PostgreSQL Hardware Performance Tuning

Bruce Momjian

POSTGRESQL is an object-relational database developed on the Internet by a group of developers spread across the globe. It is an open-source alternative to commercial databases like Oracle and Informix.

POSTGRESQL was originally developed at the University of California at Berkeley. In 1996, a group began development of the database on the Internet. They use email to share ideas and file servers to share code. POSTGRESQL is now comparable to commercial databases in terms of features, performance, and reliability. It has transactions, views, stored procedures, and referential integrity constraints. It supports a large number of programming interfaces, including ODBC, Java (JDBC), TCL/TK, PHP, Perl, and Python. POSTGRESQL continues to improve at a tremendous pace thanks to a talented pool of Internet developers.

 

• Performance Concepts
• Keeping Information Near the CPU
• POSTGRESQL Shared Buffer Cache
• How Big Is Too Big?
• Effects of Cache Size
• Proper Sizing of Shared Buffer Cache
• Sort Memory Batch Size
• Cache Size and Sort Size
• Disk Locality
• Multiple Disk Spindles
• File Systems
• Multiple CPUs
• Checkpoints
  • Determining Checkpoint Frequency
  • Reducing Checkpoint Frequency
• Conclusion