Basically data objects loaded via orm, with code to repersist to database when updated.

... except there was a long road of transactions, distributed architecture issues, etc still to hammer out, and these were the days of a gig of ram maybe and no ssds, and 100 base t if you were lucky. And jit was a wip.

So it was a app server with its own dedicated mumbo jumbo for everything to dazzle CEOs.