What is a database?

A database is a collection of information organised so as to be quickly accessible and retrieval by a computer program. A database is made up of:

  • Fields – a single piece of information
  • Records – a collection of fields
  • Files – a collection of records

A 'real world' example of a file would be a telephone book. In the book are hundreds of records for everyone – for instance, there may be a record for Headjam. Headjam's record then has perhaps three fields: Name, Address, and Phone Number.

The database for your website will lots of information for your website – so much that manually adding and modifying the information directly in the database would be very time consuming. Business Catalyst therefore acts as an intermediary – a seamless and easy way to add, edit, and remove information to or from your database.