Q. Hey, I read in a bunch of places that 7.4 was going to have native
windows support, what gives?
A. We did say that we planned to have native windows support in 7.4 and
we honestly believed it would happen. Several members of our hacker
community are very close to having this done, close enough that if one
was ambitious enough you could get 7.4 to compile on windows, but we're
just not where we need to be to release the code to the public. We
didn't make the decision to drop native windows support from 7.4
lightly, in fact we actually delayed the release of 7.4 by 1 month in an
effort to get it in, however none of our core development group felt
that the windows code, in it's current state, was ready for prime time,
and given that 7.4 has so many other great features that people are
clamoring for, we had to make the difficult choice.
You have to remember that PostgreSQL is a true open source project,
we're not controlled by corporate interests and we're not driven by
buzzwords and bottom lines. If we're going to disappoint people, we'll
do it by missing a deadline, not by delivering sub-standard code;
database software is just too important to cut corners.
The other side of this is that we know we're not leaving our Windows
based friends out in the cold. You can still run PostgreSQL on windows
using Cygwin just like you always could. There are also several
companies distributing commercial Windows versions of PostgreSQL,
including DBExperts, Peer Direct, and Software Research Associates, Inc.
If you need a windows based offering, we strongly recommend you check
out these options available to you.
And one last thing; don't forget that development of native windows
support continues. Much of the work has been committed to our source
tree, and this code should be ready for 7.5 (but hey, no promises! :-)
If you're interested in helping make this happen check out our -hackers
mailing list archives and see if there is someplace you can lend a hand,
we would welcome the support.
Robert Treat
PostgreSQL Advocacy Team
--
Build A Brighter Lamp :: Linux Apache {middleware} PostgreSQL
