PostgreSQL Overview

PostgreSQL is one of the world's most advanced open source database systems and it has many features widely used by developers and system administrators alike. In this book, many of those cool features will be covered and discussed in great detail.

In this chapter, you will be introduced to PostgreSQL and the cool new features available in PostgreSQL 9.6 and beyond. All relevant new functionality will be covered in detail. Given the sheer number of changes made to the code and given the size of the PostgreSQL project, this list of features is of course not complete, so I tried to focus on the most important aspects relevant to most people.

The features outlined in this chapter will be split into the following categories:

• Database administration
• SQL and developer-related
• Backup, recovery, and replication
• Performance-related topics