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DBMS > FoundationDB vs. H2 vs. Informix vs. PostgreSQL

System Properties Comparison FoundationDB vs. H2 vs. Informix vs. PostgreSQL

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Editorial information provided by DB-Engines
NameFoundationDB  Xexclude from comparisonH2  Xexclude from comparisonInformix  Xexclude from comparisonPostgreSQL  Xexclude from comparison
Created as commercial project in 2013, FoundationDB has been acquired by Apple in March 2015 and was withdrawn from the market.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.
DescriptionOrdered key-value store. Core features are complimented by layers.Full-featured RDBMS with a small footprint, either embedded into a Java application or used as a database server.A secure embeddable database from IBM, positioned besides IBM Db2 as a relatively low-cost product optimized for OLTP and Internet of Things dataWidely used open source RDBMS infoDeveloped as objectoriented DBMS (Postgres), gradually enhanced with 'standards' like SQL
Primary database modelDocument store infosupported via specific layer
Key-value store
Relational DBMS infosupported via specific SQL-layer
Relational DBMSRelational DBMS infoSince Version 12.10 support for JSON/BSON datatypes compatible with MongoDBRelational DBMS infowith object oriented extensions, e.g.: user defined types/functions and inheritance. Handling of key/value pairs with hstore module.
Secondary database modelsSpatial DBMSDocument store
Spatial DBMS
Time Series DBMS infowith Informix TimeSeries Extension
Document store
Graph DBMS infowith Apache Age
Spatial DBMS
Vector DBMS infowith pgvector extension
DB-Engines Ranking infomeasures the popularity of database management systemsranking trend
Trend Chart
Score1.07
Rank#188  Overall
#31  Document stores
#28  Key-value stores
#86  Relational DBMS
Score8.22
Rank#50  Overall
#32  Relational DBMS
Score18.85
Rank#35  Overall
#22  Relational DBMS
Score645.05
Rank#4  Overall
#4  Relational DBMS
Websitegithub.com/­apple/­foundationdbwww.h2database.comwww.ibm.com/­products/­informixwww.postgresql.org
Technical documentationapple.github.io/­foundationdbwww.h2database.com/­html/­main.htmlinformix.hcldoc.com
www.ibm.com/­support/­knowledgecenter/­SSGU8G/­welcomeIfxServers.html
www.postgresql.org/­docs
DeveloperFoundationDBThomas MuellerIBM, HCL Technologies infoEffective 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 infowww.postgresql.org/­developer
Initial release2013200519841989 info1989: Postgres, 1996: PostgreSQL
Current release6.2.28, November 20202.2.220, July 202314.10.FC5, November 202016.2, February 2024
License infoCommercial or Open SourceOpen Source infoApache 2.0Open Source infodual-licence (Mozilla public license, Eclipse public license)commercial infofree developer edition availableOpen Source infoBSD
Cloud-based only infoOnly available as a cloud servicenononono
DBaaS offerings (sponsored links) infoDatabase as a Service

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Aiven for PostgreSQL: Fully managed PostgreSQL for developers with 70+ extensions and flexible orchestration tools.
Implementation languageC++JavaC, C++ and JavaC
Server operating systemsLinux
OS X
Windows
All OS with a Java VMAIX
HP-UX
Linux
macOS
Solaris
Windows
FreeBSD
HP-UX
Linux
NetBSD
OpenBSD
OS X
Solaris
Unix
Windows
Data schemeschema-free infosome layers support schemasyesyesyes
Typing infopredefined data types such as float or dateno infosome layers support typingyesyes infoSince Version 12.10 support for JSON/BSON datatypesyes
XML support infoSome form of processing data in XML format, e.g. support for XML data structures, and/or support for XPath, XQuery or XSLT.noyes infospecific XML-type available, but no XML query functionality.
Secondary indexesnoyesyesyes
SQL infoSupport of SQLsupported in specific SQL layer onlyyesyesyes infostandard with numerous extensions
APIs and other access methodsJDBC
ODBC
JDBC
JSON API infoMongoDB 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.Net
C
C++
Go
Java
JavaScript infoNode.js
PHP
Python
Ruby
Swift
Java.Net
C
C++
Java
JavaScript (Node.js)
PHP
Python
Ruby
.Net
C
C++
Delphi
Java infoJDBC
JavaScript (Node.js)
Perl
PHP
Python
Tcl
Server-side scripts infoStored proceduresin SQL-layer onlyJava Stored Procedures and User-Defined Functionsyesuser defined functions inforealized in proprietary language PL/pgSQL or with common languages like Perl, Python, Tcl etc.
Triggersnoyesyesyes
Partitioning methods infoMethods for storing different data on different nodesShardingnoneShardingpartitioning by range, list and (since PostgreSQL 11) by hash
Replication methods infoMethods for redundantly storing data on multiple nodesyesWith clustering: 2 database servers on different computers operate on identical copies of a databaseMulti-source replication
Source-replica replication
Source-replica replication infoother methods possible by using 3rd party extensions
MapReduce infoOffers an API for user-defined Map/Reduce methodsnononono
Consistency concepts infoMethods to ensure consistency in a distributed systemLinearizable consistencyImmediate ConsistencyImmediate ConsistencyImmediate Consistency
Foreign keys infoReferential integrityin SQL-layer onlyyesyesyes
Transaction concepts infoSupport to ensure data integrity after non-atomic manipulations of dataACIDACIDACIDACID
Concurrency infoSupport for concurrent manipulation of datayesyes, multi-version concurrency control (MVCC)yesyes
Durability infoSupport for making data persistentyesyesyesyes
In-memory capabilities infoIs there an option to define some or all structures to be held in-memory only.yesyesno
User concepts infoAccess controlnofine grained access rights according to SQL-standardUsers with fine-grained authentication, authorization, and auditing controlsfine grained access rights according to SQL-standard

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