This comprehensive article talks about the power of SQL and how it has evolved over the past two decades. The author summarizes SQL as follows:
· The world’s second-largest software company, Oracle,
has been built on the success of SQL-based relational data management, through
both its flagship database servers and tools and its SQL-based enterprise applications.
· Microsoft, the world’s largest software
company, uses SQL Server as a critical part of its strategy to penetrate the
enterprise computing market with server editions of its Windows operating
systems, and a key part of its .NET architecture for delivering Internet web
services.
· All of the major packaged enterprise
applications (Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP), Supply Chain Management
(SCM), Human Resource Management (HRM), Sales Force Automation (SFA), Customer
Relationship Management (CRM), and so on) are built on SQL-based databases.
· SQL is emerging as a standard for specialized
databases in applications ranging from data warehousing to mobile laptop
databases to embedded applications in telecomm and data communication networks.
· SQL-based access to databases is an integral
feature of Windows, available on the vast majority of personal computer
systems, and it is a built-in capability of popular PC software products such
as spreadsheets and report writers.