Non-structured databases predate SQL. MUMPS dates to 1966, and is perhaps the canonical NoSQL database. It is a key-value store in almost exactly the same fashion as Mongo or Couch.

SQL has the impressive track record, the large installed base, but NoSQL is making impressive gains and has many proponents. We put the question to experts in both camps.

NoSQL databases did scale much, much better than Oracle Database, DB2, or SQL Server, which are all based on a 40-year-old design. However, each type of NoSQL database had new restrictions: ...

SQL database is a relational database. The basic quality of NoSQL is that it may not require fixed table schemas, usually avoid join operations, and typically scale horizontally.

The articles on NoSQL databases in Reuven M. Lerner's At the Forge column appearing in recent issues of LJ have been enjoyable. Because this is the Enterprise issue, I think it would be helpful to ...

SQL databases with in-memory column stores, NoSQL with query languages; it looks like the two schools of database design have begun to merge. Written by Simon Bisson, Contributor Nov. 24, 2014, 4: ...

It's not so much a black and white, SQL vs. NoSQL situation, of course: TokBox still kept SQL databases around. That's where his team fed portions of Hadoop output for analysts to query more easily.