Joshua D. Drake Blog Posts

We are pleased to announce that PostgresConf 2019 will be held at the Sheraton Times Square March 18th - 22nd, 2019. 
 
 
Following on the success of PostgresConf 2018, 2019 will include five days with added training and partner summits.
 


March 18th and 19th will have immersive training. Instructors are encouraged to submit half and full day material for consideration. The preferred topics are centered around Postgres but anything People, Postgres, or Data related will be considered.

Monday, March 18th through Friday, March 22nd will host several partner summits, including popular and upcoming topics within the Postgres community and the annually hosted Regulated Industry Summit. Break out sessions will be held from Wednesday - Friday.

In addition to the partner summits, PostgresConf 2019 will offer multiple program tracks with Postgres related topics including (but not limited to): 

  • Postgres Internals
  • Postgres Administration
  • Operations and Development
  • Data
  • Cloud
  • Database Security and Compliance
  • Use Cases
  • Regulated Industries
    • Telecommunications
    • Healthcare and life sciences
    • Railroad, airline and pipeline transportation
    • Oil and gas
    • Electric power and transmission
    • Financial services and trading 
Important Dates:
  • Call for Papers Open: 09/12/2018 
  • Call for Papers Close: 01/11/2019 
  • Confirmation/Acceptance: 01/18/2019
Can't wait until March? Join us at our West Coast event, PostgresConf Silicon Valley, October 15th and 16th, 2018 at the Hilton San Jose.
 
About PostgresConf:


PostgresConf is a global nonprofit conference series with a focus on growing community through increased awareness and education of Postgres and related technologies. PostgresConf is known for its highly attended national conference with the mission of:

 
 
Joshua D. Drake     September 25, 2018

In support of our theme of "People, Postgres, Data", the PostgresConf US 2018 hosts its 2nd annual Talent Exchange & Career Fair on Friday, April 20, from 10:30 am - 1:30 pm. This event is free for job seekers and open to the public.
Companies represented include:
  • Amazon
  • Pivotal
  • 2ndQuadrant
  • Microsoft
  • Timescale
  • HighGo
  • Data Dog
  • Fivetran
  • BlueTalon
  • Goldman Sachs
  • forhims
  • Immuta
Last year, the Career Fair brought together employers and candidates in one of the hottest career options available today, Postgres DBA.
New for this year -- Career Mentors and Resume Reviewers
Check out the full schedule for PostgresConf US 2018, and buy your tickets soon!
Joshua D. Drake     April 11, 2018

PGConf US and Austin PUG organized a PGConf Mini last night. It was three presentations over the evening. We had good attendance and excellent community participation. The highlight of the evening was PGConf US Co-Chair Jim Molgendski's presentation, "Top 10 Mistakes When Migrating from Oracle to PostgreSQL".

We tried something new this time around. We utilized Twitter's Periscope capability to live stream his presentation. It wasn't perfect but it was our first time and we are looking forward to utilizing the platform more in the future.

Click here to watch "To Mistakes When Migrating From Oracle to PostgreSQL", and then submit a presentation to one of our upcoming conferences:


PGConf US 2017 - 2018 
  • Diamond Sponsor: Amazon Web Services
  • Platinum Sponsor: OpenSCG

Joshua D. Drake     May 17, 2017



Seattle Postgres and People, Postgres, Data were present at the 20th Anniversary Event of LinuxFest Northwest this weekend! The “Fest” is a conference built around Free and Open Source Software, taking place in Bellingham, Washington. It is a true gathering of over 2000 Open Source practitioners. There was also a well attended Postgres Track and an “Ask the experts” panel.

Highlighted Find

Also at LinuxFest Northwest was YottaDB. YottaDB uses the PostgreSQL wire protocol to allow universal driver access to their in-memory transactional database. This has become a popular way to utilize the maturity of the PostgreSQL code base and reduce overhead in having to maintain a protocol and drivers.

Ecosystem Content

Requesting Feedback

We are looking for good dates to host PostgresConf Philly in July/August 2019 and we are actively reviewing new markets for other Postgres Conference events including Texas, Vancouver B.C., and Seattle. If you have feedback on opportunities in these areaa including dates, venues, or a desire to join the amazing People, Postgres, Data team, let us know at organizers@postgresconf.org.

 

Noteworthy Commits & Releases

The PostgreSQL git repo was largely bug fixes and updates the past couple of weeks but we have some great releases including migration tools and Distributed SQL:

 

Join our community

Upcoming Events



People, Postgres, Data and The World’s Database

 

The World’s Database celebrates all of Postgres, including whichever version, fork, or hybrid used to build yourself, your business, or your hobby. We have Open and Closed Source technologies. We have amazing extensions (TimescaleDB), unique implementations (Yugabyte), and respected forks to solve specific problems such as Greenplum, Azure, and Aurora. We have meetups where professionals can gather to collaborate and network in all major U.S. markets. Most importantly we are an inclusive community celebrating everything surrounding the maturity, extensibility, and growth of the Postgres ecosystem.

Joshua D. Drake     April 29, 2019

PgConf US 2017 has now completed. We had a record number of attendees, a record number of sponsors and a record number of talks. The conference rocked. It was only made possible by a team of highly talented and dedicated volunteers. Thank you to those volunteers.



As of this writing, we are no longer the largest PostgreSQL Conference in North America. We are the largest PostgreSQL Conference. mic drop

Members of the South African Community










We attribute our growth directly to our community. We believe that there is no better community than the PostgreSQL community. A welcoming, inclusive community that shares knowledge and a common goal: Make PostgreSQL the database you use. It is because of this common goal that not only does our conference succeed, but the majority of PostgreSQL events across the globe succeed as well. It is why over 60% of our attendees have been using PostgreSQL for less than 3 years. It is why sponsors such as Amazon Web Services, EnterpriseDB, OpenSCG, and 2ndQuadrant consistently support the conference. It is why a brand new community member flew last minute from Texas the night before the conference (more on this new community member later). It is why the South African community shows up, every year.

Thank you to our speakers
There are quite a few knobs that get turned to run a conference and although it is an amazing experience to be a part of, it takes an enormous amount of resources (financially and physically) to execute it in a manner that is beneficial to all parties.

We think we did a pretty good job this year. This is not a pat on the back; we have more work to do. We want speakers to have everything they need including scheduled mentor times for first time speakers. We want speaking at PgConf US to be a pleasant, fun, and growth opportunity.

Thank you to our sponsors

We want sponsors to get better visibility. This was the first time at our current location and the layout wasn't perfect. We want to have "sponsor training." The PostgreSQL community is different than many, and sponsors (especially those that are relatively new to the community) should be able to leverage the expertise of the organizers to learn how best to work within the community. This would allow them to generate the business that makes it worth it for them to continue to sponsor.

We want coffee in the morning. Yes, the Chairs felt that coffee in the morning wasn't a requirement. Yes, the Chairs failed in a glorious fashion. We listen, we learn. There will be coffee in the morning at the next PgConf National.

There is more but that will wait for another day.

tl;dr; It is with sincerest hearts that the Chairs, Organizers, and Volunteers thank the community for supporting our efforts to bring the best PostgreSQL Conference experience possible.

Joshua D. Drake     April 04, 2017

Tuesday, May 16, 2017 6:00 PM to 9:00 PM @ fibercove
1700 S Lamar Blvd, Suite 338, Austin, TX

Join us for a special presentation with PostgreSQL experts who will be in town for DataLayer 2017.

Food and refreshments will be provided, so please be sure to RSVP.

Thank you to OpenSCG for sponsoring our food and soft drinks, and fibercove for hosting us! Beer sponsor TBA.
  • The event starts at: 6 pm 
  • Networking and food/drink : 6:15 pm 
  • Announcements and updates: 6:30 pm   
Presentations:
• "Softlayer vs RDS/AWS: A price to performance perspective" - Joshua D. Drake, Command Prompt, Inc.

• "PostgreSQL on Debian and apt.postgresql.org" - Dr. Michael Meskes, CEO of credativ (http://www.credativ.com/)

• "Top 10 Mistakes When Migrating From Oracle to PostgreSQL" -- Jim Mlodgenski, CTO of OpenSCG
 
About our Speakers: 

Joshua D. Drake of Command Prompt, Inc. (https://www.commandprompt.com/), is a PostgreSQL Consultant who has consulted on PostgreSQL since Postgres95. Throughout his PostgreSQL career he has performed a variety of functions within the community including releasing an O'Reilly book on PostgreSQL, as well as being part of the sysadmins and advocacy teams He ran a biannual conference series dedicated to PostgreSQL from 2007 - 2011. He is a former Director for SPI (the non-profit for PostgreSQL.org). Drake is also a Founder of United States PostgreSQL, as well as a co-organizer and Chair of PGConf US.

Dr. Michael Meskes is President and CEO of the credativ Group, an industry leader in free software services with offices in five countries. Its Open Source Support Centers employ leading members of a number of Open-Source projects. He has been Open-Source developer for twenty years working on different Open-Source projects among which Debian and PostgreSQL are most widely known. He also has done a lot of Open-Source related presentations on all sorts of events doing a lot of Open-Source evangelism.

Jim Mlodgenski is CTO of OpenSCG, a leading enterprise open source services company, with a central focus on PostgreSQL. He has been part of the PostgreSQL community for over a decade, as an architect and sales engineer. He is a Director for the U.S. PostgreSQL Association, as well as an organizer of the Philly PostgreSQL User Group and a Co-organizer of the NYC PostgreSQL User Group. He Is also a co-organizer of PGConf US, the largest PostgreSQL conference in the U.S.
Joshua D. Drake     May 11, 2017

 Postgres Conference 2019


We’ve had a great response to our PostgresConf US 2019 call for proposals with over 170 potential presentations -- thank you to everyone who has submitted so far! As with what has become a tradition among Postgres Conferences, we are extending our deadline by one week to allow those final opportunities to trickle in!


We accept all topics that relate to People, Postgres, Data including any Postgres related topic, such as open source technologies (Linux, Python, Ruby, Golang, PostGIS).

Talks especially in high demand are sessions related to Regulated Industries including healthtech, fintech, govtech, etc., especially use case and case studies.

Interested in attending this year’s conference?

We’ve expanded our offerings, with trainings and tutorials open to everyone who purchases a Platinum registration. No separate fees for Mondays trainings (but it will be first come, first serve for seating).

Don’t forget that Early Bird registration ends this Friday, January 18. Tickets are substantially discounted when purchased early.

Register for PostgresConf 2019

Interested in an AWESOME international Postgres Conference opportunity? Consider attending PgConf Russia

PGConf Russia




Joshua D. Drake     January 15, 2019

Scale, already built

 

We had a call with an ecosystem partner recently about a user that has over 20TB residing in our most beloved database. The response from the partner? “They are going to fall over.” It was an interesting response and also shows a lack of understanding of the absolute power and flexibility of Postgres implementations. This production installation (in the manufacturing industry) does not fall over and it sails over the waves like the 20’ swells don’t exist. The World’s Database is already scale built!

Shoutouts

Postgres Conference Beijing CFP

CFP Closes June 3rd! Submit your presentation now!

Postgres Conference Silicon Valley

Early bird tickets now available! Get your tickets today as we expect this year to sell out!

Postgresql.org, Postgresql v12 Beta 1 released: Test now!

Developer Week New york

  • A fantastic conference that believes in the same ideals as Postgres Conference and People, Postgres, Data. It takes place June 17th - 20th.

The “People” part of People, Postgres, Data

The International Postgres Conference Series known as PostgresConf has the mission of “People, Postgres, Data.” It is based on the belief that taking care of and providing opportunities for people is our core goal.

 

In the coming months Co-Chair Amanda Nystrom will be spearheading a professional development series focused on the People part of the “People, Postgres, Data” mission. It will include articles, workshops, and, if all works out, a track at the event in 2020 at Times Square, New York City. We are excited to be expanding our serving of People through this opportunity.  

Ecosystem Content

Requesting Feedback

We are looking for good dates to host PostgresConf Philly in July/August 2019 and we are actively reviewing new markets for other Postgres Conference events including Texas, Vancouver B.C., and Seattle. If you have feedback on opportunities in these areas including dates, venues, or a desire to join the amazing People, Postgres, Data team, let us know at organizers@postgresconf.org.

 

Join our community

Upcoming Events



People, Postgres, Data and The World’s Database

 

The World’s Database celebrates all of Postgres, including whichever version, fork, or hybrid used to build yourself, your business, or your hobby. We have Open and Closed Source technologies. We have amazing extensions (TimescaleDB), unique implementations (Yugabyte), and respected forks to solve specific problems such as Greenplum, Azure, and Aurora. We have meetups where professionals can gather to collaborate and network in all major U.S. markets. Most importantly we are an inclusive community celebrating everything surrounding the maturity, extensibility, and growth of the Postgres ecosystem.

 

Joshua D. Drake     May 30, 2019

After National 2017, the PGConf US team decided to take a long hard road to bring the best in educational content and advocacy to the entire Postgres ecosystem. Today, we welcome 2ndQuadrant as a Platinum sponsor and thank them for helping us with our year over year projects.


2ndq logo color no cross

It is sponsors like 2ndQuadrant that are allowing us to achieve our goal of having not only our National event but Philly, Seattle, and Austin all within 2017. We also have other education and advocacy initiatives that continue to develop include webinars, community profiles, and e-training. Stay tuned for more information on those!

Other PGConf US news:


Joshua D. Drake     June 29, 2017

With the pending GA release of Star Link, more cities adopting municipal WIFI, and the growth of remote work due to the pandemic, one would assume that cell phone providers would be falling hand over fist to provide quality services at a quality price. Unfortunately this is not the case and it is hurting the future of our workforce.

Carriers currently think that 30GB of Hotspot data is enough for the average digital nomad. While that may have been the case previously, it isn’t any longer. There is a hundreds-of-thousands-strong workforce specializing in Information Technology, Digital Design, Web Development, and other creative industries. They are living, working and adventuring in RVs, Sprinters, Skooolies (pictured), and other vehicle dwelling options. This community is nomadic by design and should not be artificially limited by technology. 

 

Why is it that we are being charged so much money for so little? Outside of two providers announcing rural initiatives, we are still acting like data needs are small and that they come at a quality price. Data is ubiquitous; it is the new water (for getting work done). In the new economy workers need faster, higher quality, and unlimited amounts of data to get their job done.

 

Where could you go and what could you experience if you weren’t tethered by the faux limitations of bandwidth?

Resources

Featured Content

Joshua D. Drake     October 13, 2020