QUERYING HETEROGENEOUS DATA SOURCES DISTRIBUTED OVER A NETWORK USING CONTEXT INTERCHANGE AND DATA EXTRACTION

摘要

A system for querying disparate, heterogeneous data sources over a network includes a request translator and a data translator. The request translator translates a request having an associated data context declared by the requester into a query having a second data context associated with it. The second context is also associated with, and is declared by, at least one of the disparate data sources. This system also includes a data translator, which translates received data from the data context declared by the data source queried into the data context associated with the request. In this manner, structured queries may be used to access both traditional, relational data bases as well as non-traditional, semi-structured data bases such as web sites and flat files, thereby increasing the number of data bases available to a user in a transparent manner. A related method for querying disparate data sources over a network is also described.