My Adventures in Graph Databases

Several months ago, I was reading up on NoSQL databases, and noticed that the third type was Graph Databases, an application of a field in Mathematics known as Graph Theory. This piqued my interest largely because of my participation in the First Summer Workshop and International Conference in Graph Theory in the Philippines, back in the mid-70s. No, I wasn't a speaker, I was but a participant, and also a member of the Secretariat. I count that as my first job, although it was more akin to an internship, and only a summer job.

Anyway, fast-forward to that day I learned about Graph Databases and the tie-in with Graph Theory. Intrigued, I did more research, especially for implementations, and discovered neo4j about two months ago.

I first tried a native Windows executable, then a Docker image, still under Windows. The latter took several twists and turns, which I may write about some time -- if I can remember just what happened, I think it had something to do with my version of Windows 10. Nope, I didn't document the events, although suffice it to say that neo4j-in-Docker worked after a Windows upgrade. I managed to get both the native and the Docker image running, albeit not simultaneously since they both used port 7474. And no, while it was trivial, I wasn't in the mood to change that. In any case, I had a graph database accessible from the web through localhost:7474.

If accessing any network resource from localhost is fun, setting up access from across a retwork increases the fun by an order of magnitude. I have a beat-up 9-year-old ThinkPad SL400 which surprises me by still working despite the abuse I've subjected it to. I run mostly Zorin GNU/Linux on it, although I have Windows Vista Home and GhostBSD in a multiple-boot setup. I also have a BeagleBone Black which runs the stock Angstrom, Debian, and now Archlinux. I've set up native neo4j on Zorin on the ThinkPad, and Archlinux on the BBBlack. The latter has been running for the past seven days (as I write this). I can't run the SL400 for too long since it complains about a Fan Error (or something) upon bootup.

More in the coming days. Hint: The cover photo is a graphic image of a database I created.