8. A computer program product, encoded in an information carrier, operable to cause data processing apparatus to perform operations comprising: identifying a data record to be archived, the data record comprising a plurality of data record attributes and originally residing in a database; creating an archive record, the archive record comprising a first subset of the plurality of data record attributes, the first subset comprising at least some of the plurality of data record attributes; storing the archive record in a data archive, the data archive being maintained separately from the database; creating a new archive index record, the new archive index record comprising a reference to a location of the archive record in the data archive and a second plurality of attributes of the plurality of data record attributes, the second subset comprising selected attributes from the plurality of data record attributes, the selected attributes being those identified as necessary for access by users of the database; adding the new archive index record to a dictionary-based archive index, the dictionary-based archive index comprising a plurality of archive index records, being stored separately from the database, and comprising a dictionary storing every term used in the plurality of index records; deleting the data record from the database; determining whether an attribute value of the plurality of attribute values is required for frequent user read access; and if the attribute value is not required for frequent user read access, deleting the attribute value from the dictionary-based archive index.
8. A computer program product, encoded in an information carrier, operable to cause data processing apparatus to perform operations comprising: identifying a data record to be archived, the data record comprising a plurality of data record attributes and originally residing in a database; creating an archive record, the archive record comprising a first subset of the plurality of data record attributes, the first subset comprising at least some of the plurality of data record attributes; storing the archive record in a data archive, the data archive being maintained separately from the database; creating a new archive index record, the new archive index record comprising a reference to a location of the archive record in the data archive and a second plurality of attributes of the plurality of data record attributes, the second subset comprising selected attributes from the plurality of data record attributes, the selected attributes being those identified as necessary for access by users of the database; adding the new archive index record to a dictionary-based archive index, the dictionary-based archive index comprising a plurality of archive index records, being stored separately from the database, and comprising a dictionary storing every term used in the plurality of index records; deleting the data record from the database; determining whether an attribute value of the plurality of attribute values is required for frequent user read access; and if the attribute value is not required for frequent user read access, deleting the attribute value from the dictionary-based archive index. 21. The computer program product of claim 8 , wherein the adding of the new archive index record to the dictionary-based archive index further comprises: identifying each term in the second subset of the plurality of attribute values; and adding each term to the dictionary if the term is not already in the dictionary, wherein at least one archive index record of the plurality of archive index records in the dictionary-based archive index comprises one term from a plurality of terms stored in the dictionary, references to locations of multiple archive records in the data archive that contain the one term, and information regarding locations of the one term within the referenced multiple archive records, and wherein the location information includes indications, for each one of the multiple of archive records referenced by the at least one archive index record, respective attributes of the one of the multiple archive records in which the one term is found.