An introduction to the concepts involved can be found in this place:
http://www.unixspace.com/context/databases.html
A network structure is more a star topology whereas a Hierarchical structure is like a tress... Allowing you to drill down to get to an answer.
Hierarchical databases organize data in a tree-like structure with parent-child relationships and a strict one-to-many hierarchy, while network databases use a more flexible model with many-to-many relationships through pointers or links between records. Hierarchical databases are faster for accessing data along predefined paths, while network databases allow for more complex data relationships but can be more complex to manage.
Network Database
Hierarchical and network
Relational model of database is a good way to represent the database. Also network data model and hierarchical model can be used depending on the requirements.
Hierarchical Networks
There are four basic and main database management systems that are used today. Those four include hierarchical, network, relational and object-oriented.
The hierarchical data model organizes data in a tree-like structure with a single parent for each child record. On the other hand, the network data model allows for multiple parent-child relationships, creating a more flexible and complex network of interconnected records. In the hierarchical model, relationships are one-to-many, while in the network model, relationships can be many-to-many.
There are three database models. The three database models are as follows : 1) relational 2) network data 3) hierarchical
network model is a collection data in which records are physically linked through linked lists .A DBMS is said to be a Network DBMS if the relationships among data in the database are of type many-to-many. The relationships among many-to-many appears in the form of a network. Thus the structure of a network database is extremely complicated because of these many-to-many relationships in which one record can be used as a key of the entire database. A network database is structured in the form of a graph that is also a data structure .
In network model of database , all data is related to each other through a link. By a link we mean that it is an association between precisely two records/data . In hierarchical model records are organized as trees rather than arbitrary graphs.
Network Address