Inuendo, simply put, is a framework for virtualizing data down to the "piece of information" level. Traditionally, business data has been imprisoned in physical tables with fixed record layouts. The limitations of this type of rigid structure can inhibit companies from keeping their applications evolving at the same pace as their business requirements. By virtualizing the data instead, the majority of these limitations are eliminated, resulting in simpler development, maintenance and troubleshooting of applications.

Every piece of information, no matter how trivial it might seem, has an important story to tell. Therefore, Inuendo treats all business objects (a.k.a. Entities) exactly the same, regardless of their role in the supply chain. This allows entities of lesser obvious importance to produce equally valuable business intelligence.

The blueprint of any Inuendo entity is a class definition comprised of properties – a concept similar to object oriented design, except that instead of using code, Inuendo uses data. Each property conforms to a specified data type. When an entity is instantiated (created), its unique identity and high priority metadata are stored in a header record. The values of its properties are stored vertically in an associative manner (by nickname) in a series of subtables – one table per data type. As the values of properties change over time, each change is recorded chronologically in the subtables, providing a time indexed history at the property level. This is extremely useful in troubleshooting and trend analysis. In addition, the scattering of data in this fashion provides a layer of security not possible with traditional linear record formats.

As its name and logo suggests, Inuendo begins and ends with I/O (input/output). Therefore, in order to provide applications a simple and consistent way to extract and manipulate its scattered data, it is accompanied by a wealth of open source API’s to perform tasks such as entity creation and property value assignment. Various stored procedures produce result sets with useful collections of data organized from the header and subtables.

Despite the fact that Inuendo is being deployed in live applications, it is still a work in progress. Please consider joining our grass roots effort to virtualize data by becoming a member of our LinkedIn group (Inuendo - Data's New Direction) and contributing your technical expertise here on GitHub to help us improve the functionality of Inuendo for all.