A functional programming-directed database machine (Q750140)

The paper describes a non von Neumann computer architecture and its use for database application. The architecture includes an FFP machine, a general-purpose computer as a buffer between the secondary storage of the system and the FFP machine. This machine is a small-grain, cellular tree machine that directly executes formal functional languages. After a short review of functional programming notions (Section 2), the FFP machine and its extension for relational database processing is described (Section 3). Special care is given to performance characteristics of the FFP machine. Section 4 presents a technique to embed SQL queries in FFP programs. The main Sections 5 and 6 contain implementation of selected operations of the relational algebra (projection, selection and join). The author also analyses different degrees of parallelism. In Section 7 I/O architectures and memory issues are discussed. The paper concludes by enumerating some application areas for the suggested the area of database architecture (expert database systems, CAD/CAM databases, VLSI technology). In any case, the paper offers an interesting contribution to the area of database machines.