The relational and network approaches: Comparison of the application programming interfaces

For some time now there has been considerable debate in the field of database systems over the fundamental question of the underlying design philosophy of such a system. The controversy has centered on the structure of the programmer interface, though of course the design chosen for this interface has repercussions throughout the rest of the system. Two approaches to this problem have received particular attention: the network approach, which is typified by the proposals of the CODASYL Data Base Task Group (DBTG), and the relational approach, which is advocated by the present authors (among others). The purpose of this paper is to give some comparisons between these two approaches (primarily from the application programming viewpoint), and to show what the authors believe to be the advantages of the relational approach. The reader is assumed to have a basic familiarity with the two approaches.