back to article PostgreSQL 9.4's secret weapon? YES, IT'S A NEW FILE FORMAT!

Judging by the latest beta version of the open source PostgreSQL database, the differences between SQL and NoSQL approaches are fading over time. With the beta release of the open source PostgreSQL 9.4 database on Thursday, administrators have been given more of the features typically associated with NoSQL systems like MongoDB …

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  1. dinis

    Secret weapon

    A secret weapon is either a concealed weapon, or a weapon that is not officially confirmed by the owner.

    In terms of large-scale weapons, a secret weapon may refer to a newly designed or invented weapon that the government denies the existence of. For example, during its development, the atomic bomb was considered a secret weapon.

    In terms of personal weapons, a secret weapon is a weapon that is hidden, or a weapon of unexpected design. Examples include umbrellas that fire bullets (Penguin in the Batman series) and watches that fire lasers. The concept of secret weapons was widely popularized by the James Bond novels and movies.

    The very nature of secret weapons is special, as they tend to not stay secret for very long, if they are actually used as weapons. The German WWII V1 flying bomb, for example, only stayed secret until they were fired against Allied targets. The secrecy factor relies on how many people know of the weapons development and ultimately, how many people remain alive to report about the weapon's existence in the first place once the weapon is used.

    In other words, in the example of a weapon being concealed (such as a gun underneath a trench coat) the weapon would remain a "secret" if a) there are no witnesses to the carrier of the weapon prior to the event and b) there are no witnesses left after the event (other than the carrier).

    "Secret weapon" can also be a figurative phrase referring to an unknown technique of any kind that a person uses suddenly and surprises his opponent. For example, a debater may use references to a certain authoritative source as a 'secret weapon' to discredit the claims of the opponent.

    1. BlueGreen

      Re: Secret weapon @dinis

      Wow. What a gem that is. Almost relevant, to postgres too. Almost. Has that formal tone that sounds like... wait a sec, it is! A verbatim copy of the first few paras of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secret_weapon.

      Quality.

  2. gary27
    Happy

    Well done postgres hackers - fantastic job

    Postgres is amazing - coming from an ms sql background - I still find it hard to believe the incredible functionality available and completely free from true geniuses across the globe - including Russian index gurus, who have enabled the super fast jsonb.

    Equivalent capability costs a fortune from Microsoft or oracle, because you need the Enterprise version for critical functions such replication.

    Postgres also has much more powerful development potential than ms sql, user defined functions are mind blowing and can be called in in normal select statements and written in a wide variety of languages such as pl/v8.

    Also - exclusion constraints, range types, natural join, using join, windowed aggregates, recursive cte, update cte and dynamic background workers which will hopefully be improved by next version to enable better parallel processing.

    Well done and many thanks to all involved.

    1. Nigel 11

      Re: Well done postgres hackers - fantastic job

      Open source:

      "We've found a bug in your product."

      "Great. Let us have the details and we'll fix it"

      "By soonest? Well, yes, if you're willing to pay someone to work specifically on your problem for a few days ... actually it's already been fixed in the latest release, but we understand you may have operational reasons for prefering to pay for a back-port of the bug-fix ..."

      Closed source:

      "We've found a bug in your product"

      "Great. pay us $$$$$$ for an upgrade to the current version"

      "Is it fixed in the current version?"

      "No, but we can't open a ticket against your obsolete version"

      [snip - unproductive dialogue]

      "Whaddya mean, you'll sue? Haven't you read our terms and conditions? Anyway, we've got more and better-paid lawyers than you. You ought to know that, after all it's you that's paying for them when you buy our products"

      (It's Friday. Don't take this too seriously).

  3. JLV
    Thumb Up

    Excellent rdbms

    Been coding on Oracle, MS SQL, yes even Gupta for 20+ years.

    In several years of light use, I haven't pushed Postgres yet, but all the time I've worked with it it comes around as a very solid, reliable, system that just "gets" SQL. A pleasure to work with and, conveniently, I may very well have a scenario where storing and serving up pre-computed JSON to Ajax requests could come in very handy.

    Contrast that to mySQL which in my experience heads into the weeds more often than not if you really throw complex SQL at it though it's fine in a normal web storage context.

    First class citizen in Amazon RDS land too. Good stuff.

    Hats off gentlemen.

  4. cca

    " explained the chief architect at PostgreSQL company EnterpriseDB, Robert HaaS, in an email with The Register."

    would that be Hippy as a Service

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