A developmental model for data translation
James P. Fry, Randall L. Frank, Ernest A. Hershey · 1972
A model for generalized data translation is presented. Data translation is defined as “the process whereby data stored in a form that can be processed on one computer (the source file) can be translated into a form (target file) which can be used by the same or different processing systems on a possibly different computer.” Inputs to the Data Translator are the source data and two descriptive languages which drive the translation process. A description of the source and target data is presented to the data translator in a Stored Data Definition Language (SDDL). This description includes both the logical (data structure) aspects of the data as well as the physical (storage structure) aspects. A Translation Definition Language (TDL) is used to define the source to target translation parameters.