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database-agnostic

Definition

database-agnostic

Database-agnostic is a term describing the capacity of software to function with any vendor’s database management system (DBMS). In information technology (IT), agnostic refers to the ability of something – such as software or hardware – to work with various systems, rather than being customized for a single system.

Database-agnostic software can be useful in an environment where data must be sourced from heterogeneous databases. On the other hand, because a database-agnostic product isn’t customized to work with a specific DBMS, it typically can’t benefit from any special features that system offers.

Database-agnosticism is often offered as a feature of business intelligence (BI) / business analytics (BA) and enterprise resource planning (ERP) products.

See also: SQL (Structured Query Language), data analytics, data management, normalization, data structure, Database glossary

Related glossary terms: Apache Hive, Amazon Dynamo Database (DDB), database activity monitoring (DAM)

This was last updated in February 2011

Posted by: Margaret Rouse

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