Abstract:

Selecting a database engine for governmental electronic services provided by different institutions has a direct impact on the performance. This paper compiled a ranking of the most used databases in the Portuguese town halls in the year 2019. For each DBMS, this study evaluates the IT department satisfaction, focusing on the following technical dimensions: customer support, global evaluation, licensing costs, documentation, ease of use, maintenance, performance, and security. Additionally, are identified the motives that lead to the selection of each DBMS. To gather information, 308 Portuguese city halls, were inquired, 104 answered (33,7%), allowing a confidence level of 95% with an error over the answers of 8%. The resulting DBMS ranking, the 2019 most used database engines in Portuguese city halls, is as follows (from the most relevant to the least): SQL Server Express, Informix, MySQL, SQL Server (pro version), Access, and Postgres.