PostgreSQL 8.1 Available

atani writes "PostgreSQL 8.1 has been posted, though not officially announced as of this moment. This release includes two-phased commits, improved SMP and overall performance, a new role system replaces the older user/group, autovacuum is now within the backend rather than a separate contrib module, and various improvements, performance enhancements, and bugfixes. " You can also read the developer notes for the popular database. One thing is clear- with the newest Postresql and MySql, you have much to choose from.

Comments

Re:Just installed Win32 version

[bigHairyDog]

That's the PostGreSQL philosophy - don't hide the complexity. MySQL did that, and was rewarded by popularity and a generation of people who didn't understand database administration. PostGreSQL makes you pay attention to these options, and educates you in the process.

Re:Congratulations to the PostgreSQL Team!

[jadavis]

For real multi-master clustering, I think there are commercial options availabile; but yes, it'll be nice when it's included.

Replication may never be "included", in the sense that it's a part of the core distribution. There's really no reason to have it there, and several reasons not to:
(1) New releases of the replication software would have to wait until a new release of PostgreSQL.
(2) There are many completely different things that go under the heading "replication" that are used in different situations, depending on how often you expect the connections to be up, whether you're replicating for redundancy or speed, etc. Often, a real situation will require using multiple types of replication.
(3) It puts an extra burden on the developers to maintain every line of code in every piece of replication software as well as the rest of the database.

What users really want is to have another well-maintained, BSD licensed project that achieves things not possible with Slony-I, PgPool, etc.

Re:/. Meta question: a wheelbarrow?

[amorico]

I assume it is from the William Carlos Williams Poem, Red Wheelbarrow

so much depends
upon
a red wheel
barrow

glazed with rain
water

beside the white
chickens.

A database being the red wheelbarrow of course. Don't ask about the chickens.

Some ancient history

[jd]

The word "wheelbarrow" originates from the ancient burial mounds called barrows and are traditionally the same shape as the more ancient of these, called "long barrows". The common theme being dead stuff buried under large mounds of earth.

Databases are often used for dead projects, buried under large mounds of data. The parallel would seem to be pretty exact.