16.12.2018 — Blockchain

Difference between traditional Database and Blockchain from Developer Perspective

The Blockchain Will Do to the Financial System What the Internet Did to Media. Harvard Business Review (MARCH 08, 2017)

getBlockInfo
getBlockCount
verifyChain

Some of the common question raised by the web and software developers (who have just heard of blockchain but doesn't know the underpinnings of it) are:

1) How blockchain is different from traditional databases?
2) If the blockchain is just another database, how easy (or difficult) it is to jump in and start building apps (basically dapps) using blockchain?
3) Which dapp platform should we go for?

In this article I will try to answer the first question, feel free to ask if you have any more questions.

Lets take the former (traditional databases) and latter (blockchain) distinctively and then find out where the two tracks meet.

What is a database?

An organized collection of data stored electronically in a centralized server. It further allows us to create, read/retrieve, update and delete records in that collection.

What is blockchain?

A distributed ledger which is ideally decentralized that allows us to append and validate data.

Lets witness the transition from the databases to blockchain and the pros and cons of each.

1) Centralized Database

* On Premise

* Single point of failure

2) Distributed Database

* Hosted in Cloud

* Not tamper proof

3) Decentralized Database

* Hosted by nodes

* Tamper proof

* Slower

Since blockchain doesn't allow update and delete functionality and the records (blocks) are connected in the form of chain, hence it is tamper-proof and immutable. Now, lets move on to the technical perspective of it and how to approach this novel concept of distributed ledger technology.