Databases and Their Uses

Databases and Their Uses

James McGaff

DBM/380

June 22, 2015

Databases and Their Use

A DBMS, or Database Management System, is a useful collection of programs that helps a user, business, or corporation to store information. A DBMS is a critical component of any business or organization that wants to keep a controlled and structured system for being able to extract, view, and manage customer information. There are many different types of database systems of all shapes and sizes. Some examples could include a bank that keeps a record of members and their financial info, a gym members to keep track of current subscribers, a video store that shows inventory of current movies, or a retail store that could use it both for inventory and to store customer contact information.

A DBMS has many different ways that it can organize information that is input into the system. “The terms relational, network, flat, and hierarchical all refer to the way a DBMS organizes information internally. The internal organization can affect how quickly and flexibly you can extract information.” (Beal 2015) A relational database organizes a set of formally-described tables from which data can be accessed or reassembled in many different ways. This can be done so it would not have to reorganize the tables in order to access that data. “With a relational database, you can quickly compare information because of the arrangement of data in columns. The relational database model takes advantage of this uniformity to build completely new tables out of required information from existing tables. In other words, it uses the relationship of similar data to increase the speed and versatility of the database.” (HowStuffWorks)

A flat database is a database that is stored in a computer in a simple text file. The data is usually separated with characters like a straight line in order to be read. “One of the most popular flat file database engine is SQLite. Many companies such as FireFox and...