Book excerpt: Solutions for Networked Databases: How to Move from Heterogeneous Structures to Federated Concepts reviews developments in standards and ad hoc solutions aimed at providing cross-database connectivity for networked databases. The emphasis is on how to move from heterogeneous structures to federated concepts. The advent of the multidatabase is discussed, along with schemata, dictionaries, and protocols. Applications with federated databases are also considered. Comprised of 18 chapters, this book begins with an introduction to database and knowledge bank concepts; reliability and availability characteristics; and the synergy necessary to create and sustain federated databases. Centralized and distributed databases are then compared, and the different ways of managing distributed databases are outlined. Subsequent chapters focus on the importance of treating the networked database as a corporate resource; the use of schemata to solve cross-database problems; the Information Resource Dictionary System; and application programming interface and remote data access. A solution to heterogeneous distributed databases, the Data Access Integrated Services (DAIS), is described. This monograph is written for specialists in computers and communications.