DBMS > Apache Impala vs. Cassandra vs. FoundationDB vs. Oracle Berkeley DB

System Properties Comparison Apache Impala vs. Cassandra vs. FoundationDB vs. Oracle Berkeley DB

Please select another system to include it in the comparison.

Editorial information provided by DB-Engines

Name

Created as commercial project in 2013, FoundationDB has been acquired by Apple in March 2015 and was withdrawn from the market. As a consequence, the product was removed from the DB-Engines ranking. In April 2018, Apple open-sourced FoundationDB and it therefore reappears in the ranking.

Description

Analytic DBMS for Hadoop

Wide-column store based on ideas of BigTable and DynamoDB

Optimized for write access

Ordered key-value store. Core features are complimented by layers.

Widely used in-process key-value store

Primary database model

Relational DBMS

Wide column store

Document store

supported via specific layer
Key-value store
Relational DBMS

supported via specific SQL-layer

Key-value store

supports sorted and unsorted key sets
Native XML DBMS

in the Oracle Berkeley DB XML version

Secondary database models

Document store

Vector DBMS

starting with release V5

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

Score	12.45
Rank	#40	Overall
	#24	Relational DBMS

Score	98.83
Rank	#12	Overall
	#1	Wide column stores

Score	1.06
Rank	#185	Overall
	#31	Document stores
	#28	Key-value stores
	#85	Relational DBMS

Score	2.01
Rank	#126	Overall
	#21	Key-value stores
	#3	Native XML DBMS

Website

impala.apache.org

cassandra.apache.org

github.com/apple/foundationdb

www.oracle.com/database/technologies/related/berkeleydb.html

Technical documentation

impala.apache.org/impala-docs.html

cassandra.apache.org/doc/latest

apple.github.io/foundationdb

docs.oracle.com/cd/E17076_05/html/index.html

Developer

Apache Software Foundation

Apache top-level project, originally developed by Cloudera

Apache Software Foundation

Apache top level project, originally developped by Facebook

FoundationDB

Oracle

originally developed by Sleepycat, which was acquired by Oracle

Initial release

2013

2008

2013

1994

Current release

4.1.0, June 2022

4.1.3, July 2023

6.2.28, November 2020

18.1.40, May 2020

License

Commercial or Open Source

Open Source

Apache Version 2

Open Source

Apache version 2

Open Source

Apache 2.0

Open Source

commercial license 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.

Astra DB: Multi-cloud DBaaS built on Apache Cassandra.

Implementation language

C++

Java

C++

C, Java, C++ (depending on the Berkeley DB edition)

Server operating systems

Linux

BSD
Linux
OS X
Windows

Linux
OS X
Windows

AIX
Android
FreeBSD
iOS
Linux
OS X
Solaris
VxWorks
Windows

Data scheme

yes

schema-free

some layers support schemas

schema-free

Typing

predefined data types such as float or date

yes

some layers support typing

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

only with the Berkeley DB XML edition

Secondary indexes

yes

restricted

only equality queries, not always the best performing solution

yes

SQL

Support of SQL

SQL-like DML and DDL statements

SQL-like SELECT, DML and DDL statements (CQL)

supported in specific SQL layer only

yes

SQL interfaced based on SQLite is available

APIs and other access methods

JDBC
ODBC

Proprietary protocol

CQL (Cassandra Query Language, an SQL-like language)
Thrift

Supported programming languages

All languages supporting JDBC/ODBC

C#
C++
Clojure
Erlang
Go
Haskell
Java
JavaScript

Node.js
Perl
PHP
Python
Ruby
Scala

.Net
C
C++
Go
Java
JavaScript

Node.js
PHP
Python
Ruby
Swift

.Net

Figaro is a .Net framework assembly that extends Berkeley DB XML into an embeddable database engine for .NET
others

Third-party libraries to manipulate Berkeley DB files are available for many languages
C
C#
C++
Java
JavaScript (Node.js)

3rd party binding
Perl
Python
Tcl

Server-side scripts

Stored procedures

yes

user defined functions and integration of map-reduce

in SQL-layer only

Triggers

yes

only for the SQL API

Partitioning methods

Methods for storing different data on different nodes

Sharding

no "single point of failure"

Sharding

none

Replication methods

Methods for redundantly storing data on multiple nodes

selectable replication factor

Representation of geographical distribution of servers is possible

yes

Source-replica replication

MapReduce

Offers an API for user-defined Map/Reduce methods

yes

query execution via MapReduce

yes

Consistency concepts

Methods to ensure consistency in a distributed system

Eventual Consistency

Eventual Consistency
Immediate Consistency

can be individually decided for each write operation

Linearizable consistency

Foreign keys

Referential integrity

in SQL-layer only

Transaction concepts

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

Atomicity and isolation are supported for single operations

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

Access rights for users, groups and roles

based on Apache Sentry and Kerberos

Access rights for users can be defined per object

More information provided by the system vendor

Specific characteristics

Apache Cassandra is the leading NoSQL, distributed database management system, well...
» more

Competitive advantages

No single point of failure ensures 100% availability . Operational simplicity for...
» more

Typical application scenarios

Internet of Things (IOT), fraud detection applications, recommendation engines, product...
» more

Key customers

Apple, Netflix, Uber, ING,, Intuit,Fidelity, NY Times, Outbrain, BazaarVoice, Best...
» more

Market metrics

Cassandra is used by 40% of the Fortune 100.
» more

Licensing and pricing models

Apache licenseÂ Pricing for commercial distributions provided by DataStax and available...
» more

News

An Introduction to Phil Nash, Developer Relations
3 June 2024

Focus on Creativity, Not Clusters: DataStax Mission Control in Action!
30 May 2024

How Concide Built its Chat Platform with Enhanced Document Management for Legal Tech Professionals
23 May 2024

Astra Vectorize: Generate Vector Embeddings with 1 Line of Code
22 May 2024

GitHub Copilot + DataStax Astra DB: Build GenAI Apps 100x Faster
21 May 2024

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.