Understanding Data Sources

As explained in Chapter 5, “Building the Databases,” a database is a collection of tables that store related data. Databases are generally used in one of two ways:

• Directly within a DBMS application such as Microsoft Access or SQL Server's Enterprise Manager. These applications tend to be very database specific (they are usually designed by the database vendor for use with specific databases).

• Via third-party applications, commercial or custom, that know how to interact with existing external databases.