Objects and roles in the stack-based approach

Abstract

In the paper we propose a new approach to the concept of dynamic object roles. The approach assumes, among others, that: a role is a distinguished subobject for an object; a role dynamically inherits attributes’ values and methods of its parent object; objects can be accessed by their names as well as by the names of their roles. The paper focuses on implications of this concept for an object data model and for an object data store. We also explain how it fits with other modern notions from the conceptual modeling field. Finally, we discuss some issues concerning a query language for the object data model with roles.