Graph Database Management Systems

Abstract

Nowadays, the increased amount and complexity of connected data stimulated by the appearance of social networks has shed a new light on the importance of managing such data, especially handling information about the connections. The most natural way of representing connected data is to represent them as nodes connected with relationships forming a graph. The idea of storing data as a set of nodes and edges comprising a graph was implemented in various forms in data models used in the past. The network data model, developed in late 1960s, can be considered as the first data model, which most accurately incorporated this idea. However, it was not long before the relational data model appeared, and took over the entire database market for years, which it dominates even nowadays. Therefore, the objective of this article is to give a timeline overview of developed graph data storage solutions in order to gain insight into past, present and future trends of GDBMSs. Additionally, the most influential factors and reasons for changes in trends in GDBMSs' usage will be analyzed.