I am the architect of the data-replication products for IBM's DB2 family of database managers, so I am disappointed that I did not see IBM products represented in ``The Changing World of EIS'' by Karen Watterson (June). IBM is the only DBMS vendor supporting differential refresh function among mainframe relational and nonrelational databases, midrange and Unix databases, and PC databases.
DEC was the first relational database vendor to have snapshot support in an RDBMS, with a product called VAX Data Distributor, around 1987. Terminology in the industry changed when Sybase dropped the term database snapshot and began using data replication. So, if you search for early references in the field, you will find them by looking for the snapshot keyword.
Rob Goldring
Architect, IBM Data Propagation Products
Santa Teres
a, CA
Flexible C++
Matthew Wilson
My approach to software engineering is far more pragmatic than it
is
theoretical--and no language better exemplifies this than C++.
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