Thread: Building from source vs RPMs

I'm moving from a long time in BSD-land to using Linux.  I've always
been in the habit of building PostgreSQL from the source tarballs.  On
Linux, is there an advantage either way to using the RPMs as opposed
to building from source?  Thanks!
--
-- Christophe Pettus
    xof@thebuild.com

On Mon, 2009-07-27 at 16:53 -0700, Christophe Pettus wrote:
> On  Linux, is there an advantage either way to using the RPMs as
> opposed to building from source?

In terms of performance and functionality, there is no difference. On
the other hand, many people, including me, find precompiled packages
(RPMs, debs, etc) easier to administrate. Ubuntu, Debian, CentOS, Fedora
and Red Hat has packages for many PostgreSQL versions. See here:

http://www.postgresql.org/download/linux

-HTH.

Regards,
--
Devrim GÜNDÜZ, RHCE
Command Prompt - http://www.CommandPrompt.com
devrim~gunduz.org, devrim~PostgreSQL.org, devrim.gunduz~linux.org.tr
                   http://www.gunduz.org

On Tuesday 28 July 2009 02:53:19 Christophe Pettus wrote:
> I'm moving from a long time in BSD-land to using Linux.  I've always
> been in the habit of building PostgreSQL from the source tarballs.  On
> Linux, is there an advantage either way to using the RPMs as opposed
> to building from source?  Thanks!

RPMs will make sure the init script is correctly wired in and the server will
start at the right time, logging and log rotation is correctly set up, and
depending on the system, that your time zone data is current.  Also, the
dependency system will make sure everything you need is installed and stays
installed.  And finally, it saves you from having to install a complete
development and build environment on your server, and it installs much faster.