Enterprise databases support for products development using Open Source Software.

Rosu, Marius Sebastian ; Guran, Marius ; Rosu, Luminita 等

Abstract: Today, in the enterprises, an important problem is the software acquisition cost. In many cases the companies take different software product and after that they observe than these products become unnecessary in short time. A solution is Open Source Software usage because these products could be taken for free (e.g. Internet download), tested, modified, improved and redistributed. This paper presents an example of this software products implementation at the enterprise level. Key words: enterprise database, middleware, opens source software, object-relational database

1. INTRODUCTION

In the 21st century, the enterprises continuous implement IT strategies & architectures to improve manufacture, research, products quality, sales, and services and to control costs. All enterprises have now a local area network, an intranet or/and Internet, servers and workstations for operations, administration and management working together for the same objective: profits. As a result of a new product development paradigm, there is a greater need for software tools to effectively support the formal representation, collect and exchange of product information during the product development stage (Dragoi et al., 2005). The enterprise could obtain many important dates and information's requested to be know in the products development process as well as another specifics enterprise internal and external processes (see figure 1) (Dragoi, 2003) unless employees used different (specialized) updated database as well as: Materials Database for materials, raw materials and equipment structured by producers for Technical & Manufacturing Department, Material Supply and Commercial Departments, Codes, Standards & Technical Specifications Database for all applicable technical documentations, Laws in Force Database for Legal Department and Management Team, Competitors Product Database for Marketing and Research Development Departments, Employees Database for Human Resources Department and Management Team, etc.

[FIGURE 1 OMITTED]

2. THE DATABASE AND USER INTERFACE

A database is a structured data files system. To add, access and process database information's it is requested a database administration system (e.g. Oracle, MySQL, PostgreSQL, Interbase). PostgreSQL is an object-relational database management system developed at the University of California at Berkeley Computer Science Department (download from www.postgresql.org). PostgreSQL uses client/server architecture. A PostgreSQL session consists of the following co-operating processes (Darie et al., 2006):

* A server process, which manages the database files, accepts connections to the database from client applications, and performs actions on the database on behalf of the clients.

* The user's client applications that want to perform database operations. Client applications can be much diversified: a client could be a text-oriented tool, a graphical application, a web server that accessed the database to display web pages or a specialized database maintenance tool.

PostgreSQL use the SQL language (Structured Querry Language, the most prevalent standardized language for database interrogation). SQL standard language is very accessible in the Linux medium because this language has a simple interface. SQL language under PostgreSQL accept SQL instructions such as create, erase from database, create, modifiy and erase from tables, modify, insert and erase of recordings, recordings selection from different table and different base from database.

All PostgreSQL features are supported by graphical interface of PgAdmin III (see PostgreSQL Table Company in figure 2), interface who makes administration to be very easy. PgAdmin III (download from www.pgadmin.org) is Free Software under the Artistic License (approved by OSI) and is designed to satisfy all users' requirements, from simple SQL queries writing to complex databases developing.

[FIGURE 2 OMITTED]

The user interfaces are indicating to be simple to use, friendly, attractive, without many graphical pictures or animations because that could make loading operation to be slower. For the forms can be used different languages as HTML (HyperText Markup Language), CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) or JavaScript. Easy to be used is HTML because this language can be edited in any text editor software and integrated the PHP script. The most used HTML editors are Notepad for Windows and Pico for Linux. HTML is one of first WWW (World Wide Web) fundamental elements and describe primary format in which documents are distributed and visualized on the Web. Between his advantages we specify the platform independence, hypertext links and documents conformation. HTML documents are ASCII Format documents and can be created with any texts editor. HiperText means that any word, phrase, picture or any document element seen by user can make reference to another document. This property facilitates navigation between multiple documents or same kind internal documents. The strict documents structure admits their conversion from a format in another as well as databases formed by these query.

3. MIDDLEWARE

After database finalized, the follow step is data introduction and visualization. Generally, there are different employees who make these operations. Few employees introduce data in the database and for visualization there is one or many person from each department of the enterprise who can see the data from database according to assigned roles of the database manager. But, for these operations is needed a language whom can translate the browser request, to process these request, to interact with another software on server for requests satisfy and to server indicate exactly which need to send back to users browser. These languages, which work with the server and can execute these, are middleware. In the middleware languages class we have ASP, Perl, PHP and ColdFusion. PHP (Hypertext Preprocessor) program is Open Source (download from www.php.net), server-side, web scripting software. You can use, modify and redistribute free this product. To work with PHP a HTTP (HyperText Transport Protocol) server for application rolling is needed (see figure 3).

[FIGURE 3 OMITTED]

Our choice was Apache (download from httpd.apache.org) for the flexibility, portability, safety and extensibility. Apache has Apache Software License. This license is similar with BSD License but is forbidden to put the name Apache in derived products without Apache Software Foundation accord (www.opensource.com). It was used PHP and Apache for Linux. PHP is a scripting language specialized for application developing through code integration in the HTML document. PHP syntax derived from C, Java and Perl. The difference between PHP and other similar products, such as JavaScript is that PHP works on the server when JavaScript works on the user computer. In figure 4 is presented an example of the dates introducing in the company table using PHP language.

4. CONCLUSION

We describe here few Open Source Software products and an implementation method. Database developing using these method request an application server and a database server. It is very well that the management team knows from the beginning the (human and material) costs implied during the project. Must be known than open source products aren't in all cases better then commercial software. There are Open Source software solutions that excel any commercial alternative as performance, but there are also inferior Open Source solutions to similar commercial ones. Generally, to realize and to implement a database project are requisite a period within few months and few years. Certainly, in the actual market the price makes the rules. Enterprise software solution is determined by shrift, medium or long-term calculation. Decision can be taken as a consequence of a comparative analysis. In the future, we intend to study the databases implementation methods with different open source software in order to optimize the hardware equipment requirements for these solutions, as well as other applications which can be developed with these products.

5. REFERENCES

Dragoi, G., Cotet, C. E., Patrascu, G., Rosu, L., Rosu, S. M., Internet/Intranet/Extranet-based systems for virtual product development environment in the CESICED platform, in the Proceedings of the 8th Conference on Management of Innovative Technologies (MIT'2005), 24th --26th September 2005, pp. 67-72, ISBN 961-6238-96-5, Fiesa--Piran, Slovenia.

Dragoi, G., Intreprinderea integrata: metode, modele, tehnici si instrumente moderne de dezvoltare si realizare a produselor, (Integrated enterprise: methods, models, modern techniques and instruments of products development) Edited by POLITEHNICAPRESS, ISBN 973-8449-25-1, Bucharest, 2003.

Darie, C., Balanescu, E., Bucica, M., Beginning PHP and PostgreSQL E-Commerce: From Novice to Professional, ISBN 1-59059-648-x, Apress, December 2006.

www.opensource.org

www.postgresql.org

Fig. 4. PHP language

<?php
// Database connecting
 $db=pg_pconnect
 ("host=... port=... user=... password=...
dbname=...");
 if (!$db) {
 print("Connection Failed.");
 exit;
}
// Variable conversion
$company_name=$_POST
['company_name'] ;
... ... ...
$data=$_POST
['data'];
// Insert the information into the table company
$query = "INSERT INTO company VALUES
{'$company_name', ... '$data'); ";
// Company connecting
$result = pg_exec($db, $query);
 if (!$result)
{
 echo "No result set returned!";
 exit;
}
$rows=pg_numrows($result);
 if (!$rows = 0) {
 echo "Add Failed.";
 exit;
}
// Convert the variables from HTTP request parameters
$query = "SELECT * FORM company WHERE \"company_name\"
'$company_name';";
$result = pg_exec($dbr $query);
$row = pg_fetch_row($result, 0) ;
$company_nameResult = $row[0] ;
... ...
$dataResult = $row[10];
echo "Company name: = $company_nameResult<BR>";
... ...
echo "Others information: [bar] $dataResult<BR>";
 pg_close();
?>