Modern Federated Database Systems: An Overview

TLDR

Modern applications handle diverse datasets, yet one‑size‑fits‑all approaches fail to address the heterogeneity of data models, storage systems, and processing frameworks that have emerged with NoSQL stores, distributed file systems, and new processing engines. This survey aims to provide an overview of the current state of modern federated database systems. The authors review existing tools, outline guidelines for building federated solutions, and identify future research challenges. The survey offers foundational knowledge for researchers and practitioners in the field.

Abstract

Usually, modern applications manipulate datasets with diverse models, usages, and storages. “One size fits all” approaches are not sufficient for heterogeneous data, storages, and schemes. The rise of new kinds of data stores and processing, like NoSQL data stores, distributed file systems, and new data processing frameworks, brought new possibilities to meet this scenario’s requirements. However, semantic, schema and storage heterogeneity, autonomy, and distributed processing are still among the main concerns when building data-driven applications. This work surveys the literature aiming at giving an overview of the state of the art of modern federated database systems. It presents the background, characterizes existing tools, depicts guidelines one should follow when creating solutions, and points out research challenges to consider in future work. This work gives fundamentals for researchers and practitioners in the area.