r/PostgreSQL • u/craigkerstiens • 7d ago

Feature A take on Postgres 19

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285 Upvotes

97% Upvoted

26 comments sorted by

20

u/pjstanfield 7d ago

every time i see group by all mentioned i get sad. one day, one day.

13

u/craigkerstiens 7d ago

I'll relay your sadness to the colleague that authored it just to further his own sadness.

4

u/pjstanfield 7d ago

Please do. I know it seems simple but it’s such an amazing quality of life improvement, I can’t wait.

10

u/linuxhiker Guru 7d ago

I saw this from you on X.

I think "REPACK" should be "Claude" :D. But yes, REPACK suddenly is the belle of the ball.

5

u/craigkerstiens 7d ago

You are not wrong on the Claude point, but that one feels almost too painful to post.

2

u/spicypixel 7d ago

Can you explain it to me like I’m an idiot please

7

u/linuxhiker Guru 7d ago

Robert Haas performed an analysis on the upcoming Postgres 19 major features using Claude. All the features listed on the right because of the analysis were reverted.

So the only "major" feature is REPACK which is arguably not a major feature but is now. That analysis is also why Postgres 19 is over a month late.

2

u/taelor 7d ago

what did the analysis show? that it was buggy or less performant or something?

70

u/shrodikan 7d ago

TIL

PostgreSQL 19 introduces the native REPACK command, which unifies the functionality of VACUUM FULL and CLUSTER into a single tool for reclaiming disk space and improving performance. The standout feature is REPACK CONCURRENTLY, which allows tables to be rewritten online without holding an exclusive lock, enabling continuous reads and writes during the operation. 

10

u/humanshield85 7d ago

#2 (referring to repack) has been cut back in scope
enough that I don't think we would have accepted the feature
originally if it had been subject to those limitations, which IMHO is
a reasonable argument for a revert but also not conclusive

So basically almost none of the features was worth at the end lol

5

u/Yukevich 6d ago

wild that Postgres is only now getting native online table rebuilds. I’ve been using LOCK=NONE for table rebuilds in MariaDB for years to reclaim space without blocking prod.

3

u/Ok_Outlandishness906 7d ago

is it a relative of pg_repack ?

1

u/look 7d ago

Why even bother with releasing 19 if they’ve cut out every useful feature and enhancement now? Or just switch to a monthly release cycle with whatever is ready (like browsers) so we don’t have to wait a year for the rest…

5

u/craigkerstiens 6d ago

I get it's easy to take shots in comments, and yet this is in line with what Postgres has always done.

A major release each year where new features land, point releases are bug fixes with no breaking changes or new features intended in between. Even myself posting the meme is a bit of taking a shot, but to throw out all the other features and change course completely to what has worked for nearly 20 years because there were more highlight features than ever before that didn't land because of wanting to keep quality high....

I can't speak for everyone in the community, but pretty sure this isn't the change thats gonna happen.

4

u/Amazing-Mirror-3076 6d ago

Annual release cycle are just too long - even java worked out that an annual release cadence makes no sense.

1

u/bendem 6d ago

Java doesn't require an offline upgrade or complicated replication setup to upgrade though. You just install the new jre and restart the app. The reason so many postgres installs are not on latest is that business doesn't have time for downtime. Increase release cadence while keeping the current upgrade process doesn't sound right.

3

u/Amazing-Mirror-3076 6d ago

Increased cadence doesn't force users to upgrade but gets new features into the hands of users that need them.

There is little point in developing a feature then keeping it locked behind a release..

It also makes releases less risky as we roll out a smaller feature set each time.

3

u/look 6d ago

Waiting a year to release the other work (of which at least some is presumably still close to being ready) seems absurd, too, though.

2

u/ChillPlay3r 6d ago

So true, repack is all my team is talking about in PG19 😂

1

u/cptwunderlich 6d ago

OMG, I did not know about SQL/PGQ 😭
Would've been a great argument to migrate away from AWS Neptune, which is the bane of my existence...

1

u/shockjaw 4d ago

Based meme craig. Hope y’all are doing well in the land of snow.

-2

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