PgConf.Russia 2020

Sometimes it maybe a very tricky just to establish a connection with your remote database. Especially if your working place is in highly secured corporate environment and your database server is in highly secured remote cloud.

We will talk about bypassing SSH, SSL, jump servers, proxy servers, VPNs and various SSO (Kerberos/SSPI/LDAP/Active Directory) authentication systems in order to access your PostgreSQL database using console or rich UI interface and JDBC. We will describe different use cases - from trivial and typical to insane and over-secured.

I'll show an example of solving the problem of searching "similar" texts for one given text in big array using GiST index. The problem itself is not much important, but it is easy to understand. Using this problem as example, I'll show one of many methods of adapting GiST index for custom search problems. Maybe this talk will help you to solve other search problems.

If you care about Postgres performance, there are a number of hardware acceleration options to help with different use cases. Intel Optane DC persistent memory creates new tier in data hierarchy allowing developers to utilize performance of traditional memory combining with volume and persistency of block storage devices. Unlike traditional DRAM-only in-memory systems, where memory is small, expensive, and volatile, Intel Optane DC persistent memory makes it possible to run larger Postgres databases (terabytes) in memory for higher performance. FPGAs are integrated circuits that can be reprogrammed dynamically to accelerate a specific workload such as SQL execution and data compression. FPGA accelerators extend Postgres with hundreds of SQL reader and writer processes that work in parallel on the FPGA. It’s similar to adding hundreds new cores to boost parallel processing on your server.

From the very beginning, PostgreSQL in Avito has been solving very important tasks. All the main architecture components are built around DBMS. For over 10 years, the project has been actively evolving, and the infrastructure and architecture have changed a lot.

The talk will start with an overview of how PostgreSQL infrastructure and architecture have advanced in Avito over time and which challenges have been successfully resolved.

Then we'll discuss PostgreSQL usage scenarios in Avito in 2020: microservice architecture, sharding, hosting multiple databases on a single server instance, DBaaS (Database discovery, access control, failover, backup, archive, resource sharing, etc.), integration, and team evolution.
And finally, I'll share our backlog and wishlist.