A strategy for adding fuzzy types to an object-oriented database system

Fuzzy types have been developed as a new way of managing fuzzy structures. With types of this kind, properties are ordered on different levels of prec ision or amplitude, according to their relationship with the concept repres ented by the type. In order to implement this new tool, two different strat egies can be followed. On the one hand, a new system incorporating fuzzy ty pes as an intrinsic capability can be developed. On the other hand, a new l ayer that implements fuzzy types can be added to an existing object-oriente d database system (OODB). This paper shows how the typical classes of an OO DB can be used to represent a fuzzy type and how the mechanisms of instanti ation and inheritance can be modeled using this kind of new type on an OODB . (C) 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.