DBMS

DBMS

1. Database management system

2. Software that handles the data directly and provides an interface to the applications

3. Provides a number of protections and features

   • Allows different applications to access the data at the same time
   • Controls access to the data - Security features limit who can do what
   • Provides backups and restore
   • Supports query language and other languages to extract, add and amend data/alter structure of the database
   • Can force referencial integrity
   • It controls concurrency - locks the data while someone's working on it so two people can't update the same record at the same time

4. Features

   • Queries
     • Objects that extract data from a database
     • SQL = Structured query language
   • Forms
     • GUI
     • A nice looking way to run a query
   • Report
     • Outputted data from the database. Can be printed or digital
     • Often run regularly
   • Modules
     • Database software contains modules which are pre-written programs