Relational Databases
Databases are one of the backbone components in the IT world that has enabled the growth and development of technologies used on the Internet and the World Wide Web. When you look at the information that is presented on websites, or the data stored in small spreadsheet applications or Access databases sent from one colleague to another via e-mail, you are looking at functionality from a database application that was responsible for organizing and transferring that information. A Database is a data store accessed through a query language or Application Programming Interface (API). In this paper I will discuss the main differences found between the most commonly used format of database architecture today, the Relational Database, and the newest methodology to appear on the horizon, the Object Oriented Database, that has the ability to become just as popular in the near future as the relational model has in the present. I’ll point out the characteristics that are apparent in both of these models and touch briefly some common examples on how both models can be utilized.
Relational databases store data in tables and enable you to define relationships between
those tables. The relationship that is defined between the tables are based on one or more field values (keys) that are common to the tables being accessed. The tables of the database consist of rows (tuples) having the same number of components in each row. The components of each row has a defined type, such as a string character, integer, date, etc., that is used to characterize the data value stored for that component. All data values in the same column of the table are of the same type, and they each share the same attribute or name for that column. Multiple dimensions are represented by multiple rows in a table or by multiple tables which are joined to construct a multidimensional object. For the databases to qualify as relational, they must conform to the Domain Key/ Normal Form at a minimum, a condition where every constraint on the relation is a logical consequence of the definition of keys and domains . This characteristic about the RDMS structure (DK/NF) of the data allows the administrators the ability to retrieve and manipulate very large amounts of data in one transaction, and allows them to do so quickly and efficiently for most commercial purposes. Database administrators found relational databases to be the most efficient and the fastest when executing ad hoc queries on pre-formatted data already placed in a relational format thru normalization.
Object oriented databases have two fairly simple rules that must be followed in order for a database model to be considered OO: 1) It should be a DBMS, and 2) It should be compatible with the general format of the most widely used versions of object oriented programming languages today. To qualify as a DBMS, it must meet thirteen criteria: 1) complex objects, 2) object identity, 3) encapsulation, 4) types or classes, 5) inheritance, 6) overriding combined with late binding, 7) extensibility, 
computational
completeness, 9) persistence, 10) secondary storage management, 11) concurrency, 12) recovery and 13) an ad hoc query facility .
The main differences that lie between the relational database model and the object-oriented approach are centered on the structure of the model as it pertains to the use of the data. The relational model has been in use as a standard for over 15 years and the most common DBMS adhere to this model of programming, which makes the relational model’s viability very good, and database administrators already know how to maximize or optimize the queries to get the fastest results (e.g. using indexes to organize the relative position of the data). The fact that the relational model has been around for quite some time also demonstrates the fact that a lot of the methods used within the relational database schema have been tried and tested. The same cannot be said about object oriented database models. Along with the fact that this model is considerably new, there are very few experienced, quality programmers available in the industry to implement this standard. There is also a lack of a consensus on standards and definitions for the object oriented database model format; another characteristic of a new methodology evolving. On the other hand by classifying the data as an object, the object-oriented model can organize the data according to how it will be used in production and store it along with the instructions and rules of how the data should look and how the procedures and manipulations on the data should be carried out.
The relational model is used to store data that is easily organized using the relational format. If you had a customer database and wanted to store tables about a customer, the information would be set up in a relational manner to allow for the appropriate key relationships to be determined to aid in extracting the data using a query. For instance, in a drug store pharmacist record keeping program, a customer’s personal information would be kept in a customer table, the order information for the prescription would be kept in a Prescription table. Any other relevant information needed to complete the prescription order would be stored in another table and so on, and so on. The object-oriented model is exceptionally adept at storing and manipulating complex data types. Using the object oriented model, data types such as images, audio, video, animations, and mixed media are able to be contained all on one database while algorithms extract from it and search it in multiple dimensions1. For example: say you wanted to store a movie within the tables of a database. Using the relational model, you would be able to query the movie if you supplied the relevant relational information such as movie name, or serial number within a SQL query, but how would you go about extracting the first 2 minutes of that movie and not the entire movie? With the object-oriented model, it would be possible to perform this type of complex extraction because the process to extract smaller pieces of the movie could be written into the methods of the objects that would be stored within the OO database. There are other benefits to using the object oriented database model as well. For one, the programmer is able to execute operations or functions against objects without exporting them to the client, and they can extract enough about the object to develop an “intelligent” search plan to optimize performance.
The OODBMS can gauge the speed of retrieval for items being returned from the database, and optimize a retrieval plan using SERVER resources, freeing up the client machine to continue work3.
There are some very good reasons to use the relational database model (widely used, tested, proven, fits most general data use situations) and the object oriented database model (handles BLOBs well, more functional for specific granular-level manipulations). I firmly believe that the next big development in the methodologies that will be the cap for methodologies as the Domain Key Normal Form was for defining normal forms, is the creation of a model that utilizes all the good points of the relational database model and the object oriented database model in a format that is clean and intuitive for the programmer to expound on.
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