Graph database is a database that uses graph structures for semantic queries with nodes, edges, and properties to represent and store data. Graph databases provide index-free adjacency, meaning that every element contains a direct pointer to its adjacent elements and no index lookups are necessary.

How to use it in a sentence

• I wanted to use a graph database for my new social media startup, but I got overruled by the 10X brogrammers who think Mongo is web scale.

• My boss keeps talking about using a graph database to optimize our recommendation engine, but I'm pretty sure he doesn't even know what a graph is.

If you actually want to learn more...

Here are a few useful articles to learn more about graph databases:

• A Gentle Introduction to Graph Theory - This Medium post provides a beginner-friendly overview of the fundamental concepts of graph theory that underpin graph databases.

• Graph Databases for Beginners: ACID vs. BASE Explained - This Neo4j blog post compares ACID and BASE consistency models, which is important to understand when evaluating different graph database technologies.

• What is a Graph Database? (in 10 minutes) - This quick read from Neo4j covers the key characteristics, use cases and advantages of graph databases at a high level.

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