Comparison of Traditional File-Based Approach and Database Approach

At the beginning, you should understand the rationale of replacing the traditional file-based system with the database system.

File-based System

File-based systems were an early attempt to computerize the manual filing system. File-based system is a collection of application programs that perform services for the end-users. Each program defines and manages its data.

However, five types of problem are occurred in using the file-based approach:

Separation and isolation of data

When data is isolated in separate files, it is more difficult for us to access data that should be available. The application programmer is required to synchronize the processing of two or more files to ensure the correct data is extracted.

Duplication of data

When employing the decentralized file-based approach, the uncontrolled duplication of data is occurred. Uncontrolled duplication of data is undesirable because:

i. Duplication is wasteful ii. Duplication can lead to loss of data integrity

Data dependence

Using file-based system, the physical structure and storage of the data files and records are defined in the application program code. This characteristic is known as program-data dependence. Making changes to an existing structure are rather difficult and will lead to a modification of program. Such maintenance activities are time-consuming and subject to error.

Incompatible file formats

The structures of the file are dependent on the application programming language. However file structure provided in one programming language such as direct file, indexed-sequential file which is available in COBOL programming, may be different from the structure generated by other programming language such as C. The direct incompatibility makes them difficult to process jointly.