Database Technology

The PoWA team released version 5.2.0 of powa-archivist, the core extension for the PostgreSQL Workload Analyzer. This update introduces compatibility with PostgreSQL 19, including new system views for recovery and lock statistics. The tool continues to provide real-time metrics, charts, and index optimization suggestions across supported PostgreSQL versions.

• PoWA now supports PostgreSQL 19, essential for early adopters of the latest release.
• New pg_stat_recovery and pg_stat_lock views enable deeper internal diagnostics.
• Core workload analysis and index suggestion features remain stable in this update.
• Upgrade powa-archivist to maintain monitoring coverage on PG19 instances.

AWS Database Migration Service now allows offline schema conversion for Microsoft SQL Server by extracting metadata locally and uploading it to the service. This approach removes the need for direct connectivity, bypassing security reviews, firewall changes, and VPN setups. It delivers identical conversion results to the connected method while accommodating strict security policies that prohibit external tool access to production databases.

• Extract SQL Server metadata using standard commands in your own environment before uploading.
• Eliminate delays from security reviews, firewall rules, and VPN configuration for migrations.
• Achieves the same conversion accuracy as the connected method without live database access.
• Ideal for production environments with strict policies against external tool connectivity.

Percona has released an experimental MySQL 9.7 build featuring a DuckDB storage engine that routes analytical queries from marked tables directly to DuckDB. This approach allows analytical workloads to run on the same server and connection as transactional data without duplicating the dataset. Early TPC-H benchmarks at scale factor 10 show InnoDB timing out on six queries and taking 1317 seconds on others, highlighting the performance gap DuckDB aims to fill.

• Experimental MySQL 9.7 build enables ENGINE=DuckDB for analytical offloading from InnoDB.
• Analytical queries run in-process without data duplication or separate infrastructure.
• InnoDB struggled with TPC-H Q6-Q22 timeouts and high latency at scale factor 10.
• Validates hybrid transactional/analytical processing within a single database instance.

The pgrust project, a Postgres rewrite in Rust, now passes 100% of the Postgres 18.3 regression suite, covering over 46,000 queries. It maintains disk compatibility with existing Postgres data directories, allowing systems to boot directly from them. The current architecture uses a thread-per-connection model, replacing the traditional process-per-connection approach.

• pgrust achieves full regression test parity with Postgres 18.3, ensuring behavioral compatibility.
• Disk compatibility allows migration or side-by-side usage with existing Postgres data directories.
• Shifts from process-per-connection to thread-per-connection, potentially impacting concurrency models.
• Leverages Rust and AI-assisted development to explore deeper server internals changes.