[zffr]

It’s my understanding that row-based relational databases are basically key-value stores that map from row ID to column values. The “magic” of SQL-based relational databases is how the KVS is queried, and the consistency guarantees they provide.

Part of the consistency guarantees is having a reliable storage engine. That’s the value RocksDB provides.

The rest of the “SQL stuff” can be built on top this.

[yourMadness]

It seems fairly well shown that the "SQL stuff" can be build on top of it on the server side.

Building the "SQL stuff" on the client side seems less well proven to me.