IBM Archives: Edgar F. Codd http://www-03.ibm.com/ibm/history/exhibits/builders/builders_codd.
html
Edgar F. Codd
The following is the text of an IBM Research News intranet article published on April 23, The Builders details
2003.
Ray S. Abuzayyad
Arthur G. Anderson
Former IBM Fellow Edgar (Ted) Codd
passed away on April 18 C. Michael
Best known for creating the “relational” model for Armstrong
representing data that led to today’s database industry John Backus
Edgar (Ted) Codd, the mathematician and former IBM Fellow best known Arthur L. Becker
for creating the “relational” model for representing data that led to today’s
George B. Beitzel
$12 billion database industry, died Friday, April 18, at his home in Florida
at age 79. Charles P. Biggar
Most of the innumerable data transactions we routinely make today -- using Erich Bloch
bank accounts and credit cards, trading stock, making travel reservations
and participating in online auctions -- use relational databases based on the Frederick P. Brooks,
abstract and sophisticated mathematical theory that Codd first published in Jr.
1970 when he worked at IBM’s San Jose Research Laboratory, the Fred M. Carroll
forerunner to today’s Almaden Research Center.
Kaspar V. Cassani
It didn’t come easily, however. The computing landscape in the early 1970s
was a far cry from the gigahertz, terabyte and petaflop scene today. Edgar F. Codd
Computer calculations cost hundreds of dollars a minute, so great human Stephen W. Dunwell
effort was spent to make programs as efficient as possible before they were William W.
run. Early databases used either a rigid hierarchical structure or a complex Eggleston
navigational plan of pointers to the physical locations of the data on
magnetic tapes. Teams of programmers were needed to express queries to Philip D. Estridge
extract meaningful information. While such databases could be efficient in
Bob O. Evans
handling the specific data and queries they were designed for, they were
absolutely inflexible. New types of queries required complex Lucie J. Fjeldstad
reprogramming, and adding new types of data forced a total redesign of the
database itself. Charles R. Flint
In his landmark paper, “A Relational Model of Data for Large Shared Data Eugene A. Ford
Banks,” Codd proposed replacing the hierarchical or navigational structure Clarence E. Frizzell
with simple tables containing rows and columns.
Victor J. Goldberg
“Ted’s basic idea was that relationships between data items should be
based on the item’s values, and not on separately specified linking or Ralph E. Gomory
nesting. This notion greatly simplified the specification of queries and
Herman Hollerith
allowed unprecedented flexibility to exploit existing data sets in new
ways,” said Don Chamberlin, co-inventor of SQL, the industry-standard Reynold B. Johnson
language for querying relational databases, and a research staff member at
Almaden. “He believed that computer users should be able to work at a Gilbert E. Jones
more natural-language level and not be concerned about the details of Nicholas deB.
where or how the data was stored.” Katzenbach
At a 1995 reunion of IBM’s early relational database scientists, Chamberlin Kakutaro Kitashiro
recalled having an epiphany as he first heard Codd describe his relational
model at an internal seminar. Jack D. Kuehler
“Codd had a bunch of fairly complicated queries,” Chamberlin said. “And Louis H. LaMotte
since I’d been studying CODASYL (the language used to query
Terry R. Lautenbach
navigational databases), I could imagine how those queries would have
been represented in CODASYL by programs that were five pages long that Charles J. Lawson
would navigate through this labyrinth of pointers and stuff. Codd would
sort of write them down as one-liners. ... (T)hey weren’t complicated at all. Robeli J. Libero
I said, ‘Wow.’ This was kind of a conversion experience for me. I William C. Lowe
understood what the relational thing was about after that.”
Jacques G.
The idea of relying only on value-based relationships was quite a radical Maisonrouge
concept at that time, and many people were skeptical. They didn’t believe
Harold F. Martin
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IBM Archives: Edgar F. Codd http://www-03.ibm.com/ibm/history/exhibits/builders/builders_codd.html
that machine-made relational queries would be able to perform as well as
hand-tuned programs written by expert human navigators. But the David E. McKinney
increasing power of newer computers, the random-access nature of Nobuo Mii
magnetic hard-disk drives, and a long string of software innovations
enabled scientists to bring the advantages of Codd’s idea to customers. Frederick W. Nichol
System R’s practical implementation Ralph A. Pfeiffer, Jr.
In order for the relational model to be accepted, it had to be proved by an Paul J. Rizzo
industrial-strength implementation. That was the goal of the System R Gordon A. Roberts
project, begun at IBM’s San Jose Research Laboratory in 1973.
Mary P. Schultz
Among the critical technologies developed for System R were:
Takeo Shiina
Structured Query Language (SQL), developed by Chamberlin and
Ray Boyce, for expressing queries. Nancy H. Teeters
Pat Selinger’s cost-based optimizer, which automatically translates a Horace W. Thue
high-level query into an efficient plan for executing the query.
Raymond Lorie’s query compiler, which saved query plans for Patrick A. Toole
future use.
Ad hoc query formulation and execution allowing rapid development Arthur K. Watson
and testing. Dennie M. Welsh
Online data definition in support of new applications without
shutting down the system. Albert L. Williams
Boyce also worked with Codd to develop the Boyce-Codd Normal Form
for efficiently designing relational database tables so information was not
needlessly duplicated in different tables.
System R was a success, and in 1981 IBM announced its first relational
database product, SQL/DS. DB2, initially for large mainframe machines,
was announced in 1983. Now able to store data on handhelds all the way
up to supercomputers, IBM’s DB2 family of databases handles billions of
transactions per day and is one of its most successful software products.
In addition to IBM’s System R researchers, other pioneers who rushed to
exploit Codd’s relational concepts in the 1970s included Mike
Stonebraker’s INGRES team at UC-Berkeley and Larry Ellison, whose
Relational Software Inc. produced the first commercially available
relational database in 1977. Six years later, Ellison renamed his company
Oracle.
Codd’s early accomplishments
A native of England, Codd attended Oxford University, where he earned
degrees in mathematics and chemistry, and flew in the Royal Air Force
during World War II. He then moved to the United States and joined IBM
as a mathematical programmer in 1949 for the Selective Sequence
Electronic Calculator, a huge tube-based computer that had the speed and
flexibility to solve many of the largest scientific problems of its day.
He then invented a novel “multiprogramming” method for IBM’s pioneering
STRETCH computer. This method enabled STRETCH, the forerunner to
modern mainframe computers, to run several programs at the same time.
After earning his doctorate in computer science at the University of
Michigan in 1967 under a full scholarship from IBM, Codd moved to
IBM’s San Jose Research Laboratory in San Jose, where he conceived his
relational model.
Codd was named an IBM Fellow in 1976, and in 1981 he received the
Turing Award, the highest technical honor in the computing profession. In
2002, Forbes Magazine listed Codd’s relational model of data as one of
the most important innovations of the previous 85 years.
His longtime collaborator, Chris Date, said “Codd’s biggest overall
achievement was to make database management into a science. He put the
field on solid scientific footing by providing a theoretical framework -- the
relational model -- within which a variety of important problems could be
attacked in a scientific manner.”
Janet Perna, general manager of Data Management Solutions for IBM’s
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Software Group, expressed her admiration for the inventor of the product
for which she is now responsible. She remarked that “Ted Codd will
forever be remembered as the father of relational database. His remarkable
vision and intellectual genius ushered in a whole new realm of innovation
that has shaped the world of technology today -- but perhaps his greatest
achievement is inspiring generations of people who continue to build upon
the foundations he laid. Database professionals all over the world mourn
his passing”
Codd is survived by his wife, Sharon; four children and six grandchildren.
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