PostgreSQL Begins Landing LLVM JIT Support For Faster Performance

[fuzz]

The GPL is an absolutely evil license

The GPL is the best legal idea in the modern world. It ensures the only important unalienable right one needs: freedom.

BSD ideas are nice in theory, but GPL helps keeps capitalist ideology from ruining software. Capitalist douche bags dislike that... whatever, go back to your Mac and suck one.

[uid313]

If you get the SQL standard from ISO you will find that not even varchar is part of the standard let alone nvarchar. The long multi word descriptions of those nvarchar and varchar are part of the standard. So nvarchar in standard is NATIONAL CHARACTER VARYING. Next part by standard what format is NATIONAL CHARACTER VARYING is totally up to who ever is implementing database and is totally optional if it implemented at all.

Yes even the CHARACTER VARYING(varchar) contents are not solid defined by standard. Yes this is also optional to implement for standard conforming implementation.

So changing databases you always do need to double check if their implementation of character variables match what you expect because the SQL standard is many forms of grey on the topic. There are a lot of things people presume are part of the SQL standard that are not.

Thank you for for your informative reply!

The more I learn about SQL the more I hate it. I really wish it was better standardized.

When I imagine how bad SQL it is, then I find out it is even worse.

[oiaohm]

Is the data type nvarchar part of the SQL standard? Or is it a proprietary data type?

PostgreSQL does not support the nvarchar data type, however all columns are Unicode anyways. But it means SQL scripts does not work and cant be imported without modifying the script and changing nvarchar to varchar. 😢

If you get the SQL standard from ISO you will find that not even varchar is part of the standard let alone nvarchar. The long multi word descriptions of those nvarchar and varchar are part of the standard. So nvarchar in standard is NATIONAL CHARACTER VARYING. Next part by standard what format is NATIONAL CHARACTER VARYING is totally up to who ever is implementing database and is totally optional if it implemented at all.

Yes even the CHARACTER VARYING(varchar) contents are not solid defined by standard. Yes this is also optional to implement for standard conforming implementation.

So changing databases you always do need to double check if their implementation of character variables match what you expect because the SQL standard is many forms of grey on the topic. There are a lot of things people presume are part of the SQL standard that are not.

The SQL:2016 standard added support for JSON. PostgreSQL have JSON support, but its non-standard. 😢

I hope you like Oracle Database as that is the only one with so call standard JSON. Please note Postgresql does not even get a seat at the standard table so Postgresql differences to way JSON is done to get best performance on the Postgresql back end did not get into the standard as allowed.

PostgreSQL scatters binaries all over my /usr/bin/ directory. 😢

That is a distribution packaging choice.not something postgresql built from source mandates. People forget you can embedded postgresql in applications.

[wizard69]

One has to wonder how much further the FOSS ecosystem

LLVM is part of the FOSS community!

would have progressed if GCC had a modular codebase and a different licence.

The GPL is an absolutely evil license especially in the context of software developed by large groups of people. One of the good things that the LLVM/Clang community did was to force people responsible for GCC to improve GCC.

While GCC may emit better code no one else can use the technology.

GCC doesn't universally emit better code. In any event CLang most certainly stimulated many improvements to GCC especially in code generation and error reporting. Friendly competition is a good thing and it is my understanding that the two teams are on good terms. The reality is LLVM/CLang has been a positive impact on GCC.

As for the issue of using GCC in other projects one should not assume that an advantage of LLVM is something GCC needs. We don't need two look a like compilers in this world. Rather the community is much better off having technology explored on two different tracks. This can be likened to new computer languages like D, Swift, Rust and others trying to become the ideal language for future development. In the end it is all good.

[uid313]

Is the data type nvarchar part of the SQL standard? Or is it a proprietary data type?

PostgreSQL does not support the nvarchar data type, however all columns are Unicode anyways. But it means SQL scripts does not work and cant be imported without modifying the script and changing nvarchar to varchar. 😢

The SQL:2016 standard added support for JSON. PostgreSQL have JSON support, but its non-standard. 😢

PostgreSQL scatters binaries all over my /usr/bin/ directory. 😢

[andrei_me]

Last time i checked there were no decent query editors / gui tools for it (opensource + gtk or qt5 based).
Anyone knows if this changed?

Can't say for sure, but I get used to using psql.

I've added to my bash_rc PAGER="less -S" then they results of psql are easier to read.

Also the tab autocomplete isn't that awful once you get used to it

[coder111]

There's plenty Java/JDBC based tools that can work with multiple databases that also work nicely with PostgreSQL specific functionality.

Squirrel SQL is quite nice: http://www.squirrelsql.org/

DBeaver is freemium: https://dbeaver.jkiss.org/

There's SQL workbench (never used it): http://www.sql-workbench.eu/

DBVisualizer (freemium): http://www.dbvis.com/

Heidi SQL: https://www.heidisql.com/

And there's always default tools: command line psql and pgadmin3.

Also, IDEs like Eclipse, Netbeans, Jetbrains IntelliJ have tools to connect to a database and query it.

Last time i checked there were no decent query editors / gui tools for it (opensource + gtk or qt5 based).
Anyone knows if this changed?

[fuzz]

There is pgAdmin. It's okay, not great, but I'm not very interested in GUI tools anyway.

The new pgAdmin 4 is far better than the older desktop version, pgAdmin 3.

[ctwise]

Last time i checked there were no decent query editors / gui tools for it (opensource + gtk or qt5 based).
Anyone knows if this changed?

There are query tools that aren't postgresql specific or open-source. DataGrip from JetBrains is an example.

[Chewi]

Last time i checked there were no decent query editors / gui tools for it (opensource + gtk or qt5 based).
Anyone knows if this changed?

There is pgAdmin. It's okay, not great, but I'm not very interested in GUI tools anyway.