Welcome to Advent of Computing, the show that talks about the shocking, intriguing, and all too often relevant history of computing. A lot of little things we take for granted today have rich stories behind their creation, in each episode we will learn how older tech has lead to our modern world.
http://adventofcomputing.com/
episode 97: What Exactly IS A Database? Part II
We've approach the beast itself: SQL. Or, as it used to be known, SEQUEL. In this episode we will discuss how early navigational databases failed, and how we were able to move past them into a relational future. It's a fascinating tale about how careful research and planning can lead to much better tools.
Selected sources:
https://www.seas.upenn.edu/~zives/03f/cis550/codd.pdf -- Dr. Codd on relational databases
https://web.archive.org/web/20070926212100/http://www.almaden.ibm.com/cs/people/chamberlin/sequel-1974.pdf -- The first SEQUEL paper
https://people.eecs.berkeley.edu/~brewer/cs262/SystemR.pdf -- A History and Evaluation of System R