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Oracle Database

Jenna Phipps
Last Updated May 24, 2021 8:04 am

Oracle Database, often called Oracle Relational Database Management System (RDBMS), is Oracle Corporation’s main data management product. Oracle, called Software Development Laboratories at the time, released it in 1979. Oracle is one of the most popular and renowned database providers in the world.

History of Oracle and relational databases

Ellison, Miner, and Oaks founded Software Development Laboratories in the 1970s. The database was SDL’s first product and one of the first commercial relational databases. SDL went through a couple of name changes until it settled on Oracle Corporation in 1995.

Relational databases are named because their stored data is all connected through tables and columns. Edgar Codd of IBM first curated the relational database in 1970. Oracle Database is now termed an object-relational database; Oracle has tried to expand it and make it more scalable so that more businesses can use it, even if their datasets are more complicated and not fully relational.

Oracle Database features

The current version of Oracle Database, its long-term release, is 19c. The c refers to cloud availability. Oracle uses SQL as the query language for its databases.

Oracle DB runs on multiple operating systems. It integrates with multiple third-party applications and platforms, so that those applications are backed by a database. It also offers a technical support platform for customers. Oracle DB is ACID-compliant and offers data backups.

Oracle Real Application Clusters (RAC) allow users to run one database on multiple servers. This is helpful when a server experiences an outage; the database will be able to move to another instance and continue executing operations there even if others have gone down.

Oracle’s converged database

Oracle 19c is the first converged database, according to Oracle. A converged database supports the major data types. Traditionally, databases were single-purpose, meaning that they only supported one particular type of data. They are smaller and more lightweight, but they also aren’t capable of processing all types of data.

Converged databases streamline data analytics because they can more effectively manage and process a variety of data types. They help businesses by not requiring different databases for all different forms of data. With converged databases, businesses have one location to manage and analyze data. That makes data analytics both faster and simpler.