Re: Microsoft releses Services for Unix

Dave Page wrote:
> Steve Tibbett  wrote:
> > Windows users will always prefer a Windows solution to a Unix
> > solution running on SFU... I'd say sticking with the original
> > goal of making a native Win32 version would be preferable.
>
> Plus I'll bet we couldn't distribute the required components ourselves
> and would thus require the user to download interix first.

Yes, but consider this:
1. from a windows developer's point of view, requiring Interix is no
better or worse than requiring cygwin or mingw, except for maybe the
size of the download/install.

2. Interix will be faster than any emulated I/O.  sync() right now is
very slow because there is no corresponding win32 API call.  Interix
implements this as an optimized kernel mode driver.  That right there is
reason enough for me.

3. Postgres no longer contains tons of extra code specifically to
support windows.

4. 'Native' is a funny term.  Interix runs at the same operations level
as the win32 API (not above it, as cygwin, or application level
emulation code).  To a certain way of thinking, Interix applications are
more native than win32 API code written to achieve the same purpose.

The soon to be released version 3.5 has greatly beefed up performance
and support for threads.  Unless I completely misunderstand things,
getting a native win32 port for postgresql off the ground will boil down
to downloading interix and hacking out a configure script...is this
correct?

Merlin