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Breaking the question down into parts, so that Postgres is compared one-on-one with each of its potential competitors, consider Postgres-vs.-MySQL. After all,

Breaking the question down into parts, so that Postgres is compared one-on-one with each of its potential competitors, consider Postgres-vs.-MySQL. After all, it's plausible that one of the first decisions you make is whether to use a proprietary database or an open-source database. If the former, then you're probably deciding among Oracle, Microsoft, and maybe IBM. If the latter, you're probably deciding between MySQL and Postgres. So let's concentrate on the latter for a moment. Why do people choose MySQL over Postgres? I don't know the answer to that, but I was TOLD by a DBA colleague of mine who believes Postgres to be technically superior that the reason companies choose MySQL is because of the commercial support. Though it's open-source, MySQL evidently is in some sense "owned" or at least "sponsored" by Oracle, and if you go to www.mysql.com you'll find that you can purchase various services (support, training, etc.) directly from Oracle. Contrast that with PostgreSQL which even today appears to be more a house divided. At www.postgresql.org, you're presented with a list of third-party consulting organizations. I'm not positive, but I would be unsurprised if that made corporate managers a little nervous. "No one was ever fired for buying IBM." as the saying goes. Of course, this is just conjecture on my part. Perhaps someone with better intel can comment.

deadfall 13y ago
For me, I use MySQL over Postgres because it was easier for me to configure and set up. I know MySQL much more coming from PHP and now I use Python/Django. I spent a few hours trying to setup Postgres and it would not install properly with Vagrant and I couldn't find really any helpful articles. I said fuck it, and installed MySQL on the VM in a matter of minutes and was up and running. Again, I am familiar with MySQL and got a production database on Amazon RDS pretty quickly.
moron4hire 13y ago
Linux was the same way. At least from my perspective, Red Hat put Linux on the map for me. For a lot more people, that was Canonical. Given the right sort of organizations, having a lack of a single, explicit owner isn't necessarily a bad thing.
collyw 13y ago
MySQL is like PhP. Its almost always there, and no install hassles. Postgress takes a bit of farting about initially to get set up with an initial user. Thats probably enough to put a fair percentage of potential users off. I think thats why most go for MySQL.

deadfall 13y ago

For me, I use MySQL over Postgres because it was easier for me to configure and set up. I know MySQL much more coming from PHP and now I use Python/Django. I spent a few hours trying to setup Postgres and it would not install properly with Vagrant and I couldn't find really any helpful articles. I said fuck it, and installed MySQL on the VM in a matter of minutes and was up and running. Again, I am familiar with MySQL and got a production database on Amazon RDS pretty quickly.

moron4hire 13y ago

Linux was the same way. At least from my perspective, Red Hat put Linux on the map for me. For a lot more people, that was Canonical. Given the right sort of organizations, having a lack of a single, explicit owner isn't necessarily a bad thing.

collyw 13y ago

MySQL is like PhP. Its almost always there, and no install hassles. Postgress takes a bit of farting about initially to get set up with an initial user. Thats probably enough to put a fair percentage of potential users off. I think thats why most go for MySQL.