In storage terms, what is a mass storage structure that contains rows or tables called?

• A. Attribute
• B. Block
• C. Clause
• D. Dictionary

Answer: (B)

Block storage is the fixed-size unit of data on disk that a database reads and writes as a single unit. This unit can hold multiple rows from a table, or parts of rows, depending on how large each row is and the block size. Since tables are made up of rows, the mass storage structure that contains those rows is this block. An attribute is just a column value within a row, not the storage container. A clause is a fragment of SQL syntax, and a dictionary refers to metadata or a lookup structure, not the place where table data is stored. In many database systems this storage unit is also called a page, but the essential idea is the same: rows and tables are stored inside fixed-size blocks.