Object Oriented Database experiences?

Question

I'm doing a research project, part of which is concerend with object oriented databases. I would like to hear from anyone who has experience using such databases, or considered using them but opted to go for a different approach.

What did you like?
What didn't you like?
What made you choose using the approach you ended up using?
When do you think OODBs are the way to go?
When aren't they?

I'd like to hear your experiences.

PS. I'm am aware of this post asking a similar question, but I'm specifically looking for experiences and informed opinions.

Answer 1

Hi,

I used VO2 (a opensource project on sourceforge). It was back in 1998.

What did you like?

The code was much cleaner that JDBC code (now we could use hibernate, but that wasn't the case at the time).

What didn't you like?

It was a little harder for new developer to learn that plain JDBC.

What made you choose using the approach you ended up using?

I didn't make the choice, the choice was already made. The choice was in part motivated by theoretical advantage of OO database, but I think the pleasure to play with cool stuff may have been a influence.

When do you think OODBs are the way to go?

I don't have specific case in mind.

When aren't they?

In our case, we need to install our database at our client site. The potential client were reluctant to have their data in non standard format. They would have feel a lot more comfortable with a SQL database.