Object management system for digital libraries

Abstract

An object management system for storing persistent object oriented objects, includes an object vault, a structural type manager and a digital library. The object vault is connected to the structural type manager and the digital library is connected to the structural type manager. An application program is connected to the object vault. Objects to be stored are represented as a Key Value Dictionary (KVD) in which attributes, or metadata, relating to the objects are stored as key-value pairs. Objects are categorized as having different structural types in which certain attributes for objects having the same structural type are cataloged to facilitate indexing and searching for the objects. The structural type manager maintains a mapping between structural types and a subset of keys for the structural types as well as corresponding database references for cataloging the object attributes. Also disclosed is a method of storing objects in the digital library where the corresponding database references for the subset of keys are retrieved from the structural type manager. The values corresponding to the subset of keys are retrieved from the Key Value Dictionary and stored in the library catalog. The Key Value Dictionary is serialized and stored in the digital library, and a signature is returned. The object stored in the digital library is retrieved by locating the objected based on the cataloged key values. Preferably the persistent objects are Java programming language objects.