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RELATIONAL MODEL: CONCEPTS, CONSTRAINTS, LANGUAGES, DESIGN, AND PROGRAMMING
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The Relational Data Model and Relational Database Constraints
This chapter opens Part II of the book on relational databases. The relational model was first introduced by Ted Codd of IBM Research in 1970 in a classic research publication "System R4 Relational." (Codd 1970), and attracted immediate attention due to its simplicity, practicality, and mathematical foundation. The model uses the concept of a mathematical relation—which looks somewhat like a table of values—as its basic building block, and has its theoretical basis in set theory and first-order predicate logic. This …show more content…
Since then, the model has been implemented in a large number of commercial systems. Current popular relational DBMSs (RDBMSs) include DB2 and Informix Dynamic Server (from IBM), Oracle and Rdb (from Oracle), and SQL Server and Access (from Microsoft). Some other commercial relational DBMSs used are Sybase (also known as Sybase SQL Server), Paradox, and Foxbase. Recently, some open source relational DBMSs, such as MySQL and PostGreSQL have also grown in popularity. At the time this chapter was written, the market share varied depending on platform; with DB2, Oracle, and Microsoft SQL Server dominating the market overall. [Note to editor: Would you like to include TM symbol in all trademarks? Also the small caps formatting, such as SQL and SQL can be made consistent. Personally, I prefer SQL over SQL but am flexible]. Oracle dominates the market in the UNIX world followed by DB2, whereas Microsoft SQL Server dominates the Windows platform market with Oracle coming in second. [Note to editor: this will need to be updated at the time the book goes to