This document provides an overview of database management systems. It discusses what data is and how it differs from information. It then describes some issues with traditional file systems for data storage and how database management systems were created to overcome these deficiencies. The key characteristics of a database management system are then outlined, including using real-world entities, relation-based tables, isolation of data and application, normalization to reduce redundancy, consistency, and ACID properties. The document also discusses database architecture types, data models, the relational model, database schemas and instances, and SQL. Finally, it covers some database design concepts like entities and attributes, relationships and keys, and generalization and specialization.