The History Of dBase

DBase is perhaps one of the best known software databases. It was one of the first ever developed such programs and the beginning of the software that makes everyone’s life much easier. Databases have become increasingly popular, not only for individuals, but more importantly for companies from all over the world. Managing information has become much easier with the help of database software and this is greatly a result of the dBase. Here one can read more about the very beginning of this database, who came up with the idea that revolutionized the database software and how come it was so successful.

Dbase was developed by Wayne Ratliff in 1978. Ratliff was working as a contractor at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory and he wrote a database which is known as ‘Vulcan’. Some say that the name came from the race of Spock in Star Trek. However, the aim of that database was to help Ratliff win the office football pool. He wrote it for his microcomputer IMSAI8080 which was running on PTDOS and he used JPLDIS as the basis for the final program. He used this particular program because it was simple to use, command-driven language which had however been designed for interactive use on printing terminals. Specialists commonly agree that JPLDIS was actually influenced by the RETRIEVE, database software produced by the Tymshare Corporation. Ratliff entered into a marketing agreement with George Tate, from Ashton-Tate in the early 1980s and that was when the popularity of this database started skyrocketing.

Ever since then, Vulcan has been known as dBase II and one of the greatest successes on the software market. The program was nevertheless used at the basis of other databases, developed by other companies and which have been admitted as being better but which did not get recognized as superior until dBase IV appeared with several flaws.