1 Meeting Postgres
This chapter covers
- Understanding what is Postgres, why it’s so popular these days, and the meaning of “Just Use Postgres”
- Starting Postgres on your own laptop and connecting from a command-line tool.
- Generating mock data using built-in database capabilities and running a few basic queries
If you’re holding this book, then at least you’ve heard about PostgreSQL (or simply Postgres, as most call it). Whether you’re a student who completed a general-purpose database course or an experienced application developer who used Postgres or another database on one of the projects, this book will open up the breadth and depths of Postgres capabilities that go far beyond what relational databases usually offer.
In this chapter, you start by learning why Postgres became so popular among developers and what “Just Use Postgres” means. Then, you’ll explore how to get started with Postgres on your own laptop and run the first experiments in under ten minutes. Finally, you’ll use built-in database capabilities to generate mock data and run a few basic SQL queries that most developers have in their application logic.
1.1 What is Postgres?
Postgres is one of the most well-known and fastest-growing relational databases. As a relational database, it natively supports SQL (structured query language) and is usually selected by developers as a backbone for transactional applications.