Database Reference
In-Depth Information
Getting PostgreSQL
PostgreSQL is 100% open source software.
PostgreSQL is freely available to use, alter, or redistribute in any way you choose. PostgreSQL's
license is an approved open source license very similar to the BSD (Berkeley Distribution
Software) license, though only just different enough that it is now known as TPL (The
PostgreSQL License).
How to do it...
PostgreSQL is already in use by many different application packages, and so you may already
find it installed on your servers. Many Linux distributions include PostgreSQL as part of the
basic installation, or include it with the installation disk.
One thing to be wary of is that the version of PostgreSQL included may not be the latest
release. It will typically be the latest major release that was available when that operating
system release was published. There is usually no good reason to stick at that level—there is
no increased stability implied there and later production versions are just as well-supported by
the various Linux distributions.
If you don't yet have a copy, or you don't have the latest version, you can download the
source code or download binary packages for a wide variety of operating systems from
the following URL:
http://www.postgresql.org/download/
Installation details vary significantly from platform-to-platform and there aren't any special
tricks or recipes to mention. Please, just follow the installation guide, and away you go. We've
consciously avoided describing the installation processes here to make sure we don't garble
or override the information published to assist you.
If you would like to receive e-mail updates of the latest news, then you can subscribe to
the PostgreSQL announce mailing list, which contains updates from all the vendors that
support PostgreSQL. You'll get a few e-mails each month about new releases of core
PostgreSQL and related software, conferences, and user group information. It's worth
keeping in touch with developments.
For more information about the PostgreSQL announce mailing list,
visit the following URL:
http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-announce/
