1. A computer-based design framework for collaborative design of a product comprising: a virtual database management system, which receives data from a plurality of sources and creates a single database interface to said sources; software code associated with said virtual database management system for mapping various informational structures utilized by said sources to a common syntax; and additional logic associated with said virtual database management system that provides a set of publishing rules for extracting information on demand and publishing said extracted information in a format recognized by a requestor of said information.