Comparative Analysis of Graph Databases for Git Data

Abstract

In past decades, the requirements that database management systems (DBMSs) must achieve have become increasingly stringent (speed, data volume). This increase in complexity led to the development of a wide range of non-relational databases strategies, each one suited for specific scenarios. In this context, Graph Database Management Systems (GDBMSs) became popular to represent social networks and other domains that can be intuitively represented as graph-like structures. In this paper, we represent Version Control System data, specifically Git, from a large software project in a graph structure and compared three popular GDBMSs: Neo4j, Janus Graph and Dgraph. We evaluated read/write operations performance for common activities, such as inserting new commits into the graph and retrieving the complete commit history of a specific project. With this contribution, researches and engineers may choose, assertively, the better solution for their needs.