PostgreSQL is an open-source object-relational database system. This system is widely known for its reliability, good performance, and feature robustness. This is the reason behind the growing popularity of this database among various businesses. According to the DB-Engines Ranking, PostgreSQL is ranked 4 in the list of various databases available around the whole world.

What is PostgreSQL?

PostgreSQL is a type of relational database that stores the data points in rows along with columns as different data attributes. The table in PostgreSQL is used to store various related rows. This type of database is widely used in various businesses. This database can easily work with various latest technologies. Moreover, this relational database system is extensible.

Reasons For Using PostgreSQL

The PostgreSQL is an enterprise-class database and it boasts amazing features like Multi-Version Concurrency Control (MVCC), tablespaces, asynchronous replication, online/hot backups, point in time recovery, nested transactions, and write-ahead logging for fault tolerance. PostgreSQL can easily work with various widely popular Operating Systems (OS) such as Windows, Unix, Mac OS X, and Linux. postgres performance is unmatched with various other SQL databases, 

The open-source nature of this database system allows its upgrading and extension. In the PostgreSQL database system, you are free to define your own data types, create custom functions and also write code in different programming languages without any need to recompile the database. One more reason for the growing popularity of the PostgreSQL database is that it is free of cost.  

  • Reliable Database

PostgreSQL is not just a relational database, but it is also object relational and it helps in supporting the complex structures and allows the user-defined data types. Postgresql offers a huge amount of data capacity. Also, it is trusted for its data integrity. These features give an edge to this database system over other open-source SQL databases such as MariaDB, Firebird, etc. The PostgreSQL is available with various features to help developers in building applications, and administrators to protect data integrity

  • Extensible Database

The PostgreSQL database is highly extensible. There are two situations where PostgreSQL shines out among all and they are when users have to configure and control their database. PostgreSQL is compliant with high-degree SQL standards. Therefore, it is highly interoperable with various applications.

In addition to this, PostgreSQL provides users with control over the metadata. The reason behind the extensible nature of PostgreSQL is that it is catalog-driven. One of the major differences between the standard relational database system and PostgreSQL is that the latter store more information in catalogs. Users can easily modify these tables and this feature allows the users to easily extend the PostgreSQL.  

How is PostgreSQL used?

PostgreSQL is widely popular for supporting the advanced data types and also helps in optimizing the performance which is usually associated with commercial databases such as SQL Server, Oracle, etc. Many web applications, analytics applications, mobile-based, and geospatial apps use PostgreSQL for storing data. This relational database system can be used for storing structured as well as unstructured data in just one product. The unstructured data is obtained through emails, social media posts, audio, video, etc. By storing the unstructured data, the customer service can be improved, can easily discover new product requirements, etc.

This open-source relational database offers powerful online transaction processing capabilities (OLTP. Also, it can be configured for full redundancy and automatic failover. Therefore, this database is the perfect choice for manufacturers and financial firms.

Day-N operational challenges of using PostgreSQL

In addition to various benefits, some challenges are faced by the enterprises by adopting PostgreSQL. PostgreSQL is the fastest growing community, but not like various other traditional database vendors. The PostgreSQL communities do not have the mature database ambiance. In addition to this, PostgreSQL is frequently used in tandem with various databases like Oracle, MongoDB. These databases need special skills and good experience. Therefore, hiring staff with a PostgreSQL skillset is a quite difficult task. In addition to this, the developers’ team and database professionals have to manage various databases from different vendors without changing the existing processes.

The PostgreSQL relational database is open-source and various IT professionals in the company may start using this database organically. It will give rise to one more challenge- no knowledge of PostgreSQL from the enterprise IT perspective. In addition to this, there will be duplication of work because different teams in the company may try to solve the same issue independently.

Wrap up

PostgreSQL is an advanced open-source database and it is backed by more than 30 years of community development. Thus, this database is a backbone to various applications and key technologies. The canonical supports this relational database system with fully managed database services which automates the mundane task of application operations. It will let the enterprise owners and developers pay attention to building core apps.