Object-oriented database access via reflection

The object-oriented programming language Java is an ideal companion to an object-oriented database system. This paper describes our approach to provide an almost seamless application programmer interface that allows Java programs to exchange objects with a database. Unlike other approaches that add persistence capabilities to Java, our approach does not change the Java language nor does it require changes to the Java Virtual Machine. We use reflection, i.e. self-inspection and change of a running program, to map Java classes to database classes, and to enable persistence. The result is a very flexible and efficient style of Java database access