Re: Options for growth

On Thu, Jan 16, 2003 at 12:23:52PM -0500, Neil Conway wrote:
> 
> The estimates I've heard from a couple parties are that PostgreSQL tends
> to scale well up to 4 CPUs. I've been meaning to take a look at
> improving that, but I haven't had a chance yet...

I can definitely tell you that Postgres scales _fine_ beyond 4
processors.  Indeed, we have found under some loads that 4 processors
is not enough; but when we put it into an 8- or more-way box, it is
much faster.

That's on Solaris, though, which is generally very good at handling
greater-than-4 CPUs.  That's why Solaris is a good platform for us,
even though its fork() times rot.

> think the cost of subsidizing some of that development would be a
> fraction of the license fees you'll end up paying Oracle over the
> years...

And it's worth pointing out what those ORAC licenses really cost: it
might be as little as the savings of a single year.

By the way ORAC may not be _quite_ as bulletproof as it seems.  It
shares file areas, and there are rumours of locking troubles that
people trip over.  Nothing they'll share with you, of course: the
license forbids as much.  But if you ask someone over the top of a
glass, he or she might tell you about it.

A

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