The design of this on-line archive system is based on the existing resources available to the SMA; this includes software, hardware and manpower. Therefore the cost in the data processing can be minimized. We also consider that the final system (at least the software part) must be portable and hardware independent. Our goal is to create a system that can be easy to maintain and upgrade.
A key commercial database management system (DBMS) that has been used at the SMA is Sybase. Recently, this system has been upgraded to the Sybase SQL Server System 11 at both the Cambridge site and the Mauna Kea site. This relational DBMS (or RDBMS) provides a good development environment for enterprise client/server application. The database software discussed in this memo utilizes the RDBMS.