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Postgresql 9.6: Support parallel aggregation

postgresql.org

31–40 of 64 posts

Re: Postgresql 9.6: Support parallel aggregation

#31
post #25

It looks like in 9.4 PG went after the document databases and now they are after Oracle. I don't know why I get excited with point releases of postgres, but I do.

Because they are building an open source industry leading database. What's not exciting about that!

Its not just that. I waited patiently for 9.4 to come out as I needed just that functionality of indexable JSONB for something I'm working on. It was pointless for me to start the project without it. 9.4 came out better than I could have expected. Then followed by Upserts, and now this... I'm directly and personally affected by each point release. Its fantastic.

Re: Postgresql 9.6: Support parallel aggregation

#32

Short of doing a deep dive into Postgresql, do any universities use Postgresql as a basis for their DB implementation courses? I wanted to dive into Postgres and was hoping for some training wheels. Thanks.

https://courses.cs.washington.edu/courses/csep544/ might be helpful

Re: Postgresql 9.6: Support parallel aggregation

#33
post #25

It looks like in 9.4 PG went after the document databases and now they are after Oracle. I don't know why I get excited with point releases of postgres, but I do.

Because in the PostgreSQL world those are actually major versions, not "point updates" ;-)

Re: Postgresql 9.6: Support parallel aggregation

#34
post #26

A slight tangent, but I am still shocked that many open source projects lack downloads via https (including PostgreSQL). Sure you can offer some layer of security by signing the distributions, but ultimately users are lazy.

Out of curiosity what does it matter if your postgres download is via http or https? Is there any benefit of hiding your download from prying eyes?

You can validate the certificate used to establish the connection and thus the endpoint, if you want to, and thus avoid one potential vector of someone serving you a malicious postgres build. Because you're putting your trust in the network.

Re: Postgresql 9.6: Support parallel aggregation

#35
I am totally impressed by the work 2ndQuadrant is doing: many of the recent innovations to Postgres have been done by them and all of that without any obligation for them to be doing so. The BSD license would allow them to add all of these things to a proprietary fork that they could be selling.

Or they could just release their own fork under an open license and focus on just adding features.

But that's not how they work. All of their contributions are pushed upstream which is a very considerable effort with how conservative Postgres is at accepting new functionality.

Aside of that: there are 2ndQuadrant employees in the #postgres IRC chat room, helping people with daily support issues. This is their core business and yet they still help people for free (within reason). This is bloody impressive.

If I'm ever at a point when I need help with a Postgres issue, then they will be very first of the list of companies I would consider.

Thank you very much for all that you are doing.

Re: Postgresql 9.6: Support parallel aggregation

#36
post #26

A slight tangent, but I am still shocked that many open source projects lack downloads via https (including PostgreSQL). Sure you can offer some layer of security by signing the distributions, but ultimately users are lazy.

Out of curiosity what does it matter if your postgres download is via http or https? Is there any benefit of hiding your download from prying eyes?

To put it another way it's less about prying eyes and more about MitM attacks.

Re: Postgresql 9.6: Support parallel aggregation

#37

Short of doing a deep dive into Postgresql, do any universities use Postgresql as a basis for their DB implementation courses? I wanted to dive into Postgres and was hoping for some training wheels. Thanks.

My university does, though unfortunately we don't have any public course information.

Re: Postgresql 9.6: Support parallel aggregation

#38
post #30

There is going to come a point where Postgres passes Oracle in terms of features and performance. There is also a point that Postgres will perform with enough features needed by most businesses that they'll choose it even though it doesn't match Oracle on a feature by feature basis. We have hit peak Oracle. From this point forward it's going to be hard for Oracle to regain momentum. Expect a lot of FUD against Postgr…

First hand experience, I work for a bank which is a Fortune 100, and our department was heavily relying on Oracle Exadata, paying between 1-2 millions (don't know exact figure), we moved away to PostgreSQL and Casandra. Cost factor was not the only motive (1-2 millions was actually penny for this bank) but our Director was convinced that exadata was unnecessary.

Out of interest, what are the benefits of Exadata, or is it really a bit of emperorer's new clothes? Can you not get similar performance with similar good hardware?

Re: Postgresql 9.6: Support parallel aggregation

#39

A slight tangent, but I am still shocked that many open source projects lack downloads via https (including PostgreSQL). Sure you can offer some layer of security by signing the distributions, but ultimately users are lazy.

The -release RPM (which contains the yum repository configuration + GPG signing key) for any RedHat family distros is available over HTTPS. Check any of the links on this page http://yum.postgresql.org/repopackages.php#pg95 - all available over HTTPS.

The GPG signing key used by the apt repo for Debian and derivatives is also served over HTTPS @ https://www.postgresql.org/media/keys/ACCC4CF8.asc, and the instructions for use direct you to install it as such.

It literally matters not at this point whether downloads are delivered over HTTPS or not outside of anonymity (which is almost moot, because you are obviously downloading PostgreSQL or the few related packages in these repositories) since package signatures are verified.

Re: Postgresql 9.6: Support parallel aggregation

#40

A slight tangent, but I am still shocked that many open source projects lack downloads via https (including PostgreSQL). Sure you can offer some layer of security by signing the distributions, but ultimately users are lazy.

As a project, I don't think PostgreSQL wants (or should want) anybody running a DB from the source tarball that's (eventually) stamped as 9.6 - it's existence is a mere artifact of the actual packaging work that goes on during a release. In all cases you should be installing packages via your OS's installation mechanism, and those packages will be authenticated (or not, as the case may be, but it's not in-scope for Postgres-the-project, and it shouldn't be different for installing PG vs. any other piece of software on the system). A production-ready setup needs an OS user, logging/logfile rotation, some tooling for managing DB clusters, and a half-dozen other things I've never even thought about. If you just want to check out the source, clone the repo.

But in a production environment, you always want to use a package provided by your OS vendor. Postgres has excellent packagers for both Debian and RHEL-flavored distros (and I imagine more) and you really want to have the system-level considerations thought through by someone by someone who knows what needs to be thought about.

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