Skip to content

shannonlowder.com

Menu
  • About
  • Biml Interrogator Demo
  • Latest Posts
Menu

SQL 101 – What is a Database

Posted on June 1, 2005February 9, 2011 by slowder

The term database is used for many different meanings.  But if you compared them all, I think you would find that databases are all collections of data that are organized in some way.  I usually like to refer to an Excel document when I try to explain databases.

An example Excel 2003 file.
An example Excel 2003 file.

An excel file has a collection of worksheets. At a very basic level you can consider a database a collection of tables.  There are other objects in a database, but tables will be what you work with most often.

Usually each of those worksheets represents a single collection of data.  Let’s say in our Excel file we were collecting data on sales.  We’d create a worksheet for customers, a worksheet of products, and a worksheet of sales (relating the customer to a product sold, with quantities, dates sold, and sales prices.  Each of these worksheets would represent tables in our database.

Each of those worksheets have rows and columns.  Each row in our sheet would represent one record in a table.  The record is a set of data all describing a single entity to the table.  If we were to discuss the customer table, each row would hold information on a single customer.  That customer’s first name, last name, address, etc.

Each column in our worksheet would represent an attribute.  The first name, last name, etc. we just mentioned is an attribute that describes a customer.

Tips

  • Think of the database as a container.  It contains organized data.
  • Don’t confuse the term database with database management systems (DBMS).  A database is your container, MS SQL 2000 is the management system.  It’s Microsoft’s method for organizing your data into usable elements.

You should now have a basic understanding of what a database is, and few of the items you will find inside a database.  If you have any questions, please, send them in!  I look forward to helping any way I can.

Previous: Introduction Next: What is SQL?

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Recent Posts

  • A New File Interrogator
  • Using Generative AI in Data Engineering
  • Getting started with Microsoft Fabric
  • Docker-based Spark
  • Network Infrastructure Updates

Recent Comments

  1. slowder on Data Engineering for Databricks
  2. Alex Ott on Data Engineering for Databricks

Archives

  • July 2023
  • June 2023
  • March 2023
  • February 2023
  • January 2023
  • December 2022
  • November 2022
  • October 2022
  • October 2018
  • August 2018
  • May 2018
  • February 2018
  • January 2018
  • November 2017
  • October 2017
  • September 2017
  • August 2017
  • June 2017
  • March 2017
  • February 2014
  • January 2014
  • December 2013
  • November 2013
  • October 2013
  • August 2013
  • July 2013
  • June 2013
  • February 2013
  • January 2013
  • August 2012
  • June 2012
  • May 2012
  • April 2012
  • March 2012
  • February 2012
  • January 2012
  • December 2011
  • November 2011
  • October 2011
  • September 2011
  • August 2011
  • July 2011
  • June 2011
  • May 2011
  • April 2011
  • March 2011
  • February 2011
  • January 2011
  • December 2010
  • November 2010
  • October 2010
  • September 2010
  • August 2010
  • July 2010
  • June 2010
  • May 2010
  • April 2010
  • March 2010
  • January 2010
  • December 2009
  • November 2009
  • October 2009
  • September 2009
  • August 2009
  • July 2009
  • June 2009
  • May 2009
  • April 2009
  • March 2009
  • February 2009
  • January 2009
  • December 2008
  • November 2008
  • October 2008
  • September 2008
  • August 2008
  • July 2008
  • June 2008
  • May 2008
  • April 2008
  • March 2008
  • February 2008
  • January 2008
  • November 2007
  • October 2007
  • September 2007
  • August 2007
  • July 2007
  • June 2007
  • May 2007
  • April 2007
  • March 2007
  • February 2007
  • January 2007
  • December 2006
  • November 2006
  • October 2006
  • September 2006
  • August 2006
  • July 2006
  • June 2006
  • May 2006
  • April 2006
  • March 2006
  • February 2006
  • January 2006
  • December 2005
  • November 2005
  • October 2005
  • September 2005
  • August 2005
  • July 2005
  • June 2005
  • May 2005
  • April 2005
  • March 2005
  • February 2005
  • January 2005
  • November 2004
  • September 2004
  • August 2004
  • July 2004
  • April 2004
  • March 2004
  • June 2002

Categories

  • Career Development
  • Data Engineering
  • Data Science
  • Infrastructure
  • Microsoft SQL
  • Modern Data Estate
  • Personal
  • Random Technology
  • uncategorized
© 2025 shannonlowder.com | Powered by Minimalist Blog WordPress Theme