DBMS > 4D vs. Adabas vs. FileMaker vs. Microsoft SQL Server

System Properties Comparison 4D vs. Adabas vs. FileMaker vs. Microsoft SQL Server

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Editorial information provided by DB-Engines

Name

Description

Application development environment with integrated database management system

OLTP - DBMS for mainframes and Linux/Unix/Windows environments

used typically together with the Natural programming platform

FileMaker is a cross-platform RDBMS that includes a GUI frontend.

Microsofts flagship relational DBMS

Primary database model

Relational DBMS

Multivalue DBMS

Relational DBMS

Secondary database models

Document store
Graph DBMS
Spatial DBMS

DB-Engines Ranking measures the popularity of database management systems
Trend Chart

Score	2.58
Rank	#108	Overall
	#54	Relational DBMS

Score	3.17
Rank	#94	Overall
	#1	Multivalue DBMS

Score	48.20
Rank	#20	Overall
	#14	Relational DBMS

Score	824.29
Rank	#3	Overall
	#3	Relational DBMS

Website

www.4d.com

www.softwareag.com/en_corporate/platform/adabas-natural.html

www.claris.com/filemaker

www.microsoft.com/en-us/sql-server

Technical documentation

developer.4d.com

www.claris.com/resources/documentation

learn.microsoft.com/en-US/sql/sql-server

Developer

4D, Inc

Software AG

Claris

a subsidiary of Apple

Microsoft

Initial release

1984

1971

1983

1989

Current release

v20, April 2023

19.4.1, November 2021

SQL Server 2022, November 2022

License

Commercial or Open Source

commercial

restricted free version is available

Cloud-based only

Only available as a cloud service

DBaaS offerings (sponsored links)

Database as a Service

Providers of DBaaS offerings, please contact us to be listed.

Implementation language

C++

Server operating systems

OS X
Windows

BS2000
Linux
Unix
Windows
z/OS
z/VSE

iOS

client part only
Linux
OS X
Windows

Linux
Windows

Data scheme

yes

Typing

predefined data types such as float or date

yes

XML support

Some form of processing data in XML format, e.g. support for XML data structures, and/or support for XPath, XQuery or XSLT.

yes

A http query request can return the data in XML format

yes

Secondary indexes

yes

SQL

Support of SQL

yes

close to SQL 92

yes

with add-on product Adabas SQL Gateway

yes

via plugins

yes

APIs and other access methods

ODBC
RESTful HTTP API

by using 4D Mobile
SOAP webservices

HTTP API

with add-on software Adabas SOA Gateway
SOAP-based API

with add-on software Adabas SOA Gateway

Filemaker WebDirect
JDBC
ODBC

ADO.NET
JDBC
ODBC
OLE DB
Tabular Data Stream (TDS)

Supported programming languages

4D proprietary IDE
PHP

Natural

PHP

C#
C++
Delphi
Go
Java
JavaScript (Node.js)
PHP
Python
R
Ruby
Visual Basic

Server-side scripts

Stored procedures

yes

in Natural

yes

Transact SQL, .NET languages, R, Python and (with SQL Server 2019) Java

Triggers

yes

Partitioning methods

Methods for storing different data on different nodes

none

yes, with additonal products like Adabas Cluster Services, Adabas Parallel Services, Adabas Vista

none

tables can be distributed across several files (horizontal partitioning); sharding through federation

Replication methods

Methods for redundantly storing data on multiple nodes

Multi-source replication

yes, with add-on product Event Replicator

Source-replica replication, warm standby

since Version 14

yes, but depending on the SQL-Server Edition

MapReduce

Offers an API for user-defined Map/Reduce methods

Consistency concepts

Methods to ensure consistency in a distributed system

Immediate Consistency

Foreign keys

Referential integrity

yes

Transaction concepts

Support to ensure data integrity after non-atomic manipulations of data

ACID

Concurrency

Support for concurrent manipulation of data

yes

Durability

Support for making data persistent

yes

In-memory capabilities

Is there an option to define some or all structures to be held in-memory only.

yes

User concepts

Access control

Users and groups

only with OS-specific tools (e.g. IBM RACF, CA Top Secret)

simple rights management via user accounts and connection to external directory services

fine grained access rights according to SQL-standard

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