The client-server interface

The interface between the client program and the data server must be available to the user.

• These interfaces must support operations beyond those for the client program's built-in data types
• Users must be able to control the translation from general representations to their application's specific representations
• Users must not be expected to write software, but the system should not exclude that option

Because distributed systems must move data using a common format (or small set of common formats) it is important to put the user in the data translation loop. In addition, users must be able to control how data is constrained on the server-side without being limited to only those data types that can be represented by the client-side.

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