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Databases Intermediate

What is Graph Database?

A database that uses graph structures with nodes, edges, and properties to store and query highly connected data.

Graph databases excel at storing and traversing relationships between entities. Unlike relational databases where joins become expensive with depth, graph databases traverse connections in constant time per hop. Neo4j is the most popular graph database, using the Cypher query language. Use cases include social networks, recommendation engines, fraud detection, knowledge graphs, and network topology. PostgreSQL also supports graph-like queries through recursive CTEs and the Apache AGE extension. Graph databases shine when the relationships between data are as important as the data itself.

Related Terms

Stored Procedure
A precompiled collection of SQL statements stored in the database that can be executed as a single unit.
Soft Delete
A pattern where records are marked as deleted with a flag or timestamp rather than being physically removed from the database.
Elastic Search
A distributed search and analytics engine built on Apache Lucene, optimized for full-text search and log analysis.
EXPLAIN Plan
A database command that shows how the query planner will execute a SQL query, revealing join methods, scan types, and estimated costs.
Database Constraint
Rules enforced by the database to maintain data integrity, including NOT NULL, UNIQUE, CHECK, PRIMARY KEY, and FOREIGN KEY.
Prepared Statement
A pre-compiled SQL template that uses parameters instead of literal values, preventing SQL injection and improving performance.
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