In everyday life, you interact with databases more than you can think of. Every login attempt on a web application or website on the internet requires checking an encrypted database of passwords to ensure that you are the rightful owner of the account.
There are different types of databases that are in use in modern information systems as well as usage scenarios where certain kinds of databases are preferable in comparison to others. There are performance benefits of using certain databases in certain configurations which gives companies, businesses, startups, and scientific organizations the to scale up, invent and do everything a lot faster.
Small Databases
These are the databases that exist on your smartphone and other embedded devices within your home. They are designed to be lightweight so as not to impact the performance of your device when it is in use by other apps, games, and background services.
Typical examples of these small-sized and easy-to-maintain databases include SQLite which is used by games and apps to keep track of the state that your application or game is currently in. As such, you will not lose your game performance and progress when you have been gaming for a while on your smartphone.
These tiny databases are also very useful and as a developer, you should not ignore their importance in giving your app more capabilities and features that will enable it to perform faster and more efficiently on various devices.
Medium Databases
These are the kind of databases that you can create on your device or the cloud. They are relatively small in size compared to the other databases we will look at and do not scale up quite as fast. The databases are made by the users and need the use of a database application such as Microsoft Access or other online applications.
The databases can also be modified by developers to give your business or company better capabilities with the databases that you use and maintain for your business. The medium databases can also grow and at some point, they require automation to maintain their performance and benefits for the users.
Companies make use of these to keep track of their information over time and can enable the workplace to become more efficient as a result. Companies must have a means of keeping their databases backed up either locally on the premises or in the cloud.
Large Databases
These are the massive databases that are used by larger companies that have millions of customers and as such, need massive space and computing resources to manage and keep flowing. The databases are usually held in server racks within a data center that the clients have to pay for on an annual or agreed basis.
These databases are also a lot harder to manage and maintain. They require several administrators and managers who take care of all the tasks that are involved in ensuring that the database is working effectively and rendering the best services to the company.
Cloud Databases
In the modern marketplace ecosystem, things are evolving at quite a rapid rate. As such, e-commerce companies have to adapt to changing business requirements and ensure that they are delivering the same trusted services to their customers.
Most businesses are resorting to the use of cloud databases to scale up faster and deliver the best quality of service to their customers. These databases are relatively cheaper comparing the kind of storage space and other additional benefits you will get in terms of maintenance, backups, replication, and other measures of redundancy.
They are also easier to work with and deliver a better experience for all your customers. With the use of modern cloud databases, organizations are finding it easier to scale up and as such, they are delivering increasingly better services to everyone.
Whenever an organization has to release a massive amount of information to the public, they need to ensure that they have adequate storage space to do all this. Automation of business functions also gets easier when cloud computing is brought into the picture.
As such, the business can focus on its core business delivery while the rest is handled by the cloud which they do not need to manage or keep backing up in tedious shifts. The use of cloud databases is also important for research and the creation of medicines for mankind where huge amounts of research findings are stored safely instead of getting discarded.
The pace of scientific progress is also improving quite rapidly with the introduction of cloud-based research mechanisms that are making it easier for scientists to have access to greater amounts of information and more massive datasets can be inspected closely with ease. With this in mind, it is also important to remember that cloud scales up easily which means that times, when peak performance is demanded from your business or organization, will be times for you to outshine your competitors by delivering the same trusted services to the massive number of customers that are currently in need of your services.
With a huge database, you will be assured that none of your data is ever lost and as such, you get to become a more effective business thanks to more efficient data storage and management mechanisms that you have in the cloud. 24/7 availability of your services is assured for your consumers and as such, they always have time to access your services and keep using your business for their needs.
Depending on what kind of business you have, there are plenty of ways you can incorporate the cloud into your business. Not only will this ensure you are in a position to deliver better services, but it also offers your business an opportunity for growth that you can utilize and scale up to the level at which you would like your business to be operating.
In conclusion, databases are useful technological tools that are used to ensure that the intactness of information is maintained at all times. They enable us to avoid the loss of information and as such, we are in a better position to utilize the resources that are availed to us.
There are different types of databases and what we have covered is just an idea of what is available. However, it is a good start into databases and realizing the benefits they hold for any data storage problem or challenge facing you.
