Distributed Database Systems

A distributed database system is a database in which data is not stored on a single centralized machine but is instead spread across multiple interconnected computers, or nodes, often in different physical locations. While the data is physically partitioned and/or replicated across the network, the system presents a unified, single-database view to the user, masking the underlying complexity. This architecture is designed to achieve significant benefits, including enhanced scalability to handle large volumes of data and traffic, high availability and fault tolerance through data redundancy, and improved performance by processing queries in parallel and placing data closer to users, though it introduces challenges in maintaining data consistency across all nodes.