https://DevOpsCloud.io -- Cloud Monk Losang Jinpa, Ph.D., MCSE/MCT, GitOps DevOps Engineer

In the context of database systems, a Transaction is a sequence of operations performed as a single logical unit of work. Transactions ensure that a series of operations are executed in a manner that maintains data integrity and consistency. Transactions are fundamental to relational database management systems (RDBMS) and are essential for ensuring reliable data processing.

Transactions are governed by the ACID (Atomicity, Consistency, Isolation, Durability) properties, which are crucial for maintaining data integrity.

• Atomicity: This property ensures that a transaction is treated as a single, indivisible unit. Either all operations within the transaction are completed successfully, or none are applied. If any operation fails, the transaction is rolled back to its previous state.
• Consistency: Consistency ensures that a transaction brings the database from one valid state to another. The database must adhere to all predefined rules, constraints, and relationships before and after the transaction.
• Isolation: Isolation ensures that concurrent transactions do not interfere with each other. Each transaction operates independently, and intermediate states are not visible to other transactions until the transaction is completed.
• Durability: Durability guarantees that once a transaction is committed, its changes are permanent, even in the event of system failures. The database maintains a log of transactions to recover data in case of crashes.

The lifecycle of a transaction involves several stages:

• Begin Transaction: The transaction starts when a set of operations is initiated. This marks the beginning of the transaction and sets the context for the operations to follow.
• Commit: Committing a transaction means that all operations have been completed successfully and the changes are permanently saved to the database. The database ensures that all modifications are made visible to other transactions.
• Rollback: Rolling back a transaction undoes all operations performed during the transaction. This is done in case of an error or failure, reverting the database to its state before the transaction began.

Concurrency control mechanisms are used to manage the simultaneous execution of transactions. They ensure that transactions do not conflict and that the ACID properties are maintained. Common concurrency control techniques include:

• Locking: Locking mechanisms prevent multiple transactions from accessing the same data simultaneously, which could lead to conflicts. Locks can be shared (read) or exclusive (write) and are managed to ensure data consistency.
• Optimistic Concurrency Control: This approach assumes that conflicts are rare and allows transactions to execute without immediate locking. At commit time, the system checks for conflicts and may roll back transactions if necessary.
• Timestamp Ordering: This technique uses timestamps to order transactions and ensure that they are executed in a serializable manner. Older transactions are given precedence over newer ones, maintaining a consistent order of operations.

Managing transactions involves several challenges:

• Deadlocks: Deadlocks occur when two or more transactions are waiting for each other to release resources, resulting in a standstill. Deadlock detection and resolution mechanisms are used to address this issue.
• Isolation Levels: Different isolation levels provide varying degrees of protection against interference between transactions. Balancing isolation with performance requires careful consideration of the application's needs.
• Performance Impact: Ensuring the ACID properties can impact performance, especially in high-concurrency environments. Optimizing transaction management involves finding the right balance between consistency and efficiency.

• Distributed Transactions: With the rise of distributed systems, managing transactions across multiple databases or services is becoming more complex. Advances in distributed transaction protocols aim to handle coordination and consistency in these environments.
• Blockchain: Blockchain technology provides an alternative approach to transaction management by using a decentralized ledger to ensure transparency and immutability. Blockchain has implications for transaction processing beyond traditional databases.
• In-Memory Databases: In-memory databases that keep data in RAM rather than on disk can offer faster transaction processing. These databases are increasingly used for applications requiring high-speed transactions and real-time data access.

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Database_transaction
• https://www.oracle.com/database/what-is-database-transaction/
• https://www.ibm.com/docs/en/db2/11.1?topic=transactions
• https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/sql-server/sql-server-2019

Snippet from Wikipedia: Database transaction

A database transaction symbolizes a unit of work, performed within a database management system (or similar system) against a database, that is treated in a coherent and reliable way independent of other transactions. A transaction generally represents any change in a database. Transactions in a database environment have two main purposes:

1. To provide reliable units of work that allow correct recovery from failures and keep a database consistent even in cases of system failure. For example: when execution prematurely and unexpectedly stops (completely or partially) in which case many operations upon a database remain uncompleted, with unclear status.
2. To provide isolation between programs accessing a database concurrently. If this isolation is not provided, the programs' outcomes are possibly erroneous.

In a database management system, a transaction is a single unit of logic or work, sometimes made up of multiple operations. Any logical calculation done in a consistent mode in a database is known as a transaction. One example is a transfer from one bank account to another: the complete transaction requires subtracting the amount to be transferred from one account and adding that same amount to the other.

A database transaction, by definition, must be atomic (it must either be complete in its entirety or have no effect whatsoever), consistent (it must conform to existing constraints in the database), isolated (it must not affect other transactions) and durable (it must get written to persistent storage). Database practitioners often refer to these properties of database transactions using the acronym ACID.

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