Run-time support and storage management for memory-mapped persistent objects

The authors present the design and implementation of a persistent store called SPOMS. SPOMS is a runtime system that provides a store for persistent objects and is language independent. The objects are created via calls to SPOMS, and, when used, SPOMS directly maps them into the spaces of all requesting processes. The objects are stored in native format and are concurrently sharable. The store can handle distributed applications. The system uses the concept of a compiled class to manage persistent objects. The compiled class is a template that is used to create and store objects in a language independent manner and so that object reuse can occur without recompilation or relinking of an application that uses it. A prototype of SPOMS has been built on top of the Mach operating system. The motivations, the design, and implementation details are presented. Related and future work are discussed