Thursday, April 2, 2009

DBMS HISTORY

A database management system (DBMS) is known as a computer software that is used to manage databases. They can use different variety of database models, like for example we have the network model and the relational model. For systems that are greater in size, a DBMS enables the users and the other software available to save and recover data in a prearranged manner. The database manager controls the management, storage space, organization and recovery of information in a selected database. DBMS are grouped according to their types or data structures. It can be seen as a group of previously written programs that are used to create, update and search a database. The DBMS allows requirements for data from the application program and informs the OS to transmit the appropriate data.

For the past thousands of years the saving of information as been done by different types of record keeping systems that had different form then the ones used today. In the past clay tablets, palm leaves, rocks, dances, music, and a variety of other media were used in order to save the data that was needed by the human. When technology evolved the keeping of records added a new media to save the data. A new media of data storage was created and used, the databases.Databases have been used since the beginning of the creation of computers. Older systems of databases were attached to the custom databases so that they could increase speed instead of flexibility, not like the new databases that we find now that can be applied to multiple needs. In the past DBMSs were available only to large organizations and businesses that had the necessary HW to support the large sets of data. In the 60’s, the first DBMS appeared. It was a time where projects of grand scale were being contemplated, organized and engineered, and it was the first time that such a large data set was being created in this new technology of computation. A DBMS was becoming needed since the data was more volatile than it used to be, and also because of the higher costs of data storage given by other medias. In the 80’s all the biggest vendors of HW systems that were large enough to support the growing needs of the growing organization of record keeping systems created a new DBMS with their own system solution. Hence, the first database management system sample was more vendors oriented. As usual, IBM was the first to get into this system, though competitors were growing in numbers as well as clones of databases solutions who were offering different entry points into the main target of the record keeping systems of organization.Throughout the years, the problems being solved by the IT management were growing with the technology itself, but no matter what the production systems of the organizations around the globe ran on year after year. Vendors of mainframe and mini-computer hardware increased incredibly, as well as the amount of peripheral types. Production sites were becoming a template of difficult tasks. The resolution of problems in the IT management was becoming more and more complex, and it was starting to involve many external groups of the organization.

Resources:
Database Management Systems,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Database_management_system\
A Brief History of Modern RDBMS IT Management, Farmer Brown,
http://www.mountainman.com.au/software/history/
Database and Database Users (chapter 1),
http://www.ii.metu.edu.tr/~ion503/demo/chapter1/chapter12.htm

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