Relationship

What Does Relationship Mean?

A relationship, in the context of databases, is a situation that exists between two relational database tables when one table has a foreign key that references the primary key of the other table. Relationships allow relational databases to split and store data in different tables, while linking disparate data items.

Techopedia Explains Relationship

For example, in a bank database a CUSTOMER_MASTER table stores customer data with a primary key column named CUSTOMER_ID; it also stores customer data in an ACCOUNTS_MASTER table, which holds information about various bank accounts and associated customers. To link these two tables and determine customer and bank account information, a corresponding CUSTOMER_ID column must be inserted in the ACCOUNTS_MASTER table, referencing existing customer IDs from the CUSTOMER_MASTER table. In this case, the ACCOUNTS_MASTER table’s CUSTOMER_ID column is a foreign key that references a column with the same name in the CUSTOMER_MASTER table. This is an example of a relationship between the two tables.

The fundamental feature that differentiates relational databases from other database types (e.g., flat-files) is the ability to define relationships.