. surnames beginning with "HAR") similar data will collected together on the one (or just a few) disk page(s). If the rows are small then the number of disk pages that have to be accessed is significantly reduced. Caching
Most commercial RDBMS's have the ability to cache pages frequently accessed. Since tables are effectively input (e.g. Navigating using the DIT table), or output (e.g. retrieving information from the ENTRY table) then similar requests (e.g. Searches over the same portion of the Tree) will tend to result in frequently used pages being cached, meaning frequently invoked queries will gain significant benefits. Also the caching is more efficient since pages are "information intensive" as a result of small row size and clustering. Management
Smaller tables are generally easier to manage: e.g. viewing, creating indexes, collecting statistics, auditing, backups, etc. S. LOGICAL METHODS
This section describes methods of interrogating the Logical Design tables, with reference to Figure 2B.
Throughout this section, each X.500 method is defined and illustrated with an example. Table 5a displays a small hierarchy tree which includes an alias reference. The corresponding Table contents are shown in Table 5b.
Figure imgf000041_0001
Table 5a - Simple Hierarchy Tree
DIT
EID PARENT ALIAS RDN
1 0 0 DATACRAFT
10 1 1 NETWORKS
1 1 1 0 SALES
12 1 0 MARKETING
20 1 1 0 NETWORK PRODUCTS
30 20 0 CHRIS MASTERS
31 20 0 ALANA MORGAN
32 20 0 PETER EVANS NAME
EID RAW
1 [Datacraft]
10 [Networks]
1 1 [Sales]
12 [Marketing]
20 [Network Products]
30 [Chris Masters]
31 [Alana Morgan]
32 [Peter Evans]
NOTE: [ .... ] indicates a binary encoding of the exact data entry value. TREE
EID PATH
1
10 1.10.
1 1 1.11.
12 1.12.
20 1.11.20.
30 1.11.20.30.
31 1 .11.20.31.
32 1 .1 1.20.32.
ALIAS
EID A-EID
10 20 ATTRIBUTE
AID SYX DESC OBJECTID
0 objectldentifierSyntax objectClass 2.5.4.0
1 distinguishedNameSyntax aliasedObjectName 2.5.4.1
3 caselgnoreStringSyntax commonName 2.5.4.3
4 caselgnoreStringSyntax surname 2.5.4.4
7 caselgnoreStringSyntax localityName 2.5.4.7
8 caselgnoreStringSyntax stateOrProvinceName 2.5.4.8
9 caselgnoreStringSyntax streetAddress 2.5.4.9
10 caselgnoreStringSyntax organizationName 2.5.4.10
1 1 caselgnoreStringSyntax organizationalUnitName 2.5.4.11
12 caselgnoreStringSyntax title 2.5.4.12
13 caselgnoreStringSyntax description 2.5.4.13
16 Postal Ad ress postalAddress 2.5.4.16
17 caselgnoreStringSyntax postalCode 2.5.4.17
18 caselgnoreStringSyntax postOfficeBox 2.5.4.18
20 telephoneNumberSyntax telephoneNumber 2.5.4.20
SEARCH
EID AID VID DISTING NORM
1 0 0 0 2.5.6.4
1 1 0 0 1 DATACRAFT
1 16 0 0 266-268 MAROONDAH HIGHWAY
1 17 0 0 3138
10 0 0 0 2.5.6.1
10 1 0 1 DATACRAFT / SALES / NETWORK PRODUCTS
1 1 0 0 0 2.5.6.5
1 1 1 1 0 1 SALES
1 1 13 0 0 SALES DEPARTMENT
12 0 0 0 2.5.6.5
12 1 1 0 1 MARKETING
12 13 0 0 MARKETING DEPARTMENT
20 0 0 0 2.5.6.5
20 1 1 0 1 NETWORK PRODUCTS
20 13 0 0 NETWORK PRODUCTS SECTION
30 0 0 0 2.5.6.7
30 3 0 1 CHRIS
30 4 0 1 MASTERS
30 12 0 0 SALES MANAGER
30 20 0 0 03 727 9456
30 20 1 0 018 042 671
31 0 0 0 2.5.6.7
31 3 0 1 ALANA
31 4 0 1 MORGAN
31 12 0 0 SALES SUPPORT
31 20 0 0 03 727 9455
32 0 0 0 2.5.6.7
32 3 0 1 PETER
32 4 0 1 EVANS
32 1 2 0 0 SALESPERSON
32 20 0 0 03 727 9454 ENTRY
EID AID VID RAW
1 0 0 [2.5.6.4]
1 10 0 [Datacraft]
1 16 0 [266-268 Maroondah Highway]
1 17 0 [3138]
10 0 0 [2.5.6.1]
10 1 0 [Datacraft / Sales / Network Products]
1 1 0 0 [2.5.6.5]
1 1 1 1 0 [Sales]
1 1 13 0 [Sales Department]
12 0 0 [2.5.6.5]
12 1 1 0 [Marketing]
12 13 0 [Marketing Department]
20 0 0 [2.5.6.5]
20 1 1 0 [Network Products]
20 13 0 [Network Products Section]
30 0 0 [2.5.6.7]
30 3 0 [Chris]
30 4 0 [Masters]
30 12 0 [Sales Manager]
30 20 0 [(03) 727-9456]
30 20 1 [(018) - 042 671]
31 0 0 [2.5.6.7]
31 3 0 [Alana]
31 4 0 [Morgan]
31 12 0 [Sales Support]
31 20 0 [(03) 727-9455]
32 0 0 [2.5.6.7]
32 3 0 [Peter]
32 4 0 [Evans]
32 12 0 [Salesperson]
32 20 0 [(03) 727-9454]
Ta Die 5b: Example Tables
NOTE: [ .... ] indicates a binary encoding of the exact data entry value. 5.1 Common Services Tree Navigation
All X.500 services rely on navigating the directory tree. The purpose of tree navigation is to retrieve the EID of the entry corresponding to the supplied Distinguished Name. Navigation begins from the root of the tree and continues down the tree until all the RDN's in a DN have been resolved (verified). This process is known as a "Tree Walk".
The DIT Table is the primary table used for tree navigation. Referring to the example hierarchy tree, resolution of the DN "Datacraft / Sales / Network Products / Peter Evans" involves the following processes:
Scan the DIT table for a row containing PARENT = 0 and RDN =
"DATACRAFT". The EID for this row is 1.
Scan the DIT table for a row containing PARENT = 1 and RDN =
"SALES". The EID for this row is 11. • Scan the DIT table for a row containing PARENT = 1 1 and RDN =
"NETWORK PRODUCTS". The EID for this row is 20.
Scan the DIT table for a row containing PARENT = 20 and RDN =
"PETER EVANS". The EID for this row is 32.
The DN has now been resolved and any values relating to the object can be obtained from the Entry Table using the key EID = 32. Aliases
Sometimes a DN can contain an alias, which is effectively another DN. Aliases complicate the tree walk process because the tree walk cannot continue until the alias is resolved. This requires a separate tree walk for the alias. As an example, consider the DN "Datacraft / Networks / Peter Evans".
The first two steps in resolving this DN would be:
Scan the DIT table for a row containing PARENT = 0 and RDN =
"DATACRAFT". The EID for this row is 1.
Scan the DIT table for a row containing PARENT = 1 and RDN = "Networks"
The EID for this row is 10. At this stage we discover that this entry is an alias. The Alias Table is checked to see if the EID of the alias has been cached. If this is the first time an attempt has been made to resolve this alias then the A_EID column in the Alias
Table will be zero. For the purpose of discussion it will be assumed that this is the first time.
To resolve the alias, the DN of the aliased object must be determined. This is stored in the "aliasedObjectName" attribute of the alias entry. The aliasedObjectName has an AID = 1 (from the ATTR table) and so the DN is obtained from the Entry Table (RAW value) where EID = 10 and AID = 1. In this example, the DN of the alias is "Datacraft / Sales / Network
Products". This DN is resolved completely using the normal tree walking technique. The value of EID is 20.
At this stage, navigation continues for the unresolved RDN's in the original DN, namely "PETER EVANS". The last step required is then: • Scan the DIT table for a row containing PARENT = 20 and RDN =
"PETER EVANS".
Once an alias has been resolved it can be added (cached) in the Alias Table. This table contains a reference, A_EID, to the aliased object. In the above example, an entry in the Alias Table with an EID of 10 would have an A_EID of 20. Once an alias has been cached a tree walk is no longer necessary to resolve the alias. Directory Paths
When objects are added to the DIT table, a corresponding row is added to another table called the Tree Table. This table stores the list of the EID's which identify a "Path" to the object. Distinguished Names
Most services require the distinguished name to be returned in the Service Result. Using the directory path from the Tree Table, a DN can be constructed from the RAW RDN values stored in the Name Table. Entry Information Selection
Many of the X.500 Services are requested with an argument called "EntrylnformationSelection" or EIS. The EIS argument is used to indicate what information in the Entry should be returned. Basically, EIS can be optionally; • no information
• attributes and values for selected or all attributes values only for selected or all attributes Entry information
Entry Information is a return parameter for Read and Search. It always contains the Distinguished Names of selected entries and, optionally, attributes and/or values as specified in the EIS argument of the request. Common Arguments
All of the X.500 Services pass a set of common arguments in the Service Request. Common Arguments contain information such as service controls (time limit and size limit), the DN of the requestor of the service and security information. Common Results
Some X.500 Services pass a set of common results in the Service Response. Common Results contain information such as security parameters, the DN of the performer of the service and an alias dereferenced flag. 5.2 Read Service
A Read operation is used to extract information from an explicitly identified entry.
X.500 definition
Argument Description
Name A Distinguished Name
EntrylnformationSelection The attributes and values to be returned (ie EIS)
Common Arguments
Result Description
Entry Information The DN plus any attributes and values returned
Common Results
Method
Perform a tree walk using the DIT table, resolving aliases if necessary. Obtain the base EID.
Using PATH from the Tree Table and the RAW RDN's from the Name
Table, build a DN.
If EIS specifies no attributes or values, just return the DN.
If EIS specifies ALL types and values, return the RAW values from the Entry Table for the matching EID.
If EIS specifies selected types and values, obtain the AID'S from the
Attribute Table and then return selected types and/or values for the matching EID . Example: Read the entry "Datacraft / Sales / Network Products / Peter Evans".
EIS is set to: attribute Types = allAttributes, I nfoTypes attributeTypesAndValues.
Using the DIT table perform a Tree Walk traversing EID's 1 , 1 1 , 20 and 32 for the normalised RDN's DATACRAFT, SALES, NETWORK PRODUCTS, PETER EVANS. The EID of the selected object is 32.
Extract the PATH from the Tree Table for EID = 32. The PATH is 1.11.20.32. Build aDN from the RAW values in the Name Table for EID's 1 , 11 , 20, 32.
Using the Entry Table and the Attribute Table, for each matching EID; return the OBJECTID's from the Attribute Table and the ASN.1 encoded RAW values from the Entry Table
2.5.4.0 [2.5.6.7] 2.5.4.3 [PETER] 2.5.4.4 [EVANS] 2.5.4.9 [SALESPERSON] 2.5.4.20 [(03) 727-9454] return the DN 5.3 Compare Service
A Compare operation is used to compare a value (which is supplied as an argument of the request) with the value(s) of a particular attribute type in a particular object entry.
X.500 definition
Argument Description
Name A Distinguished Name
AttributeValueAssertion The attribute type and value to be compared
Common Arguments
Result Description
DistinguishedName The DN of the selected object (returned if an alias is dereferenced) matched TRUE / FALSE result of compare fromEntry N/A
Common Results
Method
Perform a tree walk using the DIT table, resolving aliases if necessary.
Obtain the EID of the base object.
From the Attribute Table, obtain the AID of the attribute to be compared.
From the Entry Table, select the row(s) matching the EID and AID. • Compare the value.
Return TRUE or FALSE as the Compare result. If an alias is dereferenced, return the DN of the selected object, using the path from the Tree Table and the RAW RDN's from the Name Table. Example
Compare the DN "Datacraft / Sales / Network Products / Peter Evans" with a purported AttributeValueAssertion of "title = [Salesperson]".
Obtain the EID for the given DN using a TreeWalk. The EID of the selected object is 32.
Using the Attribute table, obtain the AID for "title", ie AID = 12. Using the Search Table locate rows with EID = 32 and AID = 12 and test for "NORM = SALESPERSON".
Return TRUE or FALSE depending on the outcome of this test. In this instance the result would be TRUE.
Since no aliases were dereferenced, the DN of the entry is not returned. 5.4 List Service A list operation is used to obtain a list of immediate subordinates of an explicitly identified entry.
X.500 definition
Argument Description
Name A Distinguished Name
Common Arguments
Result Description
DistinguishedName The DN of the selected object (returned if an alias is dereferenced) subordinates A list of RDN's for the subordinate entries (aliases, indicated by an alias flag, are not dereferenced) partialOutcomeQualifier An indication that an incomplete result was returned, eg, a time limit or size limit restriction.
Common Results
Method • Perform a tree walk using the DIT table, resolving aliases if necessary.
Obtain the EID of the base object. Using the DIT and Name Tables return the ALIAS flag and the RAW RDN
PARENT is equal to the EID of the base object. Example
Perform a list for the DN "Datacraft". Obtain the EID for the DN using a TreeWalk. The EID of the selected object is "1 ".
For each EID with a PARENT = 1 return the RAW RDN from the Name Table, ie, [Networks], [Sales],
[Marketing] • return the alias flags, ie, TRUE, FALSE, FALSE.
As no alias was dereferenced in the tree walk, the DN of the selected object is not returned. Note also that the alias entry [Networks] is not dereferenced. 5.5 Search Service The Search Service is the most complex of all X.500 services. Search arguments indicate where to start the search (baseObject), the scope of the search (subset), the conditions to apply (filter) and what information should be returned (selection). In addition, a flag is passed to indicate whether aliases should be dereferenced (searc Aliases). The possible values for subset are baseObject, oneLevel and wholeSubtree. Base object indicates that the search filter will only be applied to attributes and values within the base object. OneLevel indicates the Search filter will be applied to the immediate subordinates of the base object. Whole subtree indicates the Search filter will be applied to the base object and all of its subordinates.
A simple example of a filter condition would be: surname = "EVANS" or telephoneNumber PRESENT. X.500 definition
Argument Description baseObject The Distinguished Name of the baseObject subset baseObject, oneLevel or wholeSubtree filter search conditions searchAliases a flag to indicate whether aliases among subordinates of the base object should be dereferenced during the search. selection EIS as for READ. The attributes and values to be returned.
Common Arguments
Result Description
DistinguishedName The DN of the selected object (returned if an alias is dereferenced) entries Attributes & values (as defined in selection) for the entries which satisfy the filter. partialOutcomeQualifier An indication that an incomplete result was returned, eg, a time limit or size limit restriction.
Common Results
The search procedures for each search scope are outlined as follows: Base Object
Perform a tree walk using the DIT table, resolving aliases if necessary.
Obtain the EID of the base object.
Apply the filter to attributes and values in the Search Table with the EID of the selected object.
If the filter condition is matched, return the Entry Information from the
Entry Table.
If an alias is dereferenced, return the DN using the Tree Table to extract the PATH and the Name Table to build the DN. One Level
Perform a tree walk using the DIT table, resolving aliases if necessary. Obtain the EID of the base object.
Check to see if any aliases exist with PARENT = EID and if so resolve them to obtain an aliases dereferenced list.
Using the Search and DIT Tables, apply the filter (attribute/value conditions) and the scope (PARENT = EID of selected object and any aliases dereferenced). A list of matching EID's will be returned. If an alias is dereferenced, return the DN using the Tree Table to extract the PATH and the Name Table to build the DN.
For each matching EID:
• Return the Entry Information obtained from the Search Table using the Entry Table (as per Read Service).
Whole Subtree • Perform a tree walk using the DIT table, resolving aliases if necessary.
Obtain the EID of the base object.
Check to see if any aliases exist with PATH prefix matching the PATH of the selected object.
• For each alias discovered, check to see if the alias points outside the current subtree and if it does repeat the previous step. Once all aliases have been resolved, a set of unique base objects will have been found
(with no overlapping areas).
Using the Search and Tree Tables, apply the filter (attribute/value conditions) and the scope (PATH LIKE PATH prefix of the selected object) to each unique base object. A list of matching EID's will be returned.
If an alias is dereferenced during Navigation (not during searching), return the DN using the Tree Table to extract the PATH and the Name
Table to build the DN. For each matching EID:
Return the Entry Information obtained from the Search Table using the
Entry Table (as per Read Service). Examole.
Perform a search on the baseObject "Datacraft / Sales" with:
Scope set to WholeSubtree a Filter of "surname, substring initial = M". (Look for all surnames beginning with "M")
SearchAliases set to TRUE.
EIS set to attribute Types = allAttributes, InfoTypes = attributeTypesAndValues. Method Obtain the EID for the base object DN using a TreeWalk. The EID of the base object is "11".
From the Tree Table, obtain the PATH for EID = 11 , ie, "1.11".
Check for any aliases among entries that have a path beginning with "1.11.". There are no aliases in this case. Obtain the AID for the attribute "surname" in the Attribute Table, ie, 4.
Apply the filter and scope simultaneously, i.e. Using the Search Table, obtain a list of EID's from the target list where AID = 4 and the value begins with "M" joined with the Tree Table who's PATH is LIKE '1.11.%*. The matching EID's are 30 and 31. Using the Entry Table and the Attribute Table, for each matching EID: return the OBJECTID's from the Attribute Table and the ASN.1 encoded
RAW values from the Entry Table ie, 2.5.4.0, [2.5.6.7],
2.5.4.3, [Chris],
2.5.4.4 [Masters]
2.5.4.9 [Sales Manager]
2.5.4.20 [(03) 727-9456]
2.5.4.20 [(018) - 042 671]
2.5.4.0 [2.5.6.7]
2.5.4.3 [Alana]
2.5.4.4 [Morgan]
2.5.4.9 [Sales Support]
2.5.4.20 [(03) 727-9454] 5.6 Add Entry Service
An AddEntry operation is used to add a leaf entry either an object entry or an alias entry) to the Directory Information Tree.
X.500 definition
Argument Description object The Distinguished Name of the entry to be added entry A set of attributes to add
Common Arguments
Result Description
NULL NULL
Method
Using the DIT table, tree walk to the parent of the entry to be added (Parent EID).
Using the DIT table, check if the entry exists (check for RDN = new RDN and PARENT = Parent EID).
If the entry does not exist, allocate a new EID and add the entry. Insert into the DIT Table, the Name Table, the Tree Table, the Search Table, the Entry Table and, if it is an alias entry, the Alias Table. Example Under the object with a DN of "Datacraft / Marketing" add an object with the following attributes and values, surname [Delahunty] commonName [Mary] title [Marketing Manager] telephoneNumber [(03) 727-9523]
Obtain the EID for the base object DN using a TreeWalk. The EID of the base object is "12".
Using the DIT Table, look for a duplicate entry, ie, PARENT = 12 and RDN = "MARY DELAHUNTY". No duplicates exist. Add the following rows to the Tables shown. DIT
EID PARENT ALIAS RDN
33 1 1 0 MARY DELAHUNTY
NAME
EID RAW
33 [Mary Delahunty]
TREE
EID PATH
33 1 .12.21.
SEARCH
EID AID VID DISTING NORM
33 0 0 0 2.5.6.7
33 3 0 1 DELAHUNTY
33 4 0 1 MARY
33 12 0 0 MARKETING MANAGER
33 20 0 0 03 727 9523
ENTRY
EID AID VID RAW
33 0 0 [2.5.6.7]
33 3 0 [Delahunty]
33 4 0 [Mary]
33 12 0 [Marketing Manager]
33 20 0 [(03) 727-9523]
5.7 Remove Entry Service
A RemoveEntry operation is used to remove a leaf entry (either an object entry or an alias entry) from the Directory Information Tree. X.500 definition
Figure imgf000058_0001
Method
Perform a tree walk using the DIT table. Obtain the EID of the base object.
If the entry exists, and it is a leaf entry, then for the condition EID = EID of the selected object, delete from the DIT Table, the Name Table, the Tree Table, the Search Table, the Entry Table and, if it is an alias entry, the Alias Table. Example
Delete the object with a DN of "Datacraft / Marketing / Mary Delahunty" Method
Obtain the EID for the base object DN using a TreeWalk. The EID of the base object is "21". Check that no entries have PARENT = 21. Delete all rows added to the DIT Table, the Name Table, the Tree Table, the Search Table and the Entry Table (refer to Add Entry example) where EID = 21. 5.8 Modify Entry Service
The ModifyEntry operation is used to perform a series of one or more of the following modifications to a single entry: add a new attribute remove an attribute add attribute values remove attribute values • replace attribute values modify an alias X.500 definition
Figure imgf000059_0001
Method
Perform a tree walk using the DIT table. Obtain the EID of the selected object.
For the selected object, perform one or more of the following actions: Add Value, Delete Value, Add Attribute, Delete Attribute
The operations required for each action are as follows:
Add Value * If the attribute exists, add the value to the Entry Table and the Search
Table. Checks are: If the attribute is single valued test for an existing value; if the attribute is multi-valued check for a duplicate value. Delete Value
• For the Entry Table and the Search Table, if the value exists, delete it. A Distinguished Value cannot be deleted.
Add Attribute
If the attribute does not exist, add the Attribute Values to the Entry Table and the Search Table. Delete Attribute • For the Entry Table and the Search Table, if the attribute exists, delete it.
Delete all values with AID = attr and EID = base object. Naming attributes cannot be deleted.
Examols.
Modify the Entry "Datacraft / Sales / Network Products / Chris Masters" with the following changes: Delete Attribute and Value telephoneNumber 018 - 042 671
Modify Attribute and Value title Sales Assistant
The Search and Entry Tables reflect the changes.
SEARCH
EID AID VID DISTING N ORM
30 0 0 0 2.5.6.7
30 3 0 1 CHRIS
30 4 0 1 MASTERS
30 1 2 0 0 SALES ASSISTANT
30 20 0 0 03 727 9456
ENTRY
EID AID VID RAW
30 0 0 [2.5.6.7]
30 3 0 [Chris]
30 4 0 [Masters]
30 1 2 0 [Sales Assistant]
30 20 0 [(03) 727-9456]
5.9 Modify RDN Service
The ModifyRDN operation is used to change the Relative Distinguished Name of a leaf entry (either an object entry or an alias entry) from the Directory Information Tree.
Arguments Description object The Distinguished Name of the entry to be modified newRDN The new RDN of the entry deleteOldRDN flag - delete all values in the old RDN not in new RDN
Common Arguments
Result Description
NULL NULL Method
Perform a tree walk using the DIT table. Obtain the EID and Parent EID of the base object.
Using the DIT table, check for equivalent entries and return error if one is found. An equivalent entry has RDN = new RDN and PARENT = Parent
EID.
Using the Name Table, replace the old RDN with the new RDN.
Using the DIT Table, replace the old RDN with the new RDN.
Using the Entry Table, insert the new value. • Using the Search Table, locate value = old RDN and set DISTING to 0.
Insert the new value.
If deleteOldRDN is set to TRUE the procedures following the Tree Walk are as follows:
Using the DIT table, check for a sibling with the same name and an EID not equal to the base EID
Using the Name Table, replace the old RDN with the new RDN.
Using the DIT Table, replace the old RDN with the new RDN.
Using the Entry Table, delete the old value(s) and insert the new value(s). • Using the Search Table, delete the old value(s) and insert the new value(s). j &arripje.
Modify the RDN of "Datacraft / Sales / Network Products / Chris Masters". The new RDN is "Christine Masters". deleteOldRDN is set to FALSE.
The changes to the Tables will be as follows: DIT
EID PARENT ALIAS RDN
21 1 1 0 CHRISTINE MASTERS
NAME
Figure imgf000061_0001
SEARCH
EID AID VID DISTING NORM
30 0 0 0 2.5.6.7
30 3 0 1 CHRISTINE
30 3 1 0 CHRIS
30 4 0 1 MASTERS
30 12 0 0 SALES ASSISTANT
30 20 0 0 03 727 9456
ENTRY
EID AID VID RAW
30 0 0 [2.5.6.7]
30 3 0 [Christine]
30 3 1 [Chris]
30 4 0 [Masters]
30 12 0 [Sales Assistant]
30 20 0 [(03) 727-9456]
5,10 CQmpliςatipns
If error, limit or abandon occurs during processing of any of the sevices, then the processing is discontinued and an appropriate error message returned.
Errors Each X.500 service consists of 3 parts; ARGUMENT, RESULT and
ERRORS. In the above descriptions of the services, ARGUMENT and RESULT have been included in the X.500 definitions. Error conditions, however, are many and varied and no attempt is made to describe them in this document.
The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) document "Stable Implementation Agreements for Open Systems Interconnection Protocols:
Version 3" provides a full coverage of errors for the X.500 standard.
Time Limit & Size Limit
Time Limit and Size Limit form part of Service Controls. They can be optionally set to some finite limit and included in the Common Arguments. Time Limit indicates the maximum elapsed time, in seconds, within which the service shall be provided. Size Limit (only applicable to List and Search) indicates the maximum number of objects to be returned. If either limit is reached an error is reported. For a limit reached on a List or a Search, the result is an arbitrary selection of the accumulated results. Abandon
Operations that interrogate the Directory, ie Read, Compare, List and Search, may be abandoned using the Abandon operation if the user is no longer interested in the results. Aliases & Search
If an alias is encountered in a search and that alias points to a separate branch of the directory tree, then dereferencing of the alias requires:
Navigation from the root entry to the referenced entry
Searching of all items subordinate to the referenced entry In the example shown in Table 5.10, if a WholeSubtree Search was performed on a base object of "Telco / Corporate / Data Services" the entries "Mervyn Purvis" and the alias "Strategic" would be searched. Strategic, however, points to a different branch of the tree which requires searching of the entry "Strategic" and all of its subordinates, ie, "Alan Bond", "Rex Hunt", "Wayne Carey" and "John Longmire".
Figure imgf000064_0001
Table 5.10: A sample tree with an alias referencing a different branch of the tree
5.11 Implementation Optimizations The Logical methods include a number of optimizations that enhance performance. These methods are outlined below.
Caching
The Attribute table can be cached. This means that (apart from initial loading of the attributes) no SQL statements need to be issued to the database when decoding or encoding the attributes. In the present X.500 system attribute conversions are performed in memory. This provides a substantial speed advantage.
Validation
Query validation is performed in memory where possible. This avoids database rollbacks which are time and system consuming. For example when adding an entry each attribute is validated before any attempt is made to add the entry. If an error is found then no SQL calls need to be issued. Optimise Query Handling
As the format of most services is known, many instances of these services can be resolved using static SQL statements. More complex services, such as searches with complex filters, can be resolved using dynamic SQL. This enables arbitrarily complex searches to be performed. Parallel Queries
Also when processing search results the present system utilizes set orientation queries of SQL to avoid 'row at a time' processing. Thus search results may be assembled in parallel in memory. Data Storage
The tables that store raw data store the data in ASN.1 format. This provides an efficient means of transfering data into or out of the database. Database Techniques
Complex services can be further improved by using the query optimiser, which provides a mechanism for reducing the time spent in resolving the query. The use of a relational database also provides an efficient use of memory and enables large databases to be constructed without the need for large amounts of memory being available. Many other X.500 applications cache the entire database in memory to achieve performance. This method consumes large amounts of memory and is not scalable. 6. PHYSICAL DESIGN
The physical design results from a process called physical transformation of the logical design. The physical design represents a preferred realization or embodiment of the logical design. Figure 2B and the tables below show one form of the physical design. New columns and tables are highlighted by double borders. DIT
EID PARENT |RDNKEY| RDN I FLAGS |
NAME
EID RAW FLAGS |
TREE
EID ΓLEV1 I LEV2 LEV3 LEV4 PATH FLAGS
INFO
MAXEID J FLAGS
ALIAS
EID A_EID FLAGS!
SEARCH
EID AID VID |NORMKEY| NORM FLAGS |
ENTRY
EID AID VID RAW FLAGS
BLOB
|EID | AID | VID | VFRAG | RAW FLAGS |
ATTR
AID SYNTAX DESC OBJECTID FLAGS
SENTRY
Figure imgf000066_0001
OCLASS
OCID DESC OBJECTID MUSTLIS1 MAYLIST SUPERLIST FLAGS
Table 6 - Physical Design
The reasons for the above changes are described below. 6.1 Efficiency
INFO Table
This table holds the highest EID value that has been used in the database. The inclusion of the INFO table enables the next EID to be obtained without any calculation of the maximum EID being performed by the database. This provides improved efficiency in adding entries to the database. More importantly the inclusion of the INFO table removes contention problems which may occur when multiple DSA's are adding entries at the same time. Shadow Keys Three tables have had shadow keys added. These are: a) The NORMKEY column in the SEARCH table. b) The RDNKEY column in the DIT table. c) The LEV1 , LEV2, LEV3 and LEV4 columns in the TREE table. Each of these shadow key columns is a shortened version of a larger column. They have been added to shorten the indexes on each table. This gives improved performance for any queries that use the indexes and it also improves disk space usage as small indexes take up less space than large indexes.
The shadow keys in the PATH table utilise the structured nature of the PATH. By being a composite key then exact matching can be used in the SQL instead of the "LIKE" operator. e.g. WHERE LEV1 = 1 AND LEV2 = 10 AND ... instead of WHERE PATH LIKE '1.10.%'.
If each of the LEV columns has their own index, then a sub-tree search needs to only use the base object, e.g. LEV2=10, since all objects under entry 10 will have LEV2=10. SENTRY Table
Some types of attribute values do not need to be normalised e.g. integer, boolean, date. Instead of storing them twice (SEARCH. NORM and ENTRY.RAW) they can be stored just once in a hybrid table called the SENTRY table. This reduces table sizes and increases storage efficiency at the cost of having to search two tables and retrieve from two tables. OCLASS Table
Most attributes have a wide variation in their values e.g. surnames could range from AALDERS to ZYLA with a great many different values in between. However, Object Classes (whose values are Object Identifiers or OIDs) have very few values e.g. in an organisation of 10,000 people, the only object classes in the directory may be for organisation, organisationalUnit and organisationalPerson (of which many may be the latter). The OCLASS table gives a numeric descriptor to an object class called an OCID. The OCID can then be stored in the SENTRY table and a mapping done whenever an Object Class is searched or retrieved. The other LIST columns store standard object class configuration information - namely the must and may contain attributes and the inherited superclasses. 6.2 Portability BLOB Table This table has been included to hold "Binary Large Objects". The maximum size of a one row entry in the ENTRY table is limited by the length of the RAW field. This means that entries must be fragmented. Fragmented entries will occupy more than one row and so a VFRAG field must be used to denote the fragment of the entry that is being stored in a particular row. There are two options for storing very large values: a) Add a "fragment flag" to the ENTRY table and store the entry in fragments over a number of lines; or b) Add a BLOB table to store the entry and add a "BLOB flag" to the ENTRY table to indicate that this value is stored in the BLOB. The second option has a number of advantages. Firstly, the inclusion of a BLOB table prevents the ENTRY table from becoming excessively large. Generally most entries will be less than a few hundred characters in length, so the length of the RAW field in the ENTRY table can accordingly be reduced to cater for those entries and the RAW field in the BLOB table can be increased to a value approaching the maximum record size. This will make storage more efficient, i.e. reduce the amount of unused bytes in each column of each table and reduce the number of fragments needed for each entry in the BLOB table. It also means that each value will have only one entry in the ENTRY table and that the ENTRY and SEARCH tables maintain their one-to-one correlation. Secondly the use of a BLOB table enables the application to make use of any database support for Binary Large Objects, (e.g. 64K Binary Columns). 6.3 Functional Extensibility FLAGS Columns
FLAGS column(s) are preferred to be added. These column(s) have been added to provide extensibility to the design. Specific values can be added to the flags as new functionality is required, without changing the table structure. Note: a) In the SEARCH table, the DISTING field may be absorbed into the FLAGS field. b) In the DIT table, the ALIAS field may be absorbed into the FLAGS field.
The FLAGS column(s) may also provide a "summary" function for each of the tables. This means that the nature of an entry can be determined to some extent by checking the value of the FLAGS field. For example, a flag can be set, in the DIT table, when an entry is a leaf. Checking this flag is much simpler than checking for children of the entry.
The FLAGS column can also be used to store security information, whether an alias points inside its parents sub-tree, whether a value is a BLOB, etc.
7. EXAMPLE IMPLEMENTATION The following provides an example of system performance and capabilities. It is to be understood that the present inventions should not be limited to the following disclosure.
7.1 Overall system benefits
The present invention is considered to provide enhanced performance over prior art implementations. Performance can be appraised in many ways, including: aliases; size (use of relational theory); complexity (use of query optimiser and search method(s)); extensibility (use of meta-data); and substantially without degrading efficiency (use of disk based model) and reliability (use of RDBMS).
The present invention is considered unique in its ability to claim performance improvement in all areas noted above. 7.2 Test results Performance testing of the present invention has been carried out, with the objectives of:
Proving that an SQL based X.500 application can perform at subsecond speeds, dispelling a widely held myth in the marketplace that it is impossible to implement an X.500 DSA application as an integrated RDBMS application and achieve efficiency and performance.
Proving that the design of an SQL based X.500 application can outperform existing memory resident style X.500 designs, especially for databases in excess of 100K entries, a typical limit of current designs. Providing a structured suite of tests that can demonstrate the above performance on demand for a wide variety of services and database sizes. Test results reveal the following Table 7A:
Service Database Size (number of entries)
Operation Qualifier Detail 1 K 1 0 K 20 K 50K 1 00 K 200 K
BIND anonymous 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00
LIST level 1 4 hems 0.05 0.05 0.05 0.05 0.05 0.05 level 3 4 hems 0.06 0.06 0.06 0.06 0.06 0.06 level 4 100 items 0.22 0.23 0.23 0.24 0.23 0.24
READ level 4 1 hem, all info 0.07 0.07 0.07 0.07 0.07 0.08 level 4 (via alias) 1 hem, all info 0.07 0.07 0.07 0.07 0.07 0.07
SEARCH 1 level, equality 100 entries, 1 hem 0.12 0.12 0.12 0.12 0.13 0.13 1 level, inhial 100 entries, 1 hem 0.13 0.14 0.15 0.15 0.15 0.14 1 level, any 100 entries, 1 hem 0.30 0.35 0.33 0.32 0.36 0.29 1 level, final 100 entries, 1 hem 0.24 0.35 0.31 0.30 0.35 0.28 subtree, equality 1 K, 1 hem, level 1 0.11 0.11 0.11 0.11 0.11 0.11 10K, 1 item, level 1 XXX XXX 0.12 0.12 0.12 0.12 20K, 1 hem, level 1 XXX XXX XXX 0.12 0.13 0.12 50K, 1 item, level 1 XXX XXX XXX XXX 0.13 0.13 100K, 1 hem, level 1 XXX XXX XXX XXX XXX 0.12 subtree, initial 1 K, 1 hem, level 1 0.13 0.12 0.12 0.12 0.12 0.11 10K, 1 item, level 1 XXX XXX 0.11 0.12 0.12 0.12 20K, 1 item, level 1 XXX XXX XXX 0.13 0.12 0.12 50K, 1 item, level 1 XXX XXX XXX XXX 0.13 0.12 100K, 1 hem, level 1 XXX XXX XXX XXX XXX 0.11 full, complex OR all entries, 1 hem 0.09 0.09 0.09 0.09 0.09 0.09 full, complex AND all entries, 1 hem 0.11 0.11 0.11 0.11 0.11 0.1 1 full, complex OR AND all entries, 1 hem 0.26 0.28 0.29 0.28 0.29 0.26 full, complex AND/OR all entries, 1 hem 0.12 0.12 0.13 0.14 0.13 0.12 full, complex AND/AND all entries, 1 hem 0.16 0.15 0.16 0.17 0.18 0.18 full, complex all entries, 1 hem 0.18 0.18 0.18 0.19 0.20 0.26 AND/AND/AND full, equality all entries, 1 hem 0.08 0.08 0.08 0.08 0.08 0.08 full, no fitter, all-info all entries, 10 hems 0.30 0.74 0.43 0.59 0.49 0.67 full, no filter, all-info all entries, 100 items 1.36 1.84 1.50 1.79 1.82 1.86 full, initial all entries, 1 hem 0.08 0.08 0.08 0.08 0.08 0.08
ADD level 5 100 sisters 0.22 0.19 0.22 0.20 0.19 0.19
MODIFY level 5 100 sisters 0.09 0.11 0.11 0.11 0.11 0.1 1
RENAME level 5 100 sisters 0.15 0.16 0.15 0.16 0.16 0.15
DELETE level 5 100 sisters 0.17 0.16 0.17 0.17 0.17 0.19
UNBIND 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00
Table 7A Notes:
1. All searches and reads return all info
2. All tests were performed under the following environment;
Sun SparcStation 5 with 32Mb of memory (entry level UNIX machine)
Ingres 6.4/04 configured for 32 users (standard Ingres installation) DSA prototype V2.1.2
Timings measured at DSA console (ie does not include network overheads) All numbers are in units of seconds and "K" means 1 ,000's.
7.3 Test Conclusions
A set of directories was constructed ranging from 1 K to 200K entries with varying depth and width of the hierarchy, and a corresponding test plan was produced. The tests were performed a number of times to ensure consistency. The following conclusions can be drawn from these results;
1. The effects of navigation, in test, were negligible.
2. Reading an object via an alias, in test, showed no appreciable decrease in performance and in some cases reading an object via an alias was in fact faster than reading the object directly. This is due to the reduced navigation required when an alias points "down" to an object that is deeper in the tree structure than the alias entry.
3. Search results were "flat" over different sized subtrees in different sized directories for both exact and initial string searches.
4. Initial and exact full tree searches, in test, were slightly quicker than their respective subtree searches, even though the number of entries searched was greater. This is due to the fact that the full tree searches are able to use more efficient SQL (no table joins are required).
5. All services were, in test, performed in under one second, except for searches returning large amounts of data. However the average time of retrieval per entry drops as the number of entries retrieved increases (e.g for 10 entries retrieval time is approximately 50 milliseconds per entry, for 100 entries this drops to approximately 20 milliseconds per entry). 6. All complex searches, in test, were performed in under one second.
However, there may be some obscure searches (e.g containing combinations of NOT) which may not perform as well.
Because this is a disk based system (rather than a memory based system) performance is essentially only dependent on the number of entries actually returned. It is relatively independent of the search complexity, the depth of the hierarchy, the number of attributes per entry or the types of attributes used in the query. In a "live" application of the system it may be possible to improve on the achieved test results by tuning the caching parameters, and by having a greater diversity of attributes.

Claims

THE CLAIMS DEFINING THE INVENTION ARE AS FOLLOWS:
1. Apparatus adapted to implement X.500 to a relational database.
2. Apparatus as claimed in claim 1 , where the relational database is a RDBMS that uses SQL.
3. A database application implementing X.500 and using meta-data.
4. A database application as claimed in claim 3, wherein the meta-data is provided by a property table.
5. A database application as claimed in claim 3, wherein the meta-data is relatively independent of data type.
6. A database application as claimed in claim 3, wherein the meta-data is relatively independent of language alphabet.
7. A database application as claimed in claim 3, wherein the meta-data is normalised.
8. A relational database including an attribute, an object and a hierarchy table.
9. An apparatus adapted to perform X.500 service request(s) by a database application, the apparatus comprising: converting means for mapping the request(s) into one or more database queries, and evaluating means for evaluating the one or more queries using a RDBMS.
10. A method of searching an area in a database, the method comprising the steps of applying a filter and a scope.
11. A method of searching an area in a database which includes aliases, the method comprising the steps of: expanding the search area by resolving aliases until a set of search areas is found; and applying a filter and a scope to the set of search areas.
12. A method as claimed in claim 10 or 1 1 , wherein the database uses X.500.
13. A method as claimed in claim 10 ,11 or 12, wherein evaluating the filter and the scope is performed by single pass resolution.
14. A method of implementing X.500 to a relational database, the method comprising: processing arbitrary data using a fixed set of queries / services.
15. A method as claimed in claim 14, where the database is a relational database with SQL.
16. A method as claimed in claim 15, where the database has 250,000 or more entries.
17. A method of implementing X.500 on a relational database, the method comprising the step of applying functional decomposition to a property table.
18. A method as claimed in claim 17, further comprising the step of service decomposition.
19. A method as claimed in claim 18, further comprising the step of physical transformation.
20. A method of storing meta-data in a database to facilitate searching of the database, the method including the steps of: normalising the meta-data; and storing the normalised meta-data in the database.
21. A method as claimed in claim 20, further including the step of: indexing the normalised meta-data.
22. A method as herein disclosed.
23. An apparatus or device as herein disclosed.
24. A device or system incorporating the apparatus and / or method of any one of claims 1 to 23.
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