Efficient Data Storage in File System and DBMS

[ankitdixit]

Hello All, I am a software developer and got the opportunity to work on a large web development project. I want to know which source allow efficient data storage feature between file system and dbms in a large project. I have asked this query on Quora and according to this post, The use of a database management system is efficient because there are numerous techniques for storing and retrieving data but not an idea about file system. Can anyone use both of them? Any suggestions?

[Dani]

You can definitely store data in the file system sometimes, and in the database other times. It really depends on the best tool for the job. Databases are great when you need to query big datasets. However, as an example of when the file system might be more appropriate, suppose you want to store data that doesn't change very frequently and is required on almost every page load. It would make sense to store that data in the file system on the web server, so it could easily be accessed on each page load, and eliminates the overhead of having to connect to, and then query, the database server (which is typically a different server than the web server on the network).

[pritaeas]

Depending on what you need to achieve, you can also consider a document database or a graph database.

[markanderson_1]

Hello,

Redundancy is the concept of repetition of data i.e. each data may have more than a single copy. The file system cannot control the redundancy of data as each user defines and maintains the needed files for a specific application to run. There may be a possibility that two users are maintaining the data of the same file for different applications. Hence changes made by one user do not reflect in files used by second users, which leads to inconsistency of data. Whereas DBMS controls redundancy by maintaining a single repository of data that is defined once and is accessed by many users. As there is no or less redundancy, data remains consistent. The file system does not allow sharing of data or sharing is too complex. Whereas in Database Management System (DBMS), data can be shared easily due to a centralized system.

Hope this helps :)
Mark Anderson