blog post # 3

Database systems have been developed that allow a computer to store a large amount of information in a way that allows a user to search for and retrieve specific information in the database. For example, an insurance company may have a database that includes all of its policy holders and their current account information, including payment history, premium amount, policy number, policy type, exclusions to coverage, etc. A database system allows the insurance company to retrieve the account information for a single policy holder among the thousands and perhaps millions of policy holders in its database.

Data is typically stored in database tables. The tables contain columns and rows of data. The data in the table is related to or associated with other data in corresponding columns and rows. For the example described for insurance companies, the rows of the database may be associated with the name of policy holders, while the columns would be for different pieces of data such as policy number and policy type. In prior art databases, relationships of the data are stored in indexes.