[Tfug] Linux db

[Bexley Hall]

Hi Liz,

--- On Wed, 7/29/09, Liz_Ravenwood at beaerospace.com <Liz_Ravenwood at beaerospace.com> wrote:

> I'm going to build a database behind
> a web application and don't know Oracle yet.

I would strongly suggest PostgreSQL, instead.  Even "building it
from scratch" is relatively straightforward (and I suspect you
can just as easily find a prebuilt version).  There is support
for tying it into PHP, Apache, etc.  Aside from one version in
the past few years, I haven't seen any data loss issues and
the code itself is "quite pretty"  :>

Featurewise, there isn't too much in the mainstream that
it doesn't do that Oracle *does*.  (I think you can find a
tabulated list of RDBMS features on the postgresql.org
web site).  I've had some issues over the years with odd
things like using inheritance on arrays of user defined 
datatypes, etc. but most things get added to the featurelist
with amazing speed.

> I've gotten pretty good with MS Access
> so I'm thinking the knowledge will transfer.

There are some GUI tools for data definition and data entry
available (e.g., pgadmin3) but I don't think you will find
the "application end" built-in like Access (e.g., you don't
draw forms or reports in PostgreSQL -- just the data and
its definitions).

> My computer at home is so f---dup that
> I'm going to take everything off and install RedHat,
> but then want to install Oracle and develop to a website.

If your database is going to be large, be sure to have
a sizable place to which to *dump* it; the safest and most
portable way of dumping PostgreSQL databases is in an ASCII 
format (so dumps can get very big, very fast).

Good luck!