Databases on the web

A database can make your website interactive and are essential for nearly any business that sells online. To make use of a database with your website you are going to need a) the database itself and b) a means of writing information to and reading information from the database.

The database you choose to work with depends on:

The operating system your database is hosted on
The programming language use to read and write to the database
The requirements of your business

Large websites will have a separate dedicated server hosting the database and will choose the database to suit their application.

The major commercial databases are Microsoft SQL and Oracle.

Usually Microsoft Access or SQL Server is used on Windows hosting platforms and Oracle, MySQL, or PostgresSQL on Linux.

Some useful Database Tutorials

mSQL

UMBC.edu - A Brief mSQL Tutorial

PHP/mySQL

Webmonkey - Introducing PHP and MySQL