High Performance PostgreSQL for Rails: Reliable, Scalable, Maintainable Database Applications

by Andrew Atkinson

Build faster, more reliable Rails apps by taking the best advanced PostgreSQL and Active Record capabilities, and using them to solve your application scale and growth challenges. Gain the skills needed to comfortably work with multi-terabyte databases, and with complex Active Record, SQL, and specialized Indexes. Develop your skills with PostgreSQL on your laptop, then take them into production, while keeping everything in sync. Make slow queries fast, perform any schema or data migration without errors, use scaling techniques like read/write splitting, partitioning, and sharding, to meet demanding workload requirements from Internet scale consumer apps to enterprise SaaS.

Deepen your firsthand knowledge of high-scale PostgreSQL databases and Ruby on Rails applications with dozens of practical and hands-on exercises. Unlock the mysteries surrounding complex Active Record. Make any schema or data migration change confidently, without downtime. Grow your experience with modern and exclusive PostgreSQL features like SQL Merge, Returning, and Exclusion constraints. Put advanced capabilities like Full Text Search and Publish Subscribe mechanisms built into PostgreSQL to work in your Rails apps. Improve the quality of the data in your database, using the advanced and extensible system of types and constraints to reduce and eliminate application bugs. Tackle complex topics like how to improve query performance using specialized indexes. Discover how to effectively use built-in database functions and write your own, administer replication, and make the most of partitioning and foreign data wrappers. Use more than 40 well-supported open source tools to extend and enhance PostgreSQL and Ruby on Rails. Gain invaluable insights into database administration by conducting advanced optimizations - including high-impact database maintenance - all while solving real-world operational challenges.

Take your new skills into production today and then take your PostgreSQL and Rails applications to a whole new level of reliability and performance.

What You Need:

-A computer running macOS, Linux, or Windows and WSL2
-PostgreSQL version 16, installed by package manager, compiled, or running with Docker
-An Internet connection

Genres: Technology, Programming

456 pages, Paperback

Published July 23, 2024

Reviews

[Sean Szurko · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book bridges the the most common gap that Rails developers face, which is a deep understanding of their Postgres database and how to achieve top performance from their tools.

For me this was one of the only times I've finished a development book and been fully satisfied with the material and knowledge gained. The author leaves no stone left unturned, has excellent code examples that are easy to follow and has a relatable writing style that kept me engaged from start to finish.

[Simon Chiu · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a very good reference book. I follow Andrew on X/Twitter and he knows his stuff around PostgreSQL and Rails. I bought this book initially for the chapters surrounding performance, of which there are plenty. Andrew is very to-the-point in his writing style. Favourite sections of mine include the index optimization and working with bulk data. Overall, I would recommend this book as a primer on PG performance in the context of Rails deployments as required reading material for most engineering teams.

[Yithzak Centeno · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a great book, with several powerful resources to build high performant and cost-effective databases for rails apps. This is a superpower that every rails dev should posses.

[Alexander · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of the best tech books I read in 2024. If you're serious about scaling your Rails app, it's an absolute must-read. Insightful, practical, and packed with real-world strategies.

[Daniel Kaczmarczyk · Rating 5 out of 5]

Andy presents so many useful Postgres concepts that it's hard to believe anything about Rails even fits in the book!

If you are a Rails engineer who always wanted to understand how to have a greater impact on your work through taking command of your database, this is the book for you!

[JP · Rating 5 out of 5]

"The High Performance PostgreSQL for Rails Challenge" - an attempt to read this book without finding something useful in every chapter. Despite having used PostgreSQL for several years, I came away from every chapter with a new insight - usually several.

If you use Rails and Postgres, this book is required reading.

If you use Postgres and a different framework, you will still get a ton of value out of it. Every section goes deep and you'll glean something new about building with Postgres on every re-read.