The BUCKY object-relational benchmark

Abstract

According to various trade journals and corporate marketing machines, we are now on the verge of a revolution—the object-relational database revolution. Since we believe that no one should face a revolution without appropriate armaments, this paper presents BUCKY, a new benchmark for object-relational database systems. BUCKY is a query-oriented benchmark that tests many of the key features offered by object-relational systems, including row types and inheritance, references and path expressions, sets of atomic values and of references, methods and late binding, and user-defined abstract data types and their methods. To test the maturity of object-relational technology relative to relational technology, we provide both an object-relational version of BUCKY and a relational equivalent thereof (i.e., a relational BUCKY simulation). Finally, we briefly discuss the initial performance results and lessons that resulted from applying BUCKY to one of the early object-relational database system products.