DBMS > Kdb vs. Microsoft SQL Server vs. NCache vs. TimescaleDB

System Properties Comparison Kdb vs. Microsoft SQL Server vs. NCache vs. TimescaleDB

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Editorial information provided by DB-Engines

Name

Description

High performance Time Series DBMS

Microsofts flagship relational DBMS

Open-Source and Enterprise in-memory Key-Value Store

A time series DBMS optimized for fast ingest and complex queries, based on PostgreSQL

Primary database model

Time Series DBMS
Vector DBMS

Relational DBMS

Key-value store

Time Series DBMS

Secondary database models

Relational DBMS

Document store
Graph DBMS
Spatial DBMS

Document store
Search engine

Using distributed Lucene

Relational DBMS

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

Score	7.55
Rank	#53	Overall
	#3	Time Series DBMS
	#1	Vector DBMS

Score	824.29
Rank	#3	Overall
	#3	Relational DBMS

Score	0.94
Rank	#195	Overall
	#29	Key-value stores

Score	4.64
Rank	#71	Overall
	#4	Time Series DBMS

Website

kx.com

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

www.alachisoft.com/ncache

www.timescale.com

Technical documentation

code.kx.com

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

www.alachisoft.com/resources/docs

docs.timescale.com

Developer

Kx Systems, a division of First Derivatives plc

Microsoft

Alachisoft

Timescale

Initial release

2000

kdb was released 2000, kdb+ in 2003

1989

2005

2017

Current release

3.6, May 2018

SQL Server 2022, November 2022

5.3.3, April 2024

2.13.0, November 2023

License

Commercial or Open Source

commercial

free 32-bit version

commercial

restricted free version is available

Open Source

Enterprise Edition available

Open Source

Apache 2.0

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.

Implementation language

C++

C#, .NET, .NET Core, Java

Server operating systems

Linux
OS X
Solaris
Windows

Linux
Windows

Linux
OS X
Windows

Data scheme

yes

schema-free

yes

Typing

predefined data types such as float or date

yes

partial

Supported data types are Lists, Queues, Hashsets, Dictionary and Counter

numerics, strings, booleans, arrays, JSON blobs, geospatial dimensions, currencies, binary data, other complex data types

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

table attribute 'grouped'

yes

SQL

Support of SQL

SQL-like query language (q)

yes

SQL-like query syntax and LINQ for searching the cache. Cache Synchronization with SQL Server using SQL dependency.

yes

full PostgreSQL SQL syntax

APIs and other access methods

HTTP API
JDBC
Jupyter
Kafka
ODBC
WebSocket

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

IDistributedCache
JCache
LINQ
Proprietary native API

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

Supported programming languages

C
C#
C++
Go
J
Java
JavaScript
Lua
MatLab
Perl
PHP
Python
R
Scala

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

.Net
.Net Core
C#
Java
JavaScript (Node.js)
Python
Scala

.Net
C
C++
Delphi
Java

JDBC
JavaScript
Perl
PHP
Python
R
Ruby
Scheme
Tcl

Server-side scripts

Stored procedures

user defined functions

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

support for stored procedures with SQL-Server CLR

user defined functions, PL/pgSQL, PL/Tcl, PL/Perl, PL/Python, PL/Java, PL/PHP, PL/R, PL/Ruby, PL/Scheme, PL/Unix shell

Triggers

yes

with views

yes

Notifications

yes

Partitioning methods

Methods for storing different data on different nodes

horizontal partitioning

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

yes

yes, across time and space (hash partitioning) attributes

Replication methods

Methods for redundantly storing data on multiple nodes

Source-replica replication

yes, but depending on the SQL-Server Edition

yes, with selectable consistency level

Source-replica replication with hot standby and reads on replicas

MapReduce

Offers an API for user-defined Map/Reduce methods

similar paradigm used for internal processing

yes

Consistency concepts

Methods to ensure consistency in a distributed system

Immediate Consistency

Eventual Consistency
Immediate Consistency
Strong Eventual Consistency over WAN with Conflict Resolution using Bridge Topology

Immediate Consistency

Foreign keys

Referential integrity

yes

Transaction concepts

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

ACID

optimistic locking and pessimistic locking

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

rights management via user accounts

fine grained access rights according to SQL-standard

Authentication to access the cache via Active Directory/LDAP (possible roles: user, administrator)

fine grained access rights according to SQL-standard

More information provided by the system vendor

Specific characteristics

Integrated columnar database & programming system for streaming, real time and historical...
» more

NCache has been the market leader in .NET Distributed Caching since 2005 . NCache...
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Competitive advantages

provides seamless scalability; runs on industry standard server platforms; is top-ranked...
» more

NCache is 100% .NET/ .NET Core based which fully supports ASP.NET Core Sessions ,...
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Typical application scenarios

tick database streaming sensor data massive intelligence applications oil and gas...
» more

NCache enables industries like retail, finance, banking IoT, travel, ecommerce, healthcare...
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Key customers

Goldman Sachs Morgan Stanley Merrill Lynch J.P. Morgan Deutsche Bank IEX Securities...
» more

Bank of America, Citi, Natures Way, Charter Spectrum, Barclays, Henry Schein, GBM,...
» more

Market metrics

kdb+ performance and reliability proven by our customers in critical infrastructure...
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Market Leader in .NET Distributed Caching since 2005.
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Licensing and pricing models

upon request
» more

NCache Open Source is free on an as-is basis without any support. NCache Enterprise...
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