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  1. Stackups
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  4. Databases
  5. CouchDB vs Realm

CouchDB vs Realm

OverviewDecisionsComparisonAlternatives

Overview

CouchDB
CouchDB
Stacks529
Followers584
Votes139
GitHub Stars6.7K
Forks1.1K
Realm
Realm
Stacks279
Followers441
Votes16

CouchDB vs Realm: What are the differences?

  1. Data Model: CouchDB uses a document-based data model, storing data in JSON documents, making it easier to store unstructured data. In contrast, Realm uses an object-based data model, with data organized as objects in tables, making it better suited for structured data.
  2. Synchronization: CouchDB offers built-in replication and synchronization capabilities, allowing data to be easily synchronized across multiple devices and servers. On the other hand, Realm provides seamless real-time data synchronization, ensuring that data changes are immediately reflected across all connected devices without the need for manual intervention.
  3. Query Language: CouchDB uses MapReduce queries for data retrieval and manipulation, providing flexibility but requiring more complex queries. In comparison, Realm uses a simpler and more intuitive query language for data manipulation, making it easier for developers to interact with the data.
  4. Programming Language Support: CouchDB supports multiple programming languages for interacting with the database, including JavaScript, Erlang, and Python. Realm, on the other hand, has better support for mobile app development, with SDKs available for popular mobile platforms like iOS and Android.
  5. Conflict Resolution: CouchDB employs conflict-free data replication mechanisms to handle conflicts that may arise during synchronization, ensuring data integrity. Realm offers conflict resolution strategies that can be customized based on application requirements, allowing developers to define how conflicts should be resolved.
  6. Indexing: CouchDB allows developers to create custom indexes to optimize data retrieval and query performance. In contrast, Realm automatically indexes all data fields by default, simplifying query performance optimization for developers.

In Summary, the key differences between CouchDB and Realm lie in their data models, synchronization mechanisms, query languages, programming language support, conflict resolution strategies, and indexing approaches.

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Advice on CouchDB, Realm

Gabriel
Gabriel

CEO at Naologic

Jan 2, 2020

DecidedonCouchDBCouchDBCouchbaseCouchbaseMemcachedMemcached

We implemented our first large scale EPR application from naologic.com using CouchDB .

Very fast, replication works great, doesn't consume much RAM, queries are blazing fast but we found a problem: the queries were very hard to write, it took a long time to figure out the API, we had to go and write our own @nodejs library to make it work properly.

It lost most of its support. Since then, we migrated to Couchbase and the learning curve was steep but all worth it. Memcached indexing out of the box, full text search works great.

592k views592k
Comments

Detailed Comparison

CouchDB
CouchDB
Realm
Realm

Apache CouchDB is a database that uses JSON for documents, JavaScript for MapReduce indexes, and regular HTTP for its API. CouchDB is a database that completely embraces the web. Store your data with JSON documents. Access your documents and query your indexes with your web browser, via HTTP. Index, combine, and transform your documents with JavaScript.

The Realm Mobile Platform is a next-generation data layer for applications. Realm is reactive, concurrent, and lightweight, allowing you to work with live, native objects.

Terrific single-node database; Clustered database ; HTTP/JSON; Offline first data sync
Feels like Home - Realm’s data structures look like the Objects and Arrays of your language, but provide additional features such as: querying, relationships & graphs, thread safety, and more.;Memory-Efficient - Realm is not built on SQLite. Instead, a custom C++ core is used to provide memory-efficient access to your data by using Realm objects, which usually consume less RAM than native objects.;F-F-Fast! - Realm offers extraordinary performance compared to SQLite and other persistence solutions.
Statistics
GitHub Stars
6.7K
GitHub Stars
-
GitHub Forks
1.1K
GitHub Forks
-
Stacks
529
Stacks
279
Followers
584
Followers
441
Votes
139
Votes
16
Pros & Cons
Pros
  • 43
    JSON
  • 30
    Open source
  • 18
    Highly available
  • 12
    Partition tolerant
  • 11
    Eventual consistency
Pros
  • 7
    Good
  • 3
    Cloud Syncing
  • 3
    Elegant API
  • 2
    React Native Support
  • 1
    Strong Adoption Growth
Cons
  • 1
    No offline support for web till now

What are some alternatives to CouchDB, Realm?

MongoDB

MongoDB

MongoDB stores data in JSON-like documents that can vary in structure, offering a dynamic, flexible schema. MongoDB was also designed for high availability and scalability, with built-in replication and auto-sharding.

MySQL

MySQL

The MySQL software delivers a very fast, multi-threaded, multi-user, and robust SQL (Structured Query Language) database server. MySQL Server is intended for mission-critical, heavy-load production systems as well as for embedding into mass-deployed software.

PostgreSQL

PostgreSQL

PostgreSQL is an advanced object-relational database management system that supports an extended subset of the SQL standard, including transactions, foreign keys, subqueries, triggers, user-defined types and functions.

Microsoft SQL Server

Microsoft SQL Server

Microsoft® SQL Server is a database management and analysis system for e-commerce, line-of-business, and data warehousing solutions.

SQLite

SQLite

SQLite is an embedded SQL database engine. Unlike most other SQL databases, SQLite does not have a separate server process. SQLite reads and writes directly to ordinary disk files. A complete SQL database with multiple tables, indices, triggers, and views, is contained in a single disk file.

Cassandra

Cassandra

Partitioning means that Cassandra can distribute your data across multiple machines in an application-transparent matter. Cassandra will automatically repartition as machines are added and removed from the cluster. Row store means that like relational databases, Cassandra organizes data by rows and columns. The Cassandra Query Language (CQL) is a close relative of SQL.

Memcached

Memcached

Memcached is an in-memory key-value store for small chunks of arbitrary data (strings, objects) from results of database calls, API calls, or page rendering.

MariaDB

MariaDB

Started by core members of the original MySQL team, MariaDB actively works with outside developers to deliver the most featureful, stable, and sanely licensed open SQL server in the industry. MariaDB is designed as a drop-in replacement of MySQL(R) with more features, new storage engines, fewer bugs, and better performance.

RethinkDB

RethinkDB

RethinkDB is built to store JSON documents, and scale to multiple machines with very little effort. It has a pleasant query language that supports really useful queries like table joins and group by, and is easy to setup and learn.

ArangoDB

ArangoDB

A distributed free and open-source database with a flexible data model for documents, graphs, and key-values. Build high performance applications using a convenient SQL-like query language or JavaScript extensions.

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