DBMS > 4D vs. EXASOL vs. Informix vs. PostgreSQL vs. SwayDB

System Properties Comparison 4D vs. EXASOL vs. Informix vs. PostgreSQL vs. SwayDB

Editorial information provided by DB-Engines

Name

Description

Application development environment with integrated database management system

High-performance, in-memory, MPP database specifically designed for in-memory analytics.

A secure embeddable database from IBM, positioned besides IBM Db2 as a relatively low-cost product optimized for OLTP and Internet of Things data

Widely used open source RDBMS

Developed as objectoriented DBMS (Postgres), gradually enhanced with 'standards' like SQL

An embeddable, non-blocking, type-safe key-value store for single or multiple disks and in-memory storage

Primary database model

Relational DBMS

Since Version 12.10 support for JSON/BSON datatypes compatible with MongoDB

Relational DBMS

with object oriented extensions, e.g.: user defined types/functions and inheritance. Handling of key/value pairs with hstore module.

Key-value store

Secondary database models

Document store
Spatial DBMS
Time Series DBMS

with Informix TimeSeries Extension

Document store
Graph DBMS

with Apache Age
Spatial DBMS
Vector DBMS

with pgvector extension

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

Score	2.58
Rank	#108	Overall
	#54	Relational DBMS

Score	1.99
Rank	#124	Overall
	#58	Relational DBMS

Score	17.87
Rank	#35	Overall
	#22	Relational DBMS

Score	645.54
Rank	#4	Overall
	#4	Relational DBMS

Score	0.00
Rank	#382	Overall
	#59	Key-value stores

Website

www.4d.com

www.exasol.com

www.ibm.com/products/informix

www.postgresql.org

swaydb.simer.au

Technical documentation

developer.4d.com

www.exasol.com/resources

informix.hcldoc.com
www.ibm.com/support/knowledgecenter/SSGU8G/welcomeIfxServers.html

www.postgresql.org/docs

Developer

4D, Inc

Exasol

IBM, HCL Technologies

Effective May 1st, 2017, HCL took on development, technical support, and product management teams, and works jointly with IBM on product strategy, marketing, and sales.

PostgreSQL Global Development Group

www.postgresql.org/developer

Simer Plaha

Initial release

1984

2000

1984

1989

1989: Postgres, 1996: PostgreSQL

2018

Current release

v20, April 2023

14.10.FC5, November 2020

16.3, May 2024

License

Commercial or Open Source

commercial

free developer edition available

Open Source

BSD

Open Source

GNU Affero GPL V3.0

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.

Aiven for PostgreSQL: Fully managed PostgreSQL for developers with 70+ extensions and flexible orchestration tools.
PostgreSQL Flex @ STACKIT offers managed PostgreSQL Instances with adjustable CPU, RAM, storage amount and speed and several extensions available, in enterprise grade to perfectly match all application requirements. All 100% GDPR-compliant.

Implementation language

C, C++ and Java

Scala

Server operating systems

OS X
Windows

AIX
HP-UX
Linux
macOS
Solaris
Windows

FreeBSD
HP-UX
Linux
NetBSD
OpenBSD
OS X
Solaris
Unix
Windows

Data scheme

yes

schema-free

Typing

predefined data types such as float or date

yes

Since Version 12.10 support for JSON/BSON datatypes

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

specific XML-type available, but no XML query functionality.

Secondary indexes

yes

SQL

Support of SQL

yes

close to SQL 92

yes

standard with numerous extensions

APIs and other access methods

ODBC
RESTful HTTP API

by using 4D Mobile
SOAP webservices

.Net
JDBC
ODBC
WebSocket

JDBC
JSON API

MongoDB compatible
MQTT (Message Queue Telemetry Transport)
ODBC
RESTful HTTP API

ADO.NET
JDBC
native C library
ODBC
streaming API for large objects

Supported programming languages

4D proprietary IDE
PHP

Java
Lua
Python
R

.Net
C
C++
Java
JavaScript (Node.js)
PHP
Python
Ruby

.Net
C
C++
Delphi
Java

JDBC
JavaScript (Node.js)
Perl
PHP
Python
Tcl

Java
Kotlin
Scala

Server-side scripts

Stored procedures

yes

user defined functions

yes

user defined functions

realized in proprietary language PL/pgSQL or with common languages like Perl, Python, Tcl etc.

Triggers

yes

Partitioning methods

Methods for storing different data on different nodes

none

Sharding

partitioning by range, list and (since PostgreSQL 11) by hash

none

Replication methods

Methods for redundantly storing data on multiple nodes

Multi-source replication

Multi-source replication
Source-replica replication

Source-replica replication

other methods possible by using 3rd party extensions

none

MapReduce

Offers an API for user-defined Map/Reduce methods

yes

Hadoop integration

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

Atomic execution of operations

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

Access rights for users, groups and roles according to SQL-standard

Users with fine-grained authentication, authorization, and auditing controls

fine grained access rights according to SQL-standard

More information provided by the system vendor

We invite representatives of system vendors to contact us for updating and extending the system information,
and for displaying vendor-provided information such as key customers, competitive advantages and market metrics.

Related products and services

3rd parties

CYBERTEC is your professional partner in PostgreSQL topics for over 20 years. As our main aim is to be your single-source all-in-one IT service provider, we offer a wide range of products and services. Visit our website for more details.
» more

pgDash: In-Depth PostgreSQL Monitoring.
» more

SharePlex is the reliable and affordable data replication solution for PostgreSQL migrations, high availability and more.
» more

Aiven for PostgreSQL: Fully managed PostgreSQL for developers with 70+ extensions and flexible orchestration tools.
» more

Navicat Monitor is a safe, simple and agentless remote server monitoring tool for PostgreSQL and many other database management systems.
» more

Redgate webinars: A series of key topics for new PostgreSQL users.
» more

Fujitsu Enterprise Postgres: An Enterprise Grade PostgreSQL with the flexibility of a hybrid cloud solution combined with industry leading security, availability and performance.
» more

Navicat for PostgreSQL is an easy-to-use graphical tool for PostgreSQL database development.
» more

Timescale: Calling all PostgreSQL users – the 2023 State of PostgreSQL survey is now open! Share your favorite extensions, preferred frameworks, community experiences, and more. Take the survey today!
» more

Instaclustr: Fully Hosted & Managed PostgreSQL
» more

We invite representatives of vendors of related products to contact us for presenting information about their offerings here.

More resources

DB-Engines blog posts

MySQL, PostgreSQL and Redis are the winners of the March ranking
2 March 2016, Paul Andlinger

show all

PostgreSQL is the DBMS of the Year 2023
2 January 2024, Matthias Gelbmann, Paul Andlinger

Snowflake is the DBMS of the Year 2022, defending the title from last year
3 January 2023, Matthias Gelbmann, Paul Andlinger

Snowflake is the DBMS of the Year 2021
3 January 2022, Paul Andlinger, Matthias Gelbmann

show all

Recent citations in the news

It's Back to the Database Future for Exasol CEO Tewes
26 October 2023, Datanami

Exasol Finds AI Underinvestment Leads to Business Failure, But Data Challenges Stall Rapid Adoption
14 May 2024, insideBIGDATA

Mathias Golombek, Chief Technology Officer of Exasol – Interview Series
21 May 2024, Unite.AI

Exasol gets jolt of AI with Espresso suite of capabilities
26 February 2024, TechTarget

Exasol Unveils New Suite of AI Tools to Turbocharge Enterprise Data Analytics
22 February 2024, AiThority

provided by Google News

IBM Informix: A key part of IBM’s hybrid cloud and AI strategy
11 January 2024, IBM

Unlock the value of your Informix data for advanced analytics and AI with watsonx.data
24 April 2024, IBM

IBM Unleashes 'Cheetah' Database
17 October 2023, InformationWeek

IBM Informix review: What you need to know about the software
12 December 2022, TechRepublic

IBM Informix Database in the Cloud
1 May 2009, AWS Blog

provided by Google News

How to implement a better like, views, comment counters in PostgreSQL?
28 May 2024, SitePoint

PostgreSQL 17: Part 4 or Commitfest 2024-01
29 May 2024, Хабр

How LeadSquared accelerated chatbot deployments with generative AI using Amazon Bedrock and Amazon Aurora ...
24 May 2024, AWS Blog

Introducing OCI Database with PostgreSQL: Completing Our Cloud Database Suite for Every Need
14 November 2023, Oracle

EDB unveils EDB Postgres AI
23 May 2024, InfoWorld

provided by Google News

Share this page