PostgreSQL: The Multi-Model Database Server

I'd like to change the way we describe PostgreSQL.

Calling PostgreSQL and Object Relational database is misleading and years out of date. Yes, PostgreSQL is Relational and the project follows the SQL Standard very closely, but that's not all it does.

PostgreSQL supports all of the following:

* Relational
* Object Relational
* Nested Relational (record types)
* Array Store
* Key-Value Store (hstore)
* Document Store (XML, JSON)

and 9.2 adds

* Range Types

So what do we call it?

We support multiple models, so I guess we should call it a "Multi-Model Database".

The good thing here is that we support them all, in one platform, allowing you to join data together no matter what shape the data is held in.

Which means that PostgreSQL is a great General Purpose database and a great default choice for use by applications. Stonebraker has spoken out against the idea of a General Purpose database, but his interest is in bringing VC-funded startups to market, not in supporting production systems and catering to a range of business requirements with flexibility and speed. The reality is that if you pick a specialised database that fits your current requirements you're completely stuck when things change, like they always do.

Alan Turing's Legacy

It's Alan Turing's 100th Anniversary today.

Interesting for me, since I live near Bletchley Park where he worked during the war. I recommend a visit there, its becoming something of a tourist attraction now after years of obscurity.

Born out of the needs of that war, Turing laid the ground work for both modern computation and cryptanalysis. Many other people helped that effort and have been forgotten, something not helped by people re-writing history in films like U-571 and other sensationalist material.

Originally, computers had just one use - mathematical computation. We might think he foresaw many things, but I don't think he even dreamed of the worlds of databases or graphics. The level and complexity of "persistent computing" we now have in PostgreSQL would astound him, though he'd probably not make the distinction between the different layers of software and hardware that we do, only see the whole system working together as being amazing.

I like to think he'd be impressed with what we've done, but I'm also thinking he might observe how much more there is yet to achieve.

On a related note, I saw something that pointed out that Blade Runner predicted flying cars yet all the cops did with them was land next to a static payphone. I guess imagining mobile phones was a stretch too far. Yet we have the mobile phones, but not the flying cars.

Predicting the future is easy. Building it is harder and slower than we like; funding the future is the hardest part.  Turing would have done nothing without a budget, and sheer persistence.

Replication Test Servers

As various people have already noted, IBM has set up some servers that will allow us to test software for robustness and performance and have kindly donated those to us for project use. Thanks very much to Mark Wong for arranging that as well as various IBM folk for assistance.

The general plan is for Rob Haas to get access to one server for performance testing, while I have access to 3 smaller virtual servers for testing replication. It's a pretty rough plan as yet and full access is still being fully configured.

This is good because it will allow us access right at the start of PostgreSQL 9.3 development cycle.

I'll post again when we've finished the 9.2 CommitFest and have had the chance to set these up in a useful way.