Welcome to the Treehouse Community
Want to collaborate on code errors? Have bugs you need feedback on? Looking for an extra set of eyes on your latest project? Get support with fellow developers, designers, and programmers of all backgrounds and skill levels here with the Treehouse Community! While you're at it, check out some resources Treehouse students have shared here.
Looking to learn something new?
Treehouse offers a seven day free trial for new students. Get access to thousands of hours of content and join thousands of Treehouse students and alumni in the community today.
Start your free trial
A X
12,842 PointsWhat is a relational database and what else can a database be besides relational?
Hi all, I get that a relational database has to do with relationships, but can anyone expound upon this in a simple way? I've looked online for the answer, and I'm frustrated that most of the sites go well beyond my ability level to understand.
I also wanted to ask that Andrew brings up in his video series other types of database designs and mentions Redis, CouchDB, and MongoDB (all of which I've never heard of). Can anyone explain (again at a beginner level) what these other types of DB designs are and when you might use one over another? Thanks!
2 Answers
Steven Parker
231,261 PointsRelational databases and SQL have been around for a while, but these are much more recent schema-less collection-oriented databases. These newer systems have been rapidly increasing in popularity, partly driven by the needs of social media systems.
Treehouse has recently released a Mongo Basics course, which might be a good place to start if you're not familiar with any of these.
jcorum
71,830 PointsSuggest you try this for starters: http://www.analyticsvidhya.com/blog/2014/11/types-databases-evolution/