The data way, of course. And now that commercial database products like Oracle 8i claim to handle both data and documents, it's even more important to know how to make a clear distinction for both purchasing and implementation reasons. Please, don't get me wrong. There are excellent guidelines for modeling data. Data retrieval works.
Database technologies are capable of Stupendous Things.
If I had some loose cash burning a hole in my pocket, I might spring for a few shares of Oracle. On the other hand, it's really disappointing that in this day and age, many data specialists pitch their products, services, and expertise as being entirely sufficient to solve problems of document modeling and retrieval. Next, I'll offer 13 reasons why data retrieval is different from document retrieval. 13 Reasons Why Data and Document Retrieval are not The Same Data retrieval and document retrieval are two different things. Here are 13 ways to tell the difference.