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Avinash VallarapuThis blog was originally written in September 2018 and was updated in March 2025. In this post, we cover the methods used to achieve an enterprise-grade PostgreSQL backup strategy. We’ll explore options like pg_basebackup and WAL archiving to enable PostgreSQL Point-in-Time Recovery (PITR), discuss PostgreSQL backup best practices, and touch upon enterprise database backup tools. […]
This post was originally published in March 2019 and was updated in February 2025. Planning a PostgreSQL upgrade but not sold on pg_upgrade? You’re not alone. If pg_upgrade feels too risky or limiting, pg_dump and pg_restore give you something better: full control. You can move across major versions, make schema changes, and leave storage format […]
This blog was originally published in September 2018 and was updated in Feburary of 2024 Configuring replication between two databases is considered to be the best strategy for achieving high availability during disasters and provides fault tolerance against unexpected failures. PostgreSQL satisfies this requirement through streaming replication. We shall talk about another option called logical […]
This post was originally published in 2019 and was updated in 2023. I presented at Percona University São Paulo about the new features in PostgreSQL that allow the deployment of simple shards. I’ve tried to summarize the main points in this post, as well as provide an introductory overview of sharding itself. Please note I […]
I have previously written a blog post on the detailed steps involved in enabling PostgreSQL monitoring using PMM. In that post, you could see me talking about the role: pg_monitor that can be granted to monitoring users. The pg_monitor role restricts a monitoring user from accessing user data but only grants access to statistic views […]
Recently we published a blog about a very simple application failover using libpq features which could be the simplest of all automatic application connection routing. In this blog post, we are discussing how a proxy server using HAProxy can be used for connection routing which is a well-known technique with very wide deployment. There are […]
PostgreSQL is a widely-used Open Source database and has been the DBMS of the year for the past 2 years in DB-Engine rankings. As such, there is always a need for reliable and robust monitoring solutions. While there are some commercial monitoring tools, there is an equally good number of open source tools available for […]
When you build replication in PostgreSQL using Streaming replication, you cannot perform writes to a standby node; only reads. This way, you could offload reads or reporting queries to standby servers and send writes to master. Additionally, starting from PostgreSQL 10, libpq and psql clients could probe the connection for a master and allow connections […]
PostgreSQL 12 can be considered revolutionary considering the performance boost we observe with partitioning enhancements, planner improvements, several SQL features, Indexing improvements, etc. You may see some of such features discussed in future blog posts. But, let me start this blog with something interesting. You might have already seen some news that there is no […]
There is always a need for profiling tools in databases for admins or developers. While it is easy to understand the point where an SQL is spending more time using EXPLAIN or EXPLAIN ANALYZE in PostgreSQL, the same would not work for functions. Recently, Jobin has published a blog post where he demonstrated how plprofiler can […]
In my previous blog post, we have seen how the extension hypopg can be helpful in creating hypothetical indexes in PostgreSQL. If you have read it already, you know that it is very useful in verifying whether an Index can improve the performance of an SQL without having to create it in reality. Considering this, […]
At recent conferences, we have received a curious question from users who have used Oracle in the past and are now using PostgreSQL: “Do we have hypothetical indexes in PostgreSQL ?“. The answer to that question is EXPLAIN <QUERY>. However, if you wish to run an EXPLAIN ANALYZE that runs that SQL and provides the run […]
There is a wide variety of indexes available in PostgreSQL. While most are common in almost all databases, there are some types of indexes that are more specific to PostgreSQL. For example, GIN indexes are helpful to speed up the search for element values within documents. GIN and GiST indexes could both be used for […]
Usually, the PostgreSQL Community releases minor patches on the Thursday of the second week of the second month of each quarter. This can vary depending on the nature of the fixes. For example, if the fixes include critical fixes as a postgres community response to security vulnerabilities or bugs that might affect data integrity. The […]
Please join Percona’s PostgreSQL Support Technical Lead, Avinash Vallarapu and Senior Support Engineers, Fernando Laudares, Jobin Augustine and Nickolay Ihalainen as they demonstrate the methods to upgrade a legacy version of PostgreSQL to a newer version using built-in as well as open source tools. Watch the Recorded Webinar To start, this webinar opens with a […]
When you need to upgrade your PostgreSQL databases, there are a number of options available to you. In this post we’ll take a look at how you can upgrade PostgreSQL versions using pg_upgrade, a built-in tool that allows in-place upgrade of your software. Using pg_upgrade allows you, potentially, to minimize your downtime, an essential consideration […]
When you need to upgrade PostgreSQL, there are a variety of approaches that you can use. To avoid application downtime, then not all of the options to upgrade postgres are suitable. When avoiding downtime is essential, then you might consider using replication as a means of upgrade, and depending on your scenario, you can choose […]
There are several approaches to assess when you need to upgrade PostgreSQL. In this blog post, we look at the option for upgrading a postgres database using pg_dumpall. As this tool can also be used to back up PostgreSQL clusters, then it is a valid option for upgrading a cluster too. We consider the advantages […]
A date for your diary. On Wednesday, April 17 at 7:00 AM PDT (UTC-7) / 10:00 AM EDT (UTC-4) Percona’s PostgreSQL Support Technical Lead, Avinash Vallarapu and Senior Support Engineers, Fernando Laudares, Jobin Augustine and Nickolay Ihalainen, will demonstrate the upgrade of a legacy version of PostgreSQL to a newer version, using built-in as well as […]
In case you didn’t already see this news, PostgreSQL has got its first minor version released for 2019. This includes minor version updates for all supported PostgreSQL versions. We have indicated in our previous blog post that PostgreSQL 9.3 had gone EOL, and it would not support any more updates. This release includes the following […]