web dev//SQL//relational database

A relational database is a database that organizes data in tables of rows and columns, with the relationships between tables defined through foreign keys and queried through JOINs. The word *relational* means the data is structured in relations (the tables), and the language that queries them is SQL.

A relational database is a database that organizes data in tables of rows and columns, with the relationships between tables defined through foreign keys and queried through JOINs. The word relational means the data is structured in relations (the tables), and the language that queries them is SQL.

It is designed for multi-user concurrency, with many clients reading and writing at the same time without corrupting the data. Its architecture is server-client: a database process runs around the clock and clients connect over a network.

SQLite is the contrast: a single file, no server and no concurrent writes, while PostgreSQL and MySQL are built for servers with many users hitting the same data. The heavier the workload and the more users, the more a server relational database pays off, because it handles the concurrency SQLite cannot.