Re: [HACKERS] Hi

On Wed, 4 Feb 1998, Michael Meskes wrote:

> Hi,
>
> despite bein chronically short of time I'd like to be involved with some
> database development in free software. It seems to me that postgresql is
> the most complete package out there and it also has some nice features
> like object identity. I consider myself fairly knowledgable when it
> comes to databases (at least it brought me my Ph.D.) so I think I could
> do some. But before I do so I'd like to ask some questions about the
> status of development:

    Welcome :)

> 2) How about ODBC? I know there is a driver but apparently I cannot use
> all ODBC features. I have an application on Windows that I'd like to use
> to stress test postgresql a little bit, but I get an SQLError -1
> everytime I try to fetch a record. Is this a knwon bug?

    Julie (maintainer of PostODBC(src/interfaces/odbc)) has just
joined this list, and will hopefully be able to answer more completely,
but the PostODBC driver is currently listed as v0.21, so is still young...

    Any aid you can provide in helping to mature it are most welcome,
both on our part, and, I imagine, Julie's...

> 3) How would you describe the general goal of this project: Offer as
> good a database system as you can create as free software? That is
> should it be able to handle huge amounts of data, or is it seen more as
> a tool for a private person/small business?

    Both...We have at least two ppl so far, that I'm aware of, that
are dealing with systems of several GB of data through it, including one
of the core developers...like *BSD/Linux "competing" with the more
entrenched OSs like Solaris (and Microsloth), we're moving towards the
concept of being a viable alternative to such monolithic RDBMS systems
such as Oracle/Informix...but we are also working at making sure that we
don't loss site of the majority of our users, which tend to be ppl using
it for WWW based projects.

> 4) Are there areas/Which ares need help?

    http://www.postgresql.org/docs/todo.shtml :)

    There is a long list of things that are "Wish list" items...if you
decide to dive into something, all we ask is that you post something here
so that others know and to prevent "recreating the wheel"...just in case
someone else is already working on it.