Re: First Step to Major Use: Integrated Full-Text - Mailing list pgsql-advocacy

Hi there,

    All good points, however I want to point out this isn't my personal issue, since I host my own websites. My only problem is that if I license my software out to people, and they have the option of using Postgres or MySQL, they're going to support MySQL because more hosts support MySQL than those who support Postgres WITH a search module enabled. I don't have a problem installing Tsearch2 myself, but I'm not going to responsible for doing it for every single one of my licensees.

I'll break my argument FOR full-text integration in the following few points:

1. Full-text search has widespread appeal, and in my use of Postgres (Postgres for websites) the need for full-text database search is practically universal. However, it's making less and less sense for me to support Postgres at all because so many of my licensees can't run it with their existing hosts (who run Postgres, but won't support a search module). Full text search in the native distribution would almost certainly bolster Postgres advocacy.
   
   
2. MySQL supports full-text searching (not to mention commercial-brand dbs like SQL Server 2005). Now that MySQL supports transactions as well, there's less reason than ever for web developers to build their applications with Postgres support. Full-text search in Postgres (which as a contrib module is already more functional than MySQL's integrated search) could make a huge difference in database choice. Why be left behind when everyone else is providing this functionality to their users?
   
   
3. Full-text search is just another, sophisticated way of querying a database. I don't see why this can't be integrated and made to be efficient like you would with any other common query.
   
   
4. It may an issue of efficiency vs. bulk, but really it's at least partially an issue of efficiency vs. widespread appeal. It's true that you want to keep the core of any application as powerful as possible with as few unnecessary widgets as possible - but this is something that I think Postgres needs to be viable for consideration in larger licensed web applications.
   

I posted this first to the the advocacy list because first and foremost I think that's what this is - an advocacy issue. I think that full-text search integration is important to getting the marketspace that's being used by what I think is Postgres's main competitor for web apps - MySQL.

    Development-wise may be another issue entirely.

       - Filipe



Joshua D. Drake wrote:

Peter Eisentraut wrote:

Am Montag, 5. Dezember 2005 20:09 schrieb C. Filipe Medeiros:
 

    I think a major step that the development community behind Pgsql
could take to advance the project would be to take Tsearch2 or OpenFTS
and make one of them (I prefer the Tsearch2 architecture, but then I
haven't used OpenFTS in a while) native to Postgres rather than a contrib.
   

This is certainly a completely misguided solution to your problem.  Imagine what software packages like Linux, Perl, or Apache would look like today if the response to every "my hoster has not installed module X" had been "let's put X in the core distribution".  One could certainly argue about the merits of full-text search in particular, but that will only postpone your real problem until next week.
 

Not to mention that Tsearch2 is part of PostgreSQL. If your hoster doesn't realize the benifits, change
hosting companies ;)... Or ask them to install postgresql-contrib.

Joshua D. Drake

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