Performance Optimization

General Setup and Optimization

• Tuning Your PostgreSQL Server by Greg Smith, Robert Treat, and Christopher Browne
• Performance Tuning PostgreSQL by Frank Wiles
• GUCs: A Three Hour Tour by Josh Berkus. Also useful here is his tuning OpenOffice spreadsheet, which suggests tuning values for 5 different types of workloads.
• QuickStart Guide to Tuning PostgreSQL by Christopher Browne
• Annotated postgresql.conf by Josh Berkus and Shridhar Daithankar (older V7.4 targeted version of material covered in the GUC tour referenced above)
• Performance Tuning by Josh Berkus and Shridhar Daithankar
• Replacing Slow Loops in PostgreSQL by Joel Burton
• PostgreSQL Hardware Performance Tuning by Bruce Momjian
• The effects of data fragmentation in a mixed load database by Dmitry Dvoinikov
• PostgreSQL Performance Features in 8.3 by Simon Riggs
• PostgreSQL Performance Features in 8.4 by Simon Riggs

Performance courses are available from a number of companies. Check events and trainings for further details.

Critical maintenance for performance

• Introduction to VACUUM, ANALYZE, EXPLAIN, and COUNT by Jim Nasby.
• VACUUM FULL and why you should avoid it
• Planner Statistics
• Using EXPLAIN
• Logging Difficult Queries
• Logging Checkpoints
• Checkpoints and the Background Writer: PostgreSQL 8.3 Improvements and Migration by Greg Smith
• Bulk Loading and Restores
• Performance Analysis Tools by Craig Ringer

Database architecture

• Limiting and prioritizing user/query/database resource usage by Craig Ringer
• Prioritizing databases by separating into multiple clusters by Craig Ringer
• Clustering
• Shared Storage

Database Hardware Selection and Setup

• Database Hardware
• Reliable Writes

Benchmark Workloads

• Category:Benchmarking