Thread: Draft #5 -- radically re-written

Advocacy people:

What follows is my re-write of the press release.   I was operating on the
idea of "telling a story", per Heather's advice earlier.  The general idea is
to piggyback on the current press fad of articles about MySQL challenging
Oracle; we present the more formidable challenge, and should let the press
know it.  Thus the sequence goes:  1) Here's how were as good as
Oracle/DB2/MSSQL, but cheaper; 2) We've made it easier to switch from them; 3)
our current users are excited about the release, too.

Surprisingly enough, I was able to get almost all of our new features to fit
into this framework.

WE NEED TO FINISH THIS BY FRIDAY!   We will have to get copies to the
translators in time for them to translate, as questions, and correct, so we
can't tinker to perfection.

Comments and requests for this version of the press release
---------------------------------------------------------------
1.  I am not *at all* attached to the ordering of the "features" in this
version; please suggest better orderings.

2. Also, a lot of my "hype it up" wording could use some help.  Please?
Particularly I hate the phrase "last piece of the puzzle" but I couldn't think
of anything else.

3. In our "enterprise features", does the "Advanced SQL" paragraph work, or
will it just confuse people?

4. I added three non-profit orgs and two Open Source projects to our list of
"companies".  Does this work?

5. I changed it to "hundreds" of developers.  Our last count was contributors
btw. 6.3 and 7.3, which included some 200 people; I doubt that number has
dropped.

6. My spellcheck on Kate bugged out, so please look for broken words below and
help me fix them!

7. In addition to the "tranisitioning from other databases" features mentioned
below,  we have two biggies that won't be ready for 7.4: the Windows Port and
dblink_oracle.  Should we mention these as "coming soon"?

8. Can someone think of a better name than "EXPLICT JOIN REWRITING"?

9. Other suggestions?


===================================================================
The PostgreSQL Global Development Group is pleased to announce the
availability of version 7.4 of the PostgreSQL Relational Database
Management System (RDBMS). This major release, the work
of our world wide network of hundreds of developers and contributors over
the last 9 months, provides commercial-grade enterprise database
functionality and performance for the very economical overhead cost of Open
Source software.

"If you tried PostgreSQL before, and went with a commercial database like
Oracle or DB2 instead, it's time to re-evaluate," says Rod Taylor of Inquent
Technologies. "PostgreSQL's expanding enterprise feature set and performance
improvements over the last two years make PostgreSQL competitive with even the
highest-end database systems.  And it's certainly less expensive."


NEW ENTERPRISE DATABASE FEATURES
------------------------------------------
Among the large enterprise features which have been added, expanded, or
improved in version 7.4 are:

OPTERON SUPPORT:  PostgreSQL is now optimized on the AMD Opteron, thanks to
the work of the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, adding to the family
of proven 64-bit platforms which includes HP/Compaq, Alpha, Sun
UltraSPARC, MIPS, PA-RISC, and RS6000*.  64-bit platforms are an emerging
class of high-performance computing, with greater power and scaleability
needed for enterprise systems.

REPLICATION:  PostgreSQL Inc. and Affilias Inc. this week contributed their
eRServer Java-based replication solution for PostgreSQL.   eRServer
provides a tremendously scalable, battle-tested replication option
significantly more powerful than previous Open Source solutions available.

PERFORMANCE: Several major performance enhancements have been added in version
7.4, ensuring that PostgreSQL can match or exceed other enterprise database
systems' speed.  These include:
   - Hash aggregation in memory to make data warehousing and OLAP queries
     up to 20 times faster;
   - Improvements in subquery handling by the planner resulting in up to 400%
     speed increases in some complex queries;
   - New wire protocol (version 3) increases the speed of data transfers;
   - Enhanced implementation of functional indexes allows better
     indexing on custom data types and composite fields.

HIGH AVAILABILITY:  Expansion of PostgreSQL's Free Space Map disk management
feature to support continuous index maintenence is the last "piece of the
puzzle" in providing 99.999% uptime for PostgreSQL databases.  Further, 7.4
downloads with the new Auto Vacuum Daemon which eliminates the guesswork from
scheduling database maintenence.

FULL TEXT INDEXING: PostgreSQL's TSearch module now includes a ranked
preference system, making TSearch equal to or better than many full text
indexing solutions offered by other RDBMSs.

ADVANCED SQL FEATURES: PostgreSQL continues to expand its support for the
Intermediate and Advanced portions of the SQL 92 and 99 standards
including some SQL features not found in other databases.  New in 7.4 are
statement-level triggers and read-only transactions, as well as several SQL
extensions including multi-byte regular expressions, polymorphic functions,
and enhanced array data type handling.


ADOPTING POSTGRESQL EASIER THAN EVER
---------------------------------------
As many Database Administrators (DBAs) will want to try PostgreSQL 7.4 for
their companies, we have taken several steps to make the transition from other
enterprise databases to PostgreSQL easier:

SQL-STANDARD ERROR FRAMEWORK: The PostgreSQL Team hascompletelyy redesigned
error logging and reporting, providing developers with an SQL99 compliant
mechanism for debugging and troubleshooting, and giving users real time
suggestions on how to avoid error conditions in their applications.

REORGANIZED AND EXPANDED DOCUMENTATION:  The documentation contributors have
completely reorganized and added many new pages to the online documentation,
making it easier for first-time PostgreSQL DBAs to get their databases built,
tuned, and running.

SQL-STANDARD INFORMATION SCHEMA: 7.4 includes an SQL99 compliant Information
Schema (or "metadata").  This provides application developers with database,
type, object, and configuration information in a way which eases the migration
of interfaces and middleware between database systems, and even the
replication of data between commercial databases and PostgreSQL.

EXPLICIT JOIN REWRITING: Core developer Tom Lane has included an option
for explicit join rewriting by the query planner, easing the transition of
existing applications and queries running on Sybase and MS SQL Server, which
handle queries this way by default.


ENTERPRISE USERS ANTICIPATING 7.4
------------------------------------
"We have used PostgreSQL successfully for over two years in a
mission-critical capacity to support our registry systems," said Ram Mohan,
Chief Technology Officer for Afilias Limited, the company responsible for
running the backend database containing all .info and .org Internet domain
names worldwide.  "This upgrade of PostgreSQL improves the scalability and
capacity of PostgreSQL and will help to ensure continued advancements to
future releases.  For real-time operations, the planner/optimizer
enhancements adds more intelligence and allows more efficient operation of
the database.  In addition, the expanded trigger capabilities sets up the
basis for even further gains in future versions of PostgreSQL."

"[quote from Lamar Owen will go here]" commented Lamar Owen, Director of
Information Technology for the Pisgah Astronomical Research Institute.


RELEASE DETAILS
-------------------------------------
Source for this release is available at:
    http://www.postgresql.org/mirrors-ftp.html

More information on PostgreSQL is available in ten languages on the
PostgreSQL Advocacy website:
    http://advocacy.postgresql.org/

A complete list of changes in PostgreSQL version 7.4 can be found in the
HISTORY file included with the release, or available on the web at:
    [http://www.postgresql.org/docs/release/740.html]

About PostgreSQL:
    With more than 16 years of development by hundreds of the world's
most generous and brilliant minds from the open source community,
PostgreSQL is the world's most advanced open source database. With its
long time support of an enterprise level feature set including
transactions, stored procedures, triggers, and subqueries, PostgreSQL is
being used by many of today's most demanding businesses and government
agencies.

    Corporations such as BASF, Red Hat, Afilias Limited, Cisco, Chrysler, and
3Com, organizations like WGCR Radio, the University of Massachusetts
at Amherst, and Pisgah Astronomical Research Institute, and Open Source
projects including Bricolage and OpenACS rely on PostgreSQL's rock solid
performance record and open development process. PostgreSQL is available under
a BSD License for both commercial and non-commercial use.

To find out more about PostgreSQL or to download it, please visit:
    http://www.postgresql.org/

Note to Editors: Additional information on the following companies quoted in
this release can be found at:
Inquent Technologies: Insert URL Contact: Insert corp. comm contact person
Afilias Limited : http://www.afilias.info/about_afilias/backgrounder
Contact: Heather Carle 215-706-5777 hcarle@afilias.info
Pisgah Astronomical Research Institute: Insert URL Contact: Insert corp. comm
contact person.


--
Josh Berkus
Aglio Database Solutions
San Francisco

Josh Berkus wrote:
> WE NEED TO FINISH THIS BY FRIDAY!   We will have to get copies to the
> translators in time for them to translate, as questions, and correct, so we
> can't tinker to perfection.

I was wondering about the urgency. This announces the availablility of
version 7.4, but we don't even have 7.4 *beta* available yet. I'd not
expect a production 7.4 release until October. Is this intended to go
out as a beta announcement?

Joe

This looks really good.  A few suggestions follow...

> ===================================================================
> The PostgreSQL Global Development Group is pleased to announce the
> availability of version 7.4 of the PostgreSQL Relational Database
> Management System (RDBMS). This major release, the work
> of our world wide network of hundreds of developers and contributors over
> the last 9 months, provides commercial-grade enterprise database
> functionality and performance for the very economical overhead cost of Open
> Source software.

... functionality and performance, with the flexibility and low total cost of ownership widely associated with Open
Sourcesoftware. 

> "If you tried PostgreSQL before, and went with a commercial database like
> Oracle or DB2 instead, it's time to re-evaluate," says Rod Taylor of Inquent
> Technologies. "PostgreSQL's expanding enterprise feature set and performance
> improvements over the last two years make PostgreSQL competitive with even the
> highest-end database systems.  And it's certainly less expensive."

"... And you can't beat the cost."

>
> NEW ENTERPRISE DATABASE FEATURES
> ------------------------------------------
> Among the large enterprise features which have been added, expanded, or
> improved in version 7.4 are:
>

Among the major enterprise features...

> OPTERON SUPPORT:  PostgreSQL is now optimized on the AMD Opteron, thanks to
> the work of the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, adding to the family
> of proven 64-bit platforms which includes HP/Compaq, Alpha, Sun
> UltraSPARC, MIPS, PA-RISC, and RS6000*.  64-bit platforms are an emerging
> class of high-performance computing, with greater power and scaleability
> needed for enterprise systems.

Is anyone from AMD active on the lists?  I'm sure their PR people would love to get on board with this.  See
http://www.amd.com/us-en/Weblets/0,,7832_8366_5730,00.html

Also, er, silly question - do we run on Itanium 2?  Even though Intel punted on the desktop, it still seems conspicuous
byits absence on this list. 

> REPLICATION:  PostgreSQL Inc. and Affilias Inc. this week contributed their
> eRServer Java-based replication solution for PostgreSQL.   eRServer
> provides a tremendously scalable, battle-tested replication option
> significantly more powerful than previous Open Source solutions available.

lose "this week" and reword - Pgsql Inc and Affilias "have contributed their eRServer Java-based replication solution
tothe PostgreSQL community.  eRServer provides a highly scalable, battle-tested replication option significantly more
powerfulthan previously available Open Source solutions. 

> PERFORMANCE: Several major performance enhancements have been added in version
> 7.4, ensuring that PostgreSQL can match or exceed other enterprise database
> systems' speed.  These include:

"... enabling PostgreSQL to match or exceed the speed of other enterprise database systems."

>    - Hash aggregation in memory to make data warehousing and OLAP queries
>      up to 20 times faster;
>    - Improvements in subquery handling by the planner resulting in up to 400%
>      speed increases in some complex queries;
>    - New wire protocol (version 3) increases the speed of data transfers;
>    - Enhanced implementation of functional indexes allows better
>      indexing on custom data types and composite fields.
>
> HIGH AVAILABILITY:  Expansion of PostgreSQL's Free Space Map disk management
> feature to support continuous index maintenence is the last "piece of the
> puzzle" in providing 99.999% uptime for PostgreSQL databases.

"... index maintenance to support 99.999% uptime for PostgreSQL databases.  The achievement of 'five nines' is the
highestlevel of uptime available in any commercial software, and is associated with only the most mission-critical
businessapplications." 


> Further, 7.4 downloads with the new Auto Vacuum Daemon which eliminates the guesswork from
> scheduling database maintenence.

"Further, 7.4 comes standard with the new Auto Vacuum Daemon ..."

> FULL TEXT INDEXING: PostgreSQL's TSearch module now includes a ranked
> preference system, making TSearch equal to or better than many full text
> indexing solutions offered by other RDBMSs.

"... preference system, for performance exceeding many searching solutions offered by other database systems."

> ADVANCED SQL FEATURES: PostgreSQL continues to expand its support for the
> Intermediate and Advanced portions of the SQL 92 and 99 standards
> including some SQL features not found in other databases.  New in 7.4 are
> statement-level triggers and read-only transactions, as well as several SQL
> extensions including multi-byte regular expressions, polymorphic functions,
> and enhanced array data type handling.
>
>
> ADOPTING POSTGRESQL EASIER THAN EVER
> ---------------------------------------
> As many Database Administrators (DBAs) will want to try PostgreSQL 7.4 for
> their companies, we have taken several steps to make the transition from other
> enterprise databases to PostgreSQL easier:

The following enhancements aid in the testing, prototyping, and porting efforts of database professionals considering a
switchto PostgreSQL: 

> SQL-STANDARD ERROR FRAMEWORK: The PostgreSQL Team hascompletelyy redesigned
> error logging and reporting, providing developers with an SQL99 compliant
> mechanism for debugging and troubleshooting, and giving users real time
> suggestions on how to avoid error conditions in their applications.

"SQL-STANDARD ERROR FRAMEWORK: Completely redesigned ..."

> REORGANIZED AND EXPANDED DOCUMENTATION:  The documentation contributors have
> completely reorganized and added many new pages to the online documentation,
> making it easier for first-time PostgreSQL DBAs to get their databases built,
> tuned, and running.

REORGANIZED AND EXPANDED DOCUMENTATION:  Completely reorganized and significantly expanded online documentation, making
iteasier for first-time PostgreSQL users to get their databases and applications built, tuned, and running. 

> SQL-STANDARD INFORMATION SCHEMA: 7.4 includes an SQL99 compliant Information
> Schema (or "metadata").  This provides application developers with database,
> type, object, and configuration information in a way which eases the migration
> of interfaces and middleware between database systems, and even the
> replication of data between commercial databases and PostgreSQL.

"SQL-STANDARD INFORMATION SCHEMA: Version 7.4 includes ..."

> EXPLICIT JOIN REWRITING: Core developer Tom Lane has included an option
> for explicit join rewriting by the query planner, easing the transition of
> existing applications and queries running on Sybase and MS SQL Server, which
> handle queries this way by default.

"EXPLICIT JOIN REWRITING: An extremely powerful option for power users, which allows explicit ..."

> ENTERPRISE USERS ANTICIPATING 7.4
> ------------------------------------
> "We have used PostgreSQL successfully for over two years in a
> mission-critical capacity to support our registry systems," said Ram Mohan,
> Chief Technology Officer for Afilias Limited, the company responsible for
> running the backend database containing all .info and .org Internet domain
> names worldwide.  "This upgrade of PostgreSQL improves the scalability and
> capacity of PostgreSQL and will help to ensure continued advancements to
> future releases.  For real-time operations, the planner/optimizer
> enhancements adds more intelligence and allows more efficient operation of
> the database.  In addition, the expanded trigger capabilities sets up the
> basis for even further gains in future versions of PostgreSQL."
>
> "[quote from Lamar Owen will go here]" commented Lamar Owen, Director of
> Information Technology for the Pisgah Astronomical Research Institute.
>
>
> RELEASE DETAILS
> -------------------------------------
> Source for this release is available at:
>     http://www.postgresql.org/mirrors-ftp.html
>
> More information on PostgreSQL is available in ten languages on the
> PostgreSQL Advocacy website:
>     http://advocacy.postgresql.org/
>
> A complete list of changes in PostgreSQL version 7.4 can be found in the
> HISTORY file included with the release, or available on the web at:
>     [http://www.postgresql.org/docs/release/740.html]
>
> About PostgreSQL:
>     With more than 16 years of development by hundreds of the world's
> most generous and brilliant minds from the open source community,
> PostgreSQL is the world's most advanced open source database. With its
> long time support of an enterprise level feature set including
> transactions, stored procedures, triggers, and subqueries, PostgreSQL is
> being used by many of today's most demanding businesses and government
> agencies.
>
>     Corporations such as BASF, Red Hat, Afilias Limited, Cisco, Chrysler, and
> 3Com, organizations like WGCR Radio, the University of Massachusetts
> at Amherst, and Pisgah Astronomical Research Institute, and Open Source
> projects including Bricolage and OpenACS rely on PostgreSQL's rock solid
> performance record and open development process. PostgreSQL is available under
> a BSD License for both commercial and non-commercial use.

Dunno if we add that much, but you're welcome to add "ERP software vendor OpenMFG" to the list.

Cheers,
Ned Lilly
aka ned@openmfg.com

Hi,

On Tue, 29 Jul 2003, Josh Berkus wrote:

<snip>

> REPLICATION:  PostgreSQL Inc. and Affilias Inc. this week contributed their
> eRServer Java-based replication solution for PostgreSQL.   eRServer
> provides a tremendously scalable, battle-tested replication option
> significantly more powerful than previous Open Source solutions available.

Have I missed something? I've got about 8000 unread messages, trying to
catch them.  Will eRServer ship with PostgreSQL 7.4, for free?

If so, even this is an incredible thing!

Regards,
--
Devrim GUNDUZ
devrim@gunduz.org                devrim.gunduz@linux.org.tr
            http://www.tdmsoft.com
            http://www.gunduz.org

On Tuesday 29 July 2003 22:59, Devrim GUNDUZ wrote:
> > REPLICATION:  PostgreSQL Inc. and Affilias Inc. this week contributed
> > their eRServer Java-based replication solution for PostgreSQL.   eRServer
> > provides a tremendously scalable, battle-tested replication option
> > significantly more powerful than previous Open Source solutions
> > available.

Dear Advocacy members,

Pardon us at pgAdmin team, but we would really appreciate a few words about
pgAdmin3, which was designed mostly for PostgreSQL 7.4. Why not also mention
PhpPgAdmin3 web interface.

A complete rewrite for GNU/Linux, FreeBSD and Win32 is a big news for some
50.000 pgAdmin3 users.  pgAdmin3 will be available in 26 languages, with
source and binary packages for most environments.

Our new website can be previewed at
http://snake.pgadmin.org/pgadmin3/index.php

Some screenshots are missing. They will be added shortly.

We are waiting for Dave Page to come back from holidays on Thursday to
validate the content of the site and go beta right afterwards. The new site
will be publised at http://www.pgadmin.org.

Best regards,
Jean-Michel POURE

Joe,

> I was wondering about the urgency. This announces the availablility of
> version 7.4, but we don't even have 7.4 *beta* available yet. I'd not
> expect a production 7.4 release until October. Is this intended to go
> out as a beta announcement?

Really?  I just thought the beta was delayed for a couple of days due to build
problems, and that we were still expecting the final before the end of August
... possibly during the 3rd week of August.

Things are worse off than it appeared?

--
Josh Berkus
Aglio Database Solutions
San Francisco

Josh Berkus wrote:
> Really?  I just thought the beta was delayed for a couple of days due to build
> problems, and that we were still expecting the final before the end of August
> ... possibly during the 3rd week of August.
>
> Things are worse off than it appeared?
>

No -- I'm just basing that on history. I could be wrong, but since I've
been hanging around IIRC it always takes about two months (or so) from
first beta release to final release. E.g. last year we started beta for
7.3 on September 1st, and release 7.3 toward the end of November I think.

Joe

Ned, Comments on the comments:
(if I don't remark on something, it's because I agree with it)

And other people:  I want your feedback on Ned's comments!

> > competitive with even the highest-end database systems.  And it's
> > certainly less expensive."
>
> "... And you can't beat the cost."

Hey, ROD!  Which version do you prefer?

> Is anyone from AMD active on the lists?  I'm sure their PR people would
> love to get on board with this.  See
> http://www.amd.com/us-en/Weblets/0,,7832_8366_5730,00.html

The think I'm worried about with involving AMD is that they might tie things
up with corporate red tape, i.e. forbid us to say anthing about Opteron
untile they get back to us, and then not get back to us until November.  I've
had that exact scenario with Apple.
If annyone in our group has contacts inside AMD to streamline this for us, I
would welcome AMD getting behind this announcement.

> Also, er, silly question - do we run on Itanium 2?  Even though Intel
> punted on the desktop, it still seems conspicuous by its absence on this
> list.

No idea.  Nobody on PERFORMANCE has mentioned Itanium.

> > Further, 7.4 downloads with the new Auto Vacuum Daemon which eliminates
> > the guesswork from scheduling database maintenence.
>
> "Further, 7.4 comes standard with the new Auto Vacuum Daemon ..."

Hmmm.  Don't quite like "comes standard", since it's a contrib module and you
have to build it.   I'll think of some similar wording.

> > SQL-STANDARD ERROR FRAMEWORK: The PostgreSQL Team has completely
> > redesigned error logging and reporting, providing developers with an

> "SQL-STANDARD ERROR FRAMEWORK: Completely redesigned ..."
>
> > REORGANIZED AND EXPANDED DOCUMENTATION:  The documentation contributors
> > have completely reorganized and added many new pages to the online

> REORGANIZED AND EXPANDED DOCUMENTATION:  Completely reorganized and
> significantly expanded online documentation, making it easier for

> > EXPLICIT JOIN REWRITING: Core developer Tom Lane has included an option
> > for explicit join rewriting by the query planner, easing the transition

> "EXPLICIT JOIN REWRITING: An extremely powerful option for power users,
> which allows explicit ..."

The thing I don't like about Ned's phrasing is that the paragraphs lack a
verb, making them more passive and less grabbing.  What do other people
think?

> Dunno if we add that much, but you're welcome to add "ERP software vendor
> OpenMFG" to the list.

Cool!   Please verify that that's official; I don't know your position in the
company.

--
Josh Berkus
Aglio Database Solutions
San Francisco

Jean-Michel,

> Pardon us at pgAdmin team, but we would really appreciate a few words about
> pgAdmin3, which was designed mostly for PostgreSQL 7.4. Why not also
> mention PhpPgAdmin3 web interface.

That would certainly go under "easier to adopt" section.

The difficulty with mentioning any of the GUI interfaces is that we don't want
to alienate any of the ones we don't mention.     So I will need to contact
phpPGAdmin and PGAccess (probably Xpg and others as well) to see if either
project expects to have an updated release for 7.4.

If what Joe Conway says is correct, though, we'll have time .....

--
Josh Berkus
Aglio Database Solutions
San Francisco

Heather,

> Contact:
> INSERT POSTGRESQL CONTACT NAME/COMPANY/PHONE/EMAIL
>
> INSERT CITY/STATE - August xx, 2003 -

I was getting to that, really ....

> My personal opinion is that their is still too much deep technical detail
> in the body ... but you don't need to waste time reworking the entire
> release. I would cut down on the headers though ... for instance I don't
> think Ram's quote needs and intro ... really quotes should be used to
> transition between ideas, or make third party substantiation claims against
> a key part of your product messaging.

Yeah.   Rod's pseudo-quote does this nicely.  Unfortunately, I have a hard
time finding a place for any part of Ram's quote.   Suggestions?

> Also if you can, you should centralize on one URL ---
> all those URLs in the release are confusing. If you want people to find the
> other stuff I'd have a hotlink on the site you send them to that says
> "Postgres v7.4 info" (or someething like that) and then detail the history,
> download, release, etc.

Sure, if we have time to compose such a page.   Hmmm ... I suppose this can
just be the "technical version" of the release.

--
Josh Berkus
Aglio Database Solutions
San Francisco

--
Josh Berkus
Aglio Database Solutions
San Francisco

On Tue, 2003-07-29 at 19:34, Josh Berkus wrote:
> Ned, Comments on the comments:
> (if I don't remark on something, it's because I agree with it)
>
> And other people:  I want your feedback on Ned's comments!
>
> > > competitive with even the highest-end database systems.  And it's
> > > certainly less expensive."
> >
> > "... And you can't beat the cost."
>
> Hey, ROD!  Which version do you prefer?

heh.. I'd be more apt to say you can't beat the cost.

For my employer, TCO for PostgreSQL has been shown to be lower than
MySQL, Oracle and MSSql primarily due to lower maintenance.

> If annyone in our group has contacts inside AMD to streamline this for us, I
> would welcome AMD getting behind this announcement.

Perhaps it would be possible to do a minor joint press release after the
fact.  Conduct a benchmark on AMD vs. another 64bit platform.  AMD may
even be willing to sponsor the hardware for something like that.

At the same time we can show that PostgreSQL ain't all that slow simply
by having a large tps published.

Few more comments on the comments on the comments:

> > > SQL-STANDARD ERROR FRAMEWORK: The PostgreSQL Team has completely
> > > redesigned error logging and reporting, providing developers with an
>
> > "SQL-STANDARD ERROR FRAMEWORK: Completely redesigned ..."
> >
> > > REORGANIZED AND EXPANDED DOCUMENTATION:  The documentation contributors
> > > have completely reorganized and added many new pages to the online
>
> > REORGANIZED AND EXPANDED DOCUMENTATION:  Completely reorganized and
> > significantly expanded online documentation, making it easier for
>
> > > EXPLICIT JOIN REWRITING: Core developer Tom Lane has included an option
> > > for explicit join rewriting by the query planner, easing the transition
>
> > "EXPLICIT JOIN REWRITING: An extremely powerful option for power users,
> > which allows explicit ..."
>
> The thing I don't like about Ned's phrasing is that the paragraphs lack a
> verb, making them more passive and less grabbing.  What do other people
> think?

That's executive bullet-point-speak, as well as a former life as an editor coming through.  Trouble with real sentences
is,you have to come up with a subject each time (e.g. Tom, the only core developer mentioned by name). 

> > Dunno if we add that much, but you're welcome to add "ERP software vendor
> > OpenMFG" to the list.
>
> Cool!   Please verify that that's official; I don't know your position in the
> company.

President and CEO ;-)

Cheers,
Ned

On Tue, 29 Jul 2003, Joe Conway wrote:

> Josh Berkus wrote:
> > WE NEED TO FINISH THIS BY FRIDAY!   We will have to get copies to the
> > translators in time for them to translate, as questions, and correct, so we
> > can't tinker to perfection.
>
> I was wondering about the urgency. This announces the availablility of
> version 7.4, but we don't even have 7.4 *beta* available yet. I'd not
> expect a production 7.4 release until October. Is this intended to go
> out as a beta announcement?

Actually, aim for a production 7.4 for September 1st ... I believe all
beta was waiting on was Tom finishing up his messages changes, which he
just announced being finished, so first beta should be going out later
this week ... from there, it depends on the # of bug reports for the full
release, which could easily be Sept 1st ...

On Tue, 29 Jul 2003, Devrim GUNDUZ wrote:

>
> Hi,
>
> On Tue, 29 Jul 2003, Josh Berkus wrote:
>
> <snip>
>
> > REPLICATION:  PostgreSQL Inc. and Affilias Inc. this week contributed their
> > eRServer Java-based replication solution for PostgreSQL.   eRServer
> > provides a tremendously scalable, battle-tested replication option
> > significantly more powerful than previous Open Source solutions available.
>
> Have I missed something? I've got about 8000 unread messages, trying to
> catch them.  Will eRServer ship with PostgreSQL 7.4, for free?

Due to various licensing restrictions, it will most likely be a gborg
project ... and no, we didn't do anything stupid like GPL'd it, but there
are some libraries included for the Java side that are under the Apache
license ... we've discussed removing the libraries, but the general
opinion was that it would cause more headaches then cure ...

What will be released is v1.2 of the code base, which is about 6 months or
so old ...

On Tue, 29 Jul 2003, Josh Berkus wrote:

> Jean-Michel,
>
> > Pardon us at pgAdmin team, but we would really appreciate a few words about
> > pgAdmin3, which was designed mostly for PostgreSQL 7.4. Why not also
> > mention PhpPgAdmin3 web interface.
>
> That would certainly go under "easier to adopt" section.
>
> The difficulty with mentioning any of the GUI interfaces is that we don't want
> to alienate any of the ones we don't mention.     So I will need to contact
> phpPGAdmin and PGAccess (probably Xpg and others as well) to see if either
> project expects to have an updated release for 7.4.

Wno't this be makign for a *very* long release announcement?  Starting to
sound more like an article then an announcement, no? :(

On Tuesday 29 July 2003 19:46, Josh Berkus wrote:
> Jean-Michel,
>
> > Pardon us at pgAdmin team, but we would really appreciate a few words
> > about pgAdmin3, which was designed mostly for PostgreSQL 7.4. Why not
> > also mention PhpPgAdmin3 web interface.
>
> That would certainly go under "easier to adopt" section.
>
> The difficulty with mentioning any of the GUI interfaces is that we don't
> want to alienate any of the ones we don't mention.     So I will need to
> contact phpPGAdmin and PGAccess (probably Xpg and others as well) to see if
> either project expects to have an updated release for 7.4.
>

FWIW we've been developing phpPgAdmin along side CVS builds of 7.4 for quite
some time now.  You can actually demo 7.4 on our demo site. The build up
there is a little old now (2 months maybe?), I'll be updating it once beta
gets officially wrapped. Point being we're already 7.4 compatible, and if any
issues come up will pop out a minor release to handle them.

Robert Treat
phpPgAdmin Project
--
Build A Brighter Lamp :: Linux Apache {middleware} PostgreSQL

On Tuesday 29 July 2003 16:59, Devrim GUNDUZ wrote:
> Hi,
>
> On Tue, 29 Jul 2003, Josh Berkus wrote:
>
> <snip>
>
> > REPLICATION:  PostgreSQL Inc. and Affilias Inc. this week contributed
> > their eRServer Java-based replication solution for PostgreSQL.   eRServer
> > provides a tremendously scalable, battle-tested replication option
> > significantly more powerful than previous Open Source solutions
> > available.
>
> Have I missed something? I've got about 8000 unread messages, trying to
> catch them.  Will eRServer ship with PostgreSQL 7.4, for free?
>

Amazing how quickly one can become backlogged on email isnt it? :-)
eRServer 1.0 is being released on gborg as it's on project. It should be
available before 7.4 comes out, and is 7.3 compatible.

Robert Treat
--
Build A Brighter Lamp :: Linux Apache {middleware} PostgreSQL

Another big update for 7.4 is enhancements to domains.  They got some
usability fixes and a big update in functionality, namely the ability to
define check constraints.  For me, that is a killer feature...do you
think its worth adding to the release?

Merlin

-----Original Message-----
From: Josh Berkus [mailto:josh@agliodbs.com]
Sent: Tuesday, July 29, 2003 4:06 PM
To: pgsql-advocacy@postgresql.org
Subject: [pgsql-advocacy] Draft #5 -- radically re-written

Advocacy people:

What follows is my re-write of the press release.   <snip>

On Tue, 2003-07-29 at 23:32, The Hermit Hacker wrote:
> On Tue, 29 Jul 2003, Josh Berkus wrote:
> Wno't this be makign for a *very* long release announcement?  Starting to
> sound more like an article then an announcement, no? :(
>

Thanks Marc, you helped put into words some feelings I had about the
announcement. I think we need remember that this is an announcement
about 7.4, not a tour through all of the wonderful things about
PostgreSQL.

Robert Treat
--
Build A Brighter Lamp :: Linux Apache {middleware} PostgreSQL

On Wed, 2003-07-30 at 08:57, Merlin Moncure wrote:
> Another big update for 7.4 is enhancements to domains.  They got some
> usability fixes and a big update in functionality, namely the ability to
> define check constraints.  For me, that is a killer feature...do you
> think its worth adding to the release?

I don't think most readers will know what domains are and it's not
really that killer of a feature.

However, a techdocs writeup could be created describing how they should
be used.

On Wed, 2003-07-30 at 09:26, Rod Taylor wrote:
> On Wed, 2003-07-30 at 08:57, Merlin Moncure wrote:
> > Another big update for 7.4 is enhancements to domains.  They got some
> > usability fixes and a big update in functionality, namely the ability
> to
> > define check constraints.  For me, that is a killer feature...do you
> > think its worth adding to the release?
>
> I don't think most readers will know what domains are and it's not
> really that killer of a feature.
>
> However, a techdocs writeup could be created describing how they should
> be used.

One of the best articles to date was Stephen Szabo's article on set
returning functions for 7.3. It would be nice to see articles like that
for all of the new 7.4 features (new domain functionality, new array
support, pg_autovacuum, working with functional indexes, tsearch2,
statement level triggers, etc..)

Robert Treat
--
Build A Brighter Lamp :: Linux Apache {middleware} PostgreSQL

On Wed, Jul 30, 2003 at 12:30:02AM -0300, The Hermit Hacker wrote:
>
> What will be released is v1.2 of the code base, which is about 6 months or
> so old ...

Marc is also being too modest, in failing to point out that this is
PostgreSQL, Inc. that's releasing the code, 'cause it's theirs.
Afilias (note the one "f", by the way) isn't really releasing
anything.

A

--
----
Andrew Sullivan                         204-4141 Yonge Street
Liberty RMS                           Toronto, Ontario Canada
<andrew@libertyrms.info>                              M2P 2A8
                                         +1 416 646 3304 x110

Rod. Merlin,

> > Another big update for 7.4 is enhancements to domains.  They got some
> > usability fixes and a big update in functionality, namely the ability to
> > define check constraints.  For me, that is a killer feature...do you
> > think its worth adding to the release?
>
> I don't think most readers will know what domains are and it's not
> really that killer of a feature.

No, but it does deserve 3 words in the "Advanced SQL" paragraph:  enhanced SQL
Domains

--
Josh Berkus
Aglio Database Solutions
San Francisco

Robert,

> Amazing how quickly one can become backlogged on email isnt it? :-)
> eRServer 1.0 is being released on gborg as it's on project. It should be
> available before 7.4 comes out, and is 7.3 compatible.

Since we won't be mailing the 7.4 release for a month, I'd like to revisit
your idea of doing a seperate release for eRServer.  Think we can whip
something up this week?

--
Josh Berkus
Aglio Database Solutions
San Francisco

Marc, Robert,

> > On Tue, 29 Jul 2003, Josh Berkus wrote:
> > Wno't this be makign for a *very* long release announcement?  Starting to
> > sound more like an article then an announcement, no? :(
>
> Thanks Marc, you helped put into words some feelings I had about the
> announcement. I think we need remember that this is an announcement
> about 7.4, not a tour through all of the wonderful things about
> PostgreSQL.

<grin>  Next stop on our mystery tour ....

Actually, given the "theme" of the press release (try switich to Postgres from
DB2, MSSQL, Oracle), a *mention* of the main GUIs makes sense.  But I'm
talking a *single* paragraph for all 3 GUIs (assuming that pgaccess will have
a new release too).

If Jean-Michel wants to tell the press more detail about the new pgAdminIII
than that, I'd be happy to help the project prepare its own press release.

The idea is that MSSQL, DB2 and Oracle all ship with GUIs on the installation
disks.  Many DBAs trying to make a transition are confused by the lack of one
and the PostgreSQL GUI list is pretty hard to find if you don't already know
where it is.   Mentioning that we have 3 GUIs releasing new versions for 7.4
will encourage the MSSQL DBAs out there to find the information they need.

Also, what *is* new is the fact that our major GUIs already have new versions
ready for the new release at beta time.  In the past, some projects have
lagged behind, making GUI users stick to older versions of Postgres.

--
Josh Berkus
Aglio Database Solutions
San Francisco

On Wed, 2003-07-30 at 11:36, Josh Berkus wrote:
> Robert,
>
> > Amazing how quickly one can become backlogged on email isnt it? :-)
> > eRServer 1.0 is being released on gborg as it's on project. It should be
> > available before 7.4 comes out, and is 7.3 compatible.
>
> Since we won't be mailing the 7.4 release for a month, I'd like to revisit
> your idea of doing a seperate release for eRServer.  Think we can whip
> something up this week?
>

Sure, perhaps someone from pgsql inc, and/or afilias can comment if they
would like to take the lead on this, since they are the ones in charge
of the code.

Robert Treat
--
Build A Brighter Lamp :: Linux Apache {middleware} PostgreSQL

On Wed, Jul 30, 2003 at 12:47:54PM -0400, Robert Treat wrote:
> Sure, perhaps someone from pgsql inc, and/or afilias can comment if they
> would like to take the lead on this, since they are the ones in charge
> of the code.

I believe that PostgreSQL, Inc. is planning a press release, but none
of that will get done until the release itself is sorted out.

Afilias is not releasing the code (as we don't own it), and so we
can't make a press release.

A

--
----
Andrew Sullivan                         204-4141 Yonge Street
Liberty RMS                           Toronto, Ontario Canada
<andrew@libertyrms.info>                              M2P 2A8
                                         +1 416 646 3304 x110

On Wednesday 30 July 2003 17:43, Josh Berkus wrote:
> If Jean-Michel wants to tell the press more detail about the new pgAdminIII
> than that, I'd be happy to help the project prepare its own press release.

Thanks for the proposal, pgAdmin members would certainly love it. Actually, I
think Dave already prepared a press release, but I am not sure.

Dave is coming back from holidays tomorrow. Give us a few days before we go
beta and publish pgAdmin3 web site, which can be previewed at
http://snake.pgadmin.org. We will be back...

Thanks for your help,
Jean-Michel

On Thursday 31 July 2003 00:51, Jean-Michel POURE wrote:
> Give us a few days before we go
> beta and publish pgAdmin3 web site, which can be previewed at
> http://snake.pgadmin.org.

Sorry, the correct URL is http://snake.pgadmin.org/pgadmin3/index.php
Cheers, Jean-Michel

Guys,

I've been trying to contact AMD with no success.  They have no Press or PR
contact information on their web page, and I have no personal contacts there.
Suggestions?

--
Josh Berkus
Aglio Database Solutions
San Francisco

Heather,

> INSERT CITY/STATE - August xx, 2003 -

Can you give me a suggestion about this for the 7.4 release?  PostgreSQL isn't
located anywhere in particular.   But if we omit the city and state, some
news agencies will fill in TORONTO, CANADA on their own, furthering the
confusion between us and PostgreSQL Inc.

Using "THE INTERNET" seems pretentious.  Any ideas?

--
Josh Berkus
Aglio Database Solutions
San Francisco

> I've been trying to contact AMD with no success.  They have no Press
> or PR contact information on their web page, and I have no personal
> contacts there.  Suggestions?

There are a few people at FreeBSD who work for Yahoo! that have
contacts with AMD (read: they did the porting of FreeBSD to
amd64/opteron with pre-release CPUs).  Best place to start would be to
ask on freebsd-amd64@freebsd.org.  If that doesn't yield anything,
I'll see if I can pick up a few names on IRC.  -sc

--
Sean Chittenden

Josh Berkus wrote:
> I've been trying to contact AMD with no success.  They have no Press or PR
> contact information on their web page, and I have no personal contacts there.
> Suggestions?
>

A little googling found this:

CONTACT: AMD
              Mary Ellen West, 512/602-3600 (PR)
              maryellen.west@amd.com
              Mike Haase, 408/749-3124 (IR)

Not sure if it helps, but might be a start.

Joe

Joe,

> CONTACT: AMD
>               Mary Ellen West, 512/602-3600 (PR)

*sigh* what would we do without google?

E-mail sent to Ms. West ....

--
Josh Berkus
Aglio Database Solutions
San Francisco

Joe,

> CONTACT: AMD
>               Mary Ellen West, 512/602-3600 (PR)
>               maryellen.west@amd.com

Hmm ... no good.  Apparently Mary West is gone.  I may try calling their PR
offfice tommorrow.

--
Josh Berkus
Aglio Database Solutions
San Francisco

Josh Berkus wrote:
> Hmm ... no good.  Apparently Mary West is gone.  I may try calling their PR
> offfice tommorrow.
>

OK, more googling finds this from a more recent (August 05, 2003) news
release:

CONTACT:

AMD
Dave Kroll, 408-749-3310 (PR)
dave.kroll@amd.com
Mike Haase, 408-749-3124 (IR)
mike.haase@amd.com


Joe

On Tue, 12 Aug 2003, Josh Berkus wrote:

> Heather,
>
> > INSERT CITY/STATE - August xx, 2003 -
>
> Can you give me a suggestion about this for the 7.4 release?  PostgreSQL isn't
> located anywhere in particular.   But if we omit the city and state, some
> news agencies will fill in TORONTO, CANADA on their own, furthering the
> confusion between us and PostgreSQL Inc.

Actually, PostgreSQL, Inc isn't in TORONTO, CANADA, nor has it ever been
... we're in Wolfville, Nova Scotia ...

And, the project is in Panama City, Panama ...

The Hermit Hacker wrote:
> On Tue, 12 Aug 2003, Josh Berkus wrote:
>
> > Heather,
> >
> > > INSERT CITY/STATE - August xx, 2003 -
> >
> > Can you give me a suggestion about this for the 7.4 release?  PostgreSQL isn't
> > located anywhere in particular.   But if we omit the city and state, some
> > news agencies will fill in TORONTO, CANADA on their own, furthering the
> > confusion between us and PostgreSQL Inc.
>
> Actually, PostgreSQL, Inc isn't in TORONTO, CANADA, nor has it ever been
> ... we're in Wolfville, Nova Scotia ...
>
> And, the project is in Panama City, Panama ...

That does have a nice international sound.

--
  Bruce Momjian                        |  http://candle.pha.pa.us
  pgman@candle.pha.pa.us               |  (610) 359-1001
  +  If your life is a hard drive,     |  13 Roberts Road
  +  Christ can be your backup.        |  Newtown Square, Pennsylvania 19073

>>>>INSERT CITY/STATE - August xx, 2003 -
>>>
>>>Can you give me a suggestion about this for the 7.4 release?  PostgreSQL isn't
>>>located anywhere in particular.   But if we omit the city and state, some
>>>news agencies will fill in TORONTO, CANADA on their own, furthering the
>>>confusion between us and PostgreSQL Inc.

Given that this is a global project, we should be able to use *any*
city, right? So why not Redwood Shores, CA? ;-)

Joe

On Tue, 12 Aug 2003, Joe Conway wrote:

> >>>>INSERT CITY/STATE - August xx, 2003 -
> >>>
> >>>Can you give me a suggestion about this for the 7.4 release?  PostgreSQL isn't
> >>>located anywhere in particular.   But if we omit the city and state, some
> >>>news agencies will fill in TORONTO, CANADA on their own, furthering the
> >>>confusion between us and PostgreSQL Inc.
>
> Given that this is a global project, we should be able to use *any*
> city, right? So why not Redwood Shores, CA? ;-)

IMHO, the release should be "anchored" where the project is anchored ...
that was why, in the past, it was Toronto, Canada (it had nothing to do
with PgSQL, Inc, since PgSQL, Inc was never located in Toronto) ...

The Hermit Hacker wrote:
> On Tue, 12 Aug 2003, Joe Conway wrote:
>>Given that this is a global project, we should be able to use *any*
>>city, right? So why not Redwood Shores, CA? ;-)
>
> IMHO, the release should be "anchored" where the project is anchored ...
> that was why, in the past, it was Toronto, Canada (it had nothing to do
> with PgSQL, Inc, since PgSQL, Inc was never located in Toronto) ...
>

Sorry, that was a failed attempt at humor. Redwood Shores, CA, USA is
where Oracle Corp has its global headquarters.

Joe

On Tue, 12 Aug 2003, Joe Conway wrote:

> The Hermit Hacker wrote:
> > On Tue, 12 Aug 2003, Joe Conway wrote:
> >>Given that this is a global project, we should be able to use *any*
> >>city, right? So why not Redwood Shores, CA? ;-)
> >
> > IMHO, the release should be "anchored" where the project is anchored ...
> > that was why, in the past, it was Toronto, Canada (it had nothing to do
> > with PgSQL, Inc, since PgSQL, Inc was never located in Toronto) ...
> >
>
> Sorry, that was a failed attempt at humor. Redwood Shores, CA, USA is
> where Oracle Corp has its global headquarters.

Ack, sorry ... the only 'geography' that I would have clued into, since
its so often in teh news, would be redmond, virginia ... I'm a Canuck, and
an East Coast one at that, and have enough problems remembering that its
Buffalo, NY, not Boston, that is over by Toronto area *roll eyes*

Josh - just use the city/market you are going to release it in. i.e.: if you
are releasing to Toronto papers put in "TORONTO, CANADA," but if you are
releasing to West coast media you could put in "LOS ANGELES, CA." The idea
behind this is really to raise the eyebrow of "local" media. I would then
just pick the most relevant media market and include that city/state on the
release you will post to the Web site.

In reality though, the focus of reporters at tech trade magazines are
usually national (or international) and so the dateline generally only
serves as a point of reference so they know where the company is located and
thus becomes less important from a news filtering perspective.

Hope that helps.

Heather

-----Original Message-----
From: Josh Berkus [mailto:josh@agliodbs.com]
Sent: Tuesday, August 12, 2003 8:17 PM
To: hcarle@afilias.info
Cc: pgsql-advocacy@postgresql.org
Subject: Re: [pgsql-advocacy] Draft #5 -- radically re-written


Heather,

> INSERT CITY/STATE - August xx, 2003 -

Can you give me a suggestion about this for the 7.4 release?  PostgreSQL
isn't
located anywhere in particular.   But if we omit the city and state, some
news agencies will fill in TORONTO, CANADA on their own, furthering the
confusion between us and PostgreSQL Inc.

Using "THE INTERNET" seems pretentious.  Any ideas?

--
Josh Berkus
Aglio Database Solutions
San Francisco

Josh Berkus wrote:
> Guys,
>
> I've been trying to contact AMD with no success.  They have no Press or PR
> contact information on their web page, and I have no personal contacts there.
> Suggestions?

Hi Josh,

What did you want to contact AMD about?  In my email history somewhere I have some technical contacts at AMD from when
Iwas investigating whether we could get  
a hold of 64 bit AMD technology prior to it's release.

Ok, just looked through the email archive with Google and found this:

http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-advocacy/2003-04/msg00012.php
http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-advocacy/2003-06/msg00023.php

Marc Miller at AMD may be able to assist.

:-)

Regards and best wishes,

Justin Clift

Guys,

The AMD connection is taken care of.  Thanks!

--
Josh Berkus
Aglio Database Solutions
San Francisco