AD HOC requests for information in databases

IS departments are being deluged with ad hoc requests for information in corporate relational databases. Everyone needs their information “yesterday” to make their business decisions. The IS departments resources are being taxed to limit trying to fill all the requests. Are there any solutions to this problem? Also, what about the new Object Oriented Databases? Will we be facing the same problems with them as their use spreads? This paper looks at the problems the IS departments have with providing information for ad hoc requests. This paper also deals with the problems of allowing non IS professionals access to corporate databases. Several attempts to solve these problems is discussed. We also examine how these problems and solutions may relate to the new Object Oriented Databases.