Thursday, February 14, 2008

Live From JBoss World Orlando!

I'm just back from a brisk walk around the Marriott World Center Resort in Orlando, FL.

What an amazing place! It is incredibly huge. I asked "How big?" when I was checking in and it has 2004 rooms, 265,000 square feet of meeting space, multiple pools (including some with waterfalls), at least one hot tub and a golf course. Oh yeah, and an alarm clock that doesn't work. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

I'm here manning the EnterpriseDB booth with Derek Rodner and, my boss, Jim Mlodgenski. Jim is giving a presentation on Friday. We're giving away copies of my book. I'm doing the signing thing. It's amazingly fun.

I have gotten to talk to so many smart people. JBoss World is not one of the largest conferences but it is a very open source friendly group. I have been amazed at how many people tell me they are already running Postgres and many have been for years. These are production systems too, not just tryouts.

A big draw (besides a free book) has been EnterpriseDB's Oracle compatibility features. Many of these companies are using Oracle and wouldn't mind saving money as long as they don't have to rewrite their apps.

Orlando is just about 65 miles or so from my house so I just drove over. Jim and Derek flew down. We'll all be leaving tomorrow.

Monday, February 11, 2008

First Meeting of the Suncoast Postgres User Group

Set aside March 11 at 6pm for the first meeting of the Suncoast Postgres User Group. The SPUG serves Tampa, St Pete, Lakeland, Bradenton and the rest of central and western Florida. You can get additional information at http://pugs.postgresql.org/spug

Tuesday, February 5, 2008

Postgres 8.3 is out

Postgres 8.3 is out and it contains plenty of new and improved features. Some of my favorites are: sql/xml support, text search, autovacuum improvements, performance improvements (significant) and some additional SQL changes. You can read the press release. You can also check out the feature list or review the simpler feature matrix which compares all of the versions since 7.4. You may also want to read the release notes. You can read about the release in the press by following along with the discussion at postgresql.org.

Monday, February 4, 2008

MySQL vs Postgres Wiki

There is a new wiki comparing MySQL to PostgreSQL. Because it's a wiki, hopefully it can be kept updated so that it's current AND accurate. The wiki is MySQL vs PostgreSQL. Personally, I'd like to see this grow into a universal comparison site that the community could keep updated. LewisC