Pre-relational, post-relational, 1968 CODASYL "Survey of Data Base Systems"

From: Ken North <knorth2_at_deletethis.yahoo.com>
Date: Sun, 25 Apr 2004 14:03:22 -0700
Message-ID: <c6h8uh$m5j$1_at_ngspool-d02.news.aol.com>



It's always amusing to read a description of some DBMSs as "post-relational", or to read that E.F. Codd's 1970 paper about the relational model was the genesis of database technology.

"A Relational Model of Data for Large Shared Data Banks", E. F. Codd (Communications of the ACM, Vol. 13, No. 6, June 1970)

When cleaning out some old files, I found a folder with vintage-1968 documents related to the CODASYL Data Base Task Group. One of the documents is a "Survey of Data Base Systems" dated 3 September 1968. It lists 51 database systems, and identifies another 22 systems not included in the survey.

The systems in that survey are predecessors of the CODASYL database standard, Codd's relational model, and SQL. Three of those systems have evolved in the 35 years since the survey.

IBM IMS is still in use. Dick Pick evolved GIM-I into the Pick database family. The Mass General/BBN system evolved and is still available today as MUMPS, M and Caché.

-- 
Ken North
www.WebServicesSummit.com
www.SQLSummit.com
www.GridSummit.com (coming soon)
Received on Sun Apr 25 2004 - 23:03:22 CEST

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