Rational Brings Objects

Modeling tool will provide new way to build database applications

By Rich Levin

ational Software this week will launch a new edition of its flagship Rose modeling tool that adds support for Oracle8 object-relational modeling. The release, an extension of Rational Rose 4.0, fills a void left by Oracle when it spiked its Sedona project earlier this month ( IW, Sept. 15, p. 168 ), and provides a change in the way IT teams can build database applications.

"The traditional technique uses object-oriented tools to build applications, and relational data modeling tools to build the database schema," says Geof f Zeiss, a director of software engineering with MCI Systemhouse in Ottawa. Now, IT managers can leverage a common tool and common models. "This is a convergence, where you can use one tool and one team to develop both the application and the underlying schema," Zeiss says.

That could help increase the scalability of the applications. "The data store is core to an application architecture," says J.P. Morgenthal, an analyst with NC.Focus, an IT consulting firm in Hewlett, N.Y. "A badly designed database can result in terrible performance and large memory and disk requirements, as well as difficulty maintaining and updating the database."

While integrated object modeling tools make the development process simpler, Morgenthal says using them requires a broader skill set. "Everybody's got to know how to speak UML (Unified Modeling Language), and have an understanding of the database application, network, storage, and systems architecture that they are going to use," he says. "That's the benefit of UML, b ut if you're not going to take advantage of that, then don't bother putting the tool in."

Rational Rose for Oracle8 is priced at $2,400 and will ship in October.

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