A million things like this are why PostgreSQL is the only relational database I consider for, well, pretty much anything. Their approach of “build it safe and then make it fast” has been paying off in spades for a couple of decades now. Thanks for everything you do, psql maintainers!
Postgres 11 – A First Look
31–40 of 193 posts
Re: Postgres 11 – A First Look
#32One thing the OP didn’t mention is that the JIT is not enabled by default. They found that it has performance improvements for only long and complex queries yet. [1] But it can be enabled by a simple configuration command: jit = on. [1]: https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=PostgreS...
It's expected to only have benefits for longer queries. The problem is primarily that the current logic what is likely to be a long query isn't perfect, so can trigger in the wrong moments. Since integrating the feature we'd added an item in the "pre-release item list" [1], to decide whether to enable/disable - but we definitely wanted it enabled during most of the beta test period. This wasn't really a last-minute "whaaaaaaa" thing...
[1] https://wiki.postgresql.org/wiki/PostgreSQL_11_Open_Items
Re: Postgres 11 – A First Look
#33Re: Postgres 11 – A First Look
#34> Now you can quit Postgres by simply typing quit or exit. Previously you had to use Ctrl + D or \q While this is good to help out beginners a bit, people should really learn Ctrl + D. It works practically everywhere and saves tons of time guessing/remembering and even typing the correct incantation for the program you want to exit.
Original author here. Yes, it's great to learn Ctrl + D. But losing out on beginners that aren't familiar in favor of things that are naturally intuitive is a great way to make those who are new to programming and especially databases feel like they're dumb or not capable of it. I still recall the first time I was in vi and I couldn't figure out how to get out of the damn thing, and don't get me started on arrow keys…
You use the word intuitive a couple of times, and suggest there's a natural way to exit interactive cli programs (and it's not ctrl-d).
Yet for me, ctrl-d is my usual first way of trying to exit any shell or cli utility.
Whether it's natural or not, I couldn't say. Arguably the nipple is the first and only intuitive interface, everything after that is learned. After many years on my/maria I find the backslash shortcuts very counterintuitive to 'show databases | tables' etc.
While I think it's great to have both options present, I don't think the demographic of people who work out they want an rdbms, evaluate and select postgresql, work out how to install server and client components, su to the postgres user, and are then likely to abandon in frustration as they can't determine how to exit the cli, is negligible.
Re: Postgres 11 – A First Look
#35> Now you can quit Postgres by simply typing quit or exit. Previously you had to use Ctrl + D or \q While this is good to help out beginners a bit, people should really learn Ctrl + D. It works practically everywhere and saves tons of time guessing/remembering and even typing the correct incantation for the program you want to exit.
Original author here. Yes, it's great to learn Ctrl + D. But losing out on beginners that aren't familiar in favor of things that are naturally intuitive is a great way to make those who are new to programming and especially databases feel like they're dumb or not capable of it. I still recall the first time I was in vi and I couldn't figure out how to get out of the damn thing, and don't get me started on arrow keys…
I'm reminded of this bit, from https://www.gnu.org/fun/jokes/ed-msg.html
Let's look at a typical novice's session with the mighty ed:
golem$ ed
?
help
?
?
?
quit
?
exit
?
bye
?
hello?
?
eat flaming death
?
^C
?
^C
?
^D
?Note the consistent user interface and error reportage. Ed is generous enough to flag errors, yet prudent enough not to overwhelm the novice with verbosity.
Re: Postgres 11 – A First Look
#36I’m already loving PG10’s native partitioning support. PG11 closes the loop on a few convenience features like being able to set foreign and primary keys at the master table level. With PG10 I can’t use ON CONFLICT clauses - looking forward to upgrading and sorting that out.
Re: Postgres 11 – A First Look
#37A million things like this are why PostgreSQL is the only relational database I consider for, well, pretty much anything. Their approach of “build it safe and then make it fast” has been paying off in spades for a couple of decades now. Thanks for everything you do, psql maintainers!
100% naive question: why is mysql and their similars so popular then?
Spanner and AWS Aurora base off of more mysql than postregsql from what I can tell. Why?
Re: Postgres 11 – A First Look
#38Earlier quoted context omitted.
Original author here. Yes, it's great to learn Ctrl + D. But losing out on beginners that aren't familiar in favor of things that are naturally intuitive is a great way to make those who are new to programming and especially databases feel like they're dumb or not capable of it. I still recall the first time I was in vi and I couldn't figure out how to get out of the damn thing, and don't get me started on arrow keys…
You use the word intuitive a couple of times, and suggest there's a natural way to exit interactive cli programs (and it's not ctrl-d). Yet for me, ctrl-d is my usual first way of trying to exit any shell or cli utility. Whether it's natural or not, I couldn't say. Arguably the nipple is the first and only intuitive interface, everything after that is learned. After many years on my/maria I find the backslash shortcu…
The background of what you learned on is key to whats intuitive or natural. If you came up on an unix based system then yes you'd expect this. If you learned databases via MySQL then you'd expect show database to work.
Today though many more are coming to development without an academic or linux background. If you install Postgres via Postgres.app there is a chance you're not at all familiar with a commandline. What is intuitive... yes it's relative to your background. I very much hope that the number quit or exit is intuitive for, those that don't come from a linux or academic background, grows of time. This does become a more valuable tool the more beginners there are, and personally from working with a lot of beginners already suspect it's more valuable than many realize.
Re: Postgres 11 – A First Look
#39Earlier quoted context omitted.
I learned about Ctrl + D pretty early on in my software career, probably around 2009 or so, and have been using it 99.99% of the time since then[1]. It's both consistent and easy, so I really can't see any benefit of not using it. [1] The 0.01% of the time was when I was testing out using Windows for software dev. I don't remember but I don't think Ctrl + D works there.
I find myself pressing ctrl+c on windows.
ctrl+c also works on Crosh (Chrome Shell).
Re: Postgres 11 – A First Look
#40Earlier quoted context omitted.
Oh no! I used to be able to Ctrl+C knowing that it would interrupt any currently running query but never lose my session. If I want to quit the PostgreSQL shell, I'd Ctrl+D like any other shell. What will I do now?
Ctrl-D still works. The new sql commands additions.
Right, but now I can't Ctrl+C to cancel a query without worrying instead I will exit the shell instead.