DBMS > Informix vs. Lovefield vs. Microsoft Azure SQL Database vs. Snowflake

System Properties Comparison Informix vs. Lovefield vs. Microsoft Azure SQL Database vs. Snowflake

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Editorial information provided by DB-Engines

Name

Description

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

Embeddable relational database for web apps written in pure JavaScript

Database as a Service offering with high compatibility to Microsoft SQL Server

Cloud-based data warehousing service for structured and semi-structured data

Primary database model

Relational DBMS

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

Relational DBMS

Secondary database models

Document store
Spatial DBMS
Time Series DBMS

with Informix TimeSeries Extension

Document store
Graph DBMS
Spatial DBMS

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

Score	17.12
Rank	#34	Overall
	#21	Relational DBMS

Score	0.33
Rank	#286	Overall
	#131	Relational DBMS

Score	76.78
Rank	#16	Overall
	#11	Relational DBMS

Score	130.36
Rank	#8	Overall
	#5	Relational DBMS

Website

www.ibm.com/products/informix

google.github.io/lovefield

azure.microsoft.com/en-us/products/azure-sql/database

www.snowflake.com

Technical documentation

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

github.com/google/lovefield/blob/master/docs/spec_index.md

docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/azure-sql

docs.snowflake.net/manuals/index.html

Developer

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.

Google

Microsoft

Snowflake Computing Inc.

Initial release

1984

2014

2010

2014

Current release

14.10.FC5, November 2020

2.1.12, February 2017

V12

License

Commercial or Open Source

commercial

free developer edition available

Open Source

Apache 2.0

commercial

Cloud-based only

Only available as a cloud service

yes

DBaaS offerings (sponsored links)

Database as a Service

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

Implementation language

C, C++ and Java

JavaScript

C++

Server operating systems

AIX
HP-UX
Linux
macOS
Solaris
Windows

server-less, requires a JavaScript environment (browser, Node.js)

tested with Chrome, Firefox, IE, Safari

hosted

Data scheme

yes

support of semi-structured data formats (JSON, XML, Avro)

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

Secondary indexes

yes

SQL

Support of SQL

yes

SQL-like query language

via JavaScript builder pattern

yes

APIs and other access methods

JDBC
JSON API

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

ADO.NET
JDBC
ODBC

CLI Client
JDBC
ODBC

Supported programming languages

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

JavaScript

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

JavaScript (Node.js)
Python

Server-side scripts

Stored procedures

yes

Transact SQL

user defined functions

Triggers

yes

Using read-only observers

yes

similar concept for controling cloud resources

Partitioning methods

Methods for storing different data on different nodes

Sharding

none

yes

Replication methods

Methods for redundantly storing data on multiple nodes

Multi-source replication
Source-replica replication

none

yes, with always 3 replicas available

yes

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

yes, by using IndexedDB or the cloud service Firebase Realtime Database

yes

In-memory capabilities

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

yes

using MemoryDB

User concepts

Access control

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

fine grained access rights according to SQL-standard

Users with fine-grained authorization concept, user roles and pluggable authentication

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