RDBMS or relational database platforms have been powering businesses for years. Recent developments, however, dictate that there are many applications where RDBMS systems might be lacking in certain ways. Many organizations currently feel the need to extend and augment the functionality, scope, scalability, and versatility of their RDBMS platforms, so as to be better equipped to handle business challenges of today and tomorrow.
What are these new challenges?
- Consider these challenges that you might have faced with your RDBMS application –
- Higher read and write queries per second, going up to a million
- Scalability problems in accordance with the needs of the business
- Agile rollout of applications
- Global reach with geo-specific information
- Operational and analytical processing on the same data chunks, reducing database performance
- Proprietary database platforms with more TCO
If you have faced these challenges, you are sure to appreciate the need for adding extra features and robustness to scale as per business demands.
Augmenting RDBMS with NoSQL Solutions
SQL databases have certain characteristics. They support one slightly alterable data type; the schema requires prior definition of data types and structures; they are vertically scalable only, and operate data querying with statements like Select, Update and Insert. NoSQL databases, on the other hand, have a dynamic schema and support horizontal scaling too. They also support many different data types and handle data querying tasks through object oriented APIs. These vital differences indicate that you can get much more out of your database platform by augmenting your existing RDBMS application with a NoSQL solution.
MongoDB – A Great NoSQL Solution
With excellent features, great scalability and rising popularity among business users, MongoDB is one of the best NoSQL solutions currently available on the market. With dynamic schema design, integrated caching and deployment automation features, MongoDB can really provide a boost to your database application used in conjunction with your existing RDBMS platform. MongoDB provides up to ten times better performance, reduces your storage requirements by 80% with compression algorithms and can reduce operational overhead up to a whopping 95%. Because of the tremendous value offered by MongoDB it has been named a ‘Cool Vendor’ in the prestigious Information Infrastructure & Big Data report published by Gartner.
MongoDB Solutions from CIGNEX
CIGNEX has versatile experience in providing creative and highly customized MongoDB solutions that can be suited to your specific requirements. Features on offer include personalization, social listening, user data management, content management, content delivery, reputation management, IoT integration and much more. Using these solutions, you can really empower your organizational database application to achieve much more.
A Case Study – MongoDB for e-Learning
To demonstrate the positive aspects of leveraging your RDBMS solution with a NoSQL platform lie MongoDB, let’s take a look at this case study which uses MongoDB to augment RDBMS for an e-learning company.
Here are some of the important operational aspects where the use of MongoDB increases efficiency, adds features and improves overall capacity of the platform –
- Storage Engine - Using the WiredTiger module of MongoDB, the database application can achieve ten times better throughput with the ability to saturate all present CPU cores. There is also scope for up to 90% data compression using the relevant compression module. The upgrade is completely backward compatible and there needs to be no server downtime while deploying the upgrade.
- Schema Design – By studying data types and common queries, it is possible to convert your RDBMS schema to a MongoDB schema. With careful tuning and de-normalization of collections, you can get optimum performance. Query optimization can also be carried out via MongoDB profiler and explain method, and transaction support can be implemented using two-phase commits.
- Data Migration – Using a JAVA based custom ETL tool, an interface can be established between your RDBMS platform and MongoDB. Using migration scripts, data can be fetched from SQL and fed into MongoDB collections in an efficient, fault tolerant manner. Hosting the RDBMS on read optimized instance can further expedite the migration process.
- Sharding – The use of “tag aware” sharding with the ideal shard key can bring geographical awareness to your data.
Post the implementation of MongoDB, performance tests showed response times came down to about 3 seconds on all parameters. While it is a 75% increase in performance with portal dashboard operation, searches occurred 90% faster.
Benefits
With the implementation of MongoDB, web page response times can become up to 80% faster while migration can be accomplished in a matter of hours. Geo-tagged data shards contribute to lowering latency, increasing security and enhancing scalability. The overall TCO shrinks considerably with less dependence on proprietary technologies, lower vendor costs and reduced vendor dependency. Overall, using MongoDB solutions provided by CIGNEX can really empower your RDBMS platform. Learn more about our MongoDB Consulting Services and connect with us today to supercharge your business operations with higher speed, better efficiency and improved productivity.
