The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Sep. 17, 2002
Filed:
Feb. 11, 1999
Justin H. Hill, Durham, NC (US);
Timo J. Salo, Apex, NC (US);
IBM Corporation, Armonk, NY (US);
Abstract
A technique for creating and using a structured cache to increase the efficiency of reading persistent objects from a database. The structured cache is comprised of an object cache, an associations cache, and a data cache. Data read-ahead is used to retrieve rows from a relational database in advance of an application's need for the data. Entries are created in the data cache and association cache as the rows are processed. The data cache stores data in unstructured binary format, delaying the expense of instantiation until an object is requested by the application. At that time, data is retrieved from the data cache, an object is instantiated from the data, and an entry is created in the object cache. This approach also saves storage space that would be wasted if objects were instantiated upon retrieval, but never used. The association cache stores members of an association, organized by member key within owner key for each association. According to the preferred embodiment, maintaining cache consistency is not required, further increasing the efficiency gains that can be realized using this technique.