Mobile service data objects are technologies that allow access to heterogeneous data in uniform ways (Rouse, 2007). It allows for the access and manipulation of data from sources such as web services, rational databases, and XML documents. Some of the useful features of service data objects include providing metadata API, integrating and supporting XML, decoupling of data access code, incorporating best practices and J2EE, the unification of data application development, and simplification of J2EE data programming (Rouse, 2007).
The service data objects’ (SDO) components include SDO clients, data mediator services, data sources, data objects, and data graphs (Portier & Budinsky, 2004). The components help it to maintain data between the application and the database server. SDO clients work with data by using SDO frameworks. They use API and SDO programming model instead of frameworks and APIs that are technology specific. They also work on SDO graphs without the knowledge of whether data is serialized or not (Portier & Budinsky, 2004). Data Mediators services update data sources and create data graphs. Examples of data mediator services are XML, entity EJB, and a JDBC. Data sources have data in different formats. SDO applications do not access data sources, but DMSs do. Mobile service data objects work in data graphs, and specifically with data objects.
The most important components of the mobile service data objects are data objects. They are the SDO’s structured data representation (Portier & Budinsky, 2004). Data objects are contained in data graphs and are linked together. For SDO clients, data graphs are produced by DMS. They are sent back to the DMS once modified to update the data source. SDO clients are capable of modifying and reading data objects by traversing the data graphs. When being moved from the application and saved to disk or the DMS, there is a serialization process on the data graphs (Portier & Budinsky, 2004).
- Portier, B., & Budinsky, F. (2004, September 28). Introduction to service data objects. Retrieved October 4, 2018, from https://www.ibm.com/developerworks/library/j-sdo/index.html
- Rouse, M. (2007, August). What is service data objects (SDO)? – Definition from WhatIs.com. Retrieved October 4, 2018, from https://searchmicroservices.techtarget.com/definition/Service-Data-Objects-SDO