Databases are designed to offer an organized mechanism for storing, managing and retrieving information. They do so through the use of
tables.
If you’re familiar with spreadsheets like Microsoft Excel, you’re
probably already accustomed to storing data in tabular form. It’s not
much of a stretch to make the leap from spreadsheets to databases. Let’s
take a look.
Database Tables
Just like Excel tables, database tables consist of
columns and
rows. Each column contains a different type of
attribute and each row corresponds to a single
record. For example, imagine that we were building a database
table
that contained names and telephone numbers. We’d probably set up
columns named “FirstName”, “LastName” and “TelephoneNumber.” Then we’d
simply start adding rows underneath those columns that contained the
data we’re planning to store.
If we were building a table of contact information for our business that
has 50 employees, we’d wind up with a table that contains 50 rows.
Databases and Spreadsheets
At this point, you’re probably asking yourself an obvious question – if a
database is so much like a spreadsheet, why can’t I just use a
spreadsheet? Databases are actually much more powerful than spreadsheets
in the way you’re able to manipulate data. Here are just a few of the
actions that you can perform on a database that would be difficult if
not impossible to perform on a spreadsheet:
- Retrieve all records that match certain criteria
- Update records in bulk
- Cross-reference records in different tables
- Perform complex aggregate calculations
Let's Explore Databases
This site will help you get started with databases. We explore together the process of
choosing database software,
importing spreadsheets into databases,
using the Structured Query Language and more.
