Database in which records or objects are found by following references from other objects
A navigational database is a type of database in which records or objects are found primarily by following references from other objects. The term was popularized by the title of Charles Bachman's 1973 Turing Award paper, The Programmer as Navigator.[1] This paper emphasized the fact that the new disk-based database systems allowed the programmer to choose arbitrary navigational routes following relationships from record to record, contrasting this with the constraints of earlier magnetic-tape and punched card systems where data access was strictly sequential.
One of the earliest navigational databases was Integrated Data Store (IDS), which was developed by Bachman for General Electric in the 1960s. IDS became the basis for the CODASYL database model in 1969.
Although Bachman described the concept of navigation in abstract terms, the idea of navigational access came to be associated strongly with the procedural design of the CODASYL Data Manipulation Language. Writing in 1982, for example, Tsichritzis and Lochovsky[2] state that "The notion of currency is central to the concept of navigation." By the notion of currency, they refer to the idea that a program maintains (explicitly or implicitly) a current position in any sequence of records that it is processing, and that operations such as GET NEXT and GET PRIOR retrieve records relative to this current position, while also changing the current position to the record that is retrieved.
Navigational database programming thus came to be seen as intrinsically procedural; and moreover to depend on the maintenance of an implicit set of global variables (currency indicators) holding the current state. As such, the approach was seen as diametrically opposed to the declarative programming style used by the relational model. The declarative nature of relational languages such as SQL offered better programmer productivity and a higher level of data independence (that is, the ability of programs to continue working as the database structure evolves.) Navigational interfaces, as a result, were gradually eclipsed during the 1980s by declarative query languages.
During the 1990s it started becoming clear that for certain applications handling complex data (for example, spatial databases and engineering databases), the relational calculus had limitations. At that time, a reappraisal of the entire database market began, with several companies describing the new systems using the marketing term NoSQL. Many of these systems introduced data manipulation languages which, while far removed from the CODASYL DML with its currency indicators, could be understood as implementing Bachman's "navigational" vision. Some of these languages are procedural; others (such as XPath) are entirely declarative. Offshoots of the navigational concept, such as the graph database, found new uses in modern transaction processing workloads.
^Bachman, Charles W. (1973). "The programmer as navigator". Communications of the ACM. 16 (11). Portal.acm.org: 653–658. doi:10.1145/355611.362534. S2CID 18635540.
^Dionysios C. Tsichritzis and Frederick H. Lochovsky (1982). Data Models. Prentice-Hall. p. 67. ISBN 0-13-196428-3.
and 28 Related for: Navigational database information
A navigationaldatabase is a type of database in which records or objects are found primarily by following references from other objects. The term was...
for its model of data navigation instead of CODASYL's network model. Both concepts later became known as navigationaldatabases due to the way data was...
known as DEC VAX DBMS) Navigationaldatabase Graph database David M, k., 1997. Fundamentals, Design, and Implementation. database processing ed. s.l.:Prentice-Hall...
The Navigation Data Standard (NDS) is a standardized format for automotive-grade navigationdatabases, jointly developed by automobile manufacturers and...
An electronic navigational chart (ENC) is an official database created by a national hydrographic office for use with an Electronic Chart Display and Information...
database transaction Navigationaldatabase[citation needed] This disambiguation page lists articles associated with the title Transactional database....
perform navigation tasks. All navigational techniques involve locating the navigator's position compared to known locations or patterns. Navigation, in a...
characteristics are common to all FMSs. All FMSs contain a navigationdatabase. The navigationdatabase contains the elements from which the flight plan is constructed...
analysis engines at executing graph queries. In the mid-1960s, navigationaldatabases such as IBM's IMS supported tree-like structures in its hierarchical...
Below are proposed relational alternatives to the SQL language. See navigationaldatabase and NoSQL for alternatives to the relational model. .QL: object-oriented...
an RNAV system for navigation presupposes that a defined path representing the intended track is loaded into the navigationdatabase. A consistent, repeatable...
execution time. They borrow aspects of navigationaldatabases, hierarchical databases and relational databases. OLAP is typically contrasted to OLTP (online...
Distributed database management system Hierarchical model Navigationaldatabase Network model Object model Object database (OODBMS) Object–relational database (ORDBMS)...
Data Store (IDS), one of the first database management systems using what came to be known as the navigationaldatabase model, in the Manufacturing Information...
tools and languages. Most object databases (invented in the 1990s) use the navigational concept to provide fast navigation across networks of objects, generally...
specifications are not a database, but a "standard for the preparation and transmission of data for assembly of airborne navigation system data bases". ARINC...
faded due to growing interest in relational databases beginning in the early 1980s. Navigationaldatabase T. William Olle Waldner, Jean-Baptiste (1992)...
damaged, but Han brings the Falcon to safety with help from L3's navigationaldatabase after he hotwires it into the ship's computer. Lando later takes...
used model to describe relational databases. Chen was able to propose a model that was superior to the navigational model and was more applicable to the...
area of object query languages, and the integration of the query and navigational interfaces, that the biggest differences between products are found....
Fifty-seven navigational stars and additionally the star Polaris are given a special status in the field of celestial navigation. Of the approximately...
Btrieve is a transactional database (navigationaldatabase) software product. It is based on Indexed Sequential Access Method (ISAM), which is a way of...
tree, then XPath rules are defined over the tree. XPath 3 Navigationaldatabase XLink XML database XSL XSL-FO XPath 2.0 supports atomic types, defined as...
broad categories that cover most web search queries: informational, navigational, and transactional. These are also called "do, know, go." Although this...
known in English as New Social Democracy Navigation Data Standard, a format for automotive-grade navigationdatabases New Democratic Party (Serbian: Нова демократска...
first CD-ROM-based navigation system on the Toyota Crown. 1989: Gregg Howe of Design Works USA applied Hunter Systems $40,000 navigational computer to the...
development of a web navigation interface that maximizes usability. A website overall navigational scheme includes several navigational pieces such as global...
approved the project in May 2006. It consists of a constellation of 7 navigational satellites. Three of the satellites are placed in geostationary orbit...