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Jan Kammerath
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My relationship with relational databases relates back to the late 90s. It was part of my first steps with computers and programming, became an essential part of my formal education and studies as a software engineer and constantly followed me through my professional career. I almost crawled through the entire RDBMS rabbit hole and still love it.
During my career, I touched MySQL, Postgres, Oracle, Microsoft SQL Server, DBase, Access, SQLite, DB2, MariaDB, AWS RDS, Azure SQL, Google Cloud SQL and pretty much any RDBMS I could get my hands on. You can’t love RDBMS without loving SQL which is a rabbit hole of its own. And not all SQLs are the same. You’ve got MySQL with its own jargon, you’ve got Microsoft’s T-SQL and the world famous PL/SQL from Oracle. Probably not necessary to mention that they’re all not compatible with each other.
Trust me, I’ve seen them all — finance, transportation, hospitality, social media, video streaming services and many others. Regardless of where you go, you’ll probably find a relational database. The world seems to run entirely on relational databases filling the pockets primarily for Oracle, IBM and Microsoft. If you need it big, like really big, you’re calling up Oracle, IBM or Microsoft. Chances are, you’re requirements may also lead you to SAP — especially in the finance sector.
The first RDBMS are said to be around since the early 1970s when the Structured English Query Language (SEQUEL, later abbreviated to SQL) was invented. Oracle released its first database in 1979, three years after Honeywell released its Multics Relational Data Store in 1976 — said to be the world’s first relational database. In just a couple of years, we’ll look back at 50 years of relational database management systems (RDBMS). Unsurprisingly, the RDBMS became the backbone of our modern society and economy. Safe to say that everyone has at least one and everyone is in at least one relational database, unless you live in a cave.
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I love technology, programming, computers, mobile devices and the world of tomorrow. Check out kammerath.com and follow me on github.com/jankammerath
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