Data Model Evolution Using Object-NoSQL Mappers: Folklore or State-of-the-Art?

摘要

In big data software engineering, the schema flexibility of NoSQL document stores is a major selling point: When the document store itself does not actively manage a schema, the data model is maintained within the application. Just like object-relational mappers for relational databases, object-NoSQL mappers are part of professional software development with NoSQL document stores. Some mappers go beyond merely loading and storing Java objects: Using dedicated evolution annotations, developers may conveniently add, remove, or rename attributes from stored objects, and also conduct more complex transformations. In this paper, we analyze the dissemination of this technology in Java open source projects. While we find evidence on GitHub that evolution annotations are indeed being used, developers do not employ them so much for evolving the data model, but to solve different tasks instead. Our observations trigger interesting questions for further research.