Top all-time · #3270
PostgresAI
Company blog · postgres.ai/blog · on HN as samokhvalovdataprogramming
PostgresAI is the company blog at postgres.ai, writing about data and programming. Since 2020, 22 different Hacker News readers have linked it 53 times, most often “Common DB schema change mistakes in Postgres”. It is still writing: the last post was on 2026-10-28, and you can follow it by feed.
Too few sampled comments (15) to say how often HN recommends it.?
Why HN links it
HN readers link postgres.ai mainly for its Database Lab Engine, a tool that makes disposable, ZFS-snapshot-based Postgres clones, along with its docs and product pages. The comments do not discuss the writing.
Summarised by Claude from a sample of 15 HN comments that link here. Each comment is marked recommending, critical or neutral (citing without judging); how this works.
We fix Postgres trouble and keep it fixed. Every change, upgrades included, is rehearsed on a full copy of your data with evidence before it lands.
Most-linked posts?
- Common DB schema change mistakes in Postgres4 people · 6 mentions · first linked 2022-05-26
- DLE is an open-source experimentation platform for PostgreSQL databases3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2021-12-15
- Postgres.ai Bot. Towards LLM OS for Postgres3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2024-01-28
- /3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2021-06-29
- Zero-downtime Postgres schema migrations need this: lock_timeout and retries2 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2021-09-27
- Self-Driving Postgres2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2025-07-25
- Useful queries to analyze PostgreSQL lock queues2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2021-10-19
What Hacker News says?
I've used SQLite with HashBackup for 13 years and it's been awesome. A lot of the stories I read about "data corruption" with SQLite are, IMO, really about faulty applications that do database commits with the data in an inconsistent state from the application point of view. I've done it myself - it's an easy sin. I've migrated database versions 35 times over the last 13 years, ie, every individual HB database has b…
Comment linking /blog/20210923-zero-downtime-postgres-schema-migrations-lock-timeout-and-retries
on “Ask HN: Have you used SQLite as a primary database?”Submitted Common DB schema change mistakes in Postgres as a story · 357 points
HN discussionLet's say you wanted to test something quickly. You could 1) Clone your VM in 1.5s as described in the article 2) Clone your database in a few seconds with Database Lab Engine [1] 3) Something else? [1] https://postgres.ai/products/how-it-works
Comment linking /products/how-it-works
on “We clone a running VM in 2 seconds”Submitted Joe, a Postgres query optimization bot as a story · 174 points
HN discussionIf all you care about is the forking aspect we use DBLab Engine pretty effectively: https://postgres.ai/products/dblab_engine . Gets deployed within your own infrastructure.
Comment linking /products/dblab_engine
on “Databricks acquires Neon”Submitted PostgreSQL Subtransactions Considered Harmful as a story · 110 points
HN discussionThank you! Your posts let me know to this product: https://postgres.ai/docs/ Looks interesting too
Comment linking /docs/
on “Waiting for PostgreSQL 14 – SEARCH and CYCLE clauses”Submitted Zero-downtime Postgres schema migrations need this: lock_timeout and retries as a story · 8 points
HN discussionI'm a bit confused with the "branching" [0] and "non-blocking schema changes" [1] features. I'm confused as they sound like "the next big thing" and I don't see anything special here. Not saying are bad concepts or ideas, the contrary. But not really useful either. Surely I'm missing something, so I would love to hear from the PlanetScale team here if possible. I have a strong and long Postgres operational backgroun…
Comment linking /products/realistic-test-environments
on “PlanetScale is now generally available”Submitted Show HN: Database Lab – thin Postgres clones for faster development and testing as a story · 7 points
HN discussion> Different table statistics can cause the planner to go in wildly different directions Exactly. That's why my team and I (Postgres.ai) have developed Database Lab Engine [1] and a chatops tool for SQL optimization, Joe bot [2], both are open-source (AGPLv3). EXPLAIN (ANALYZE, BUFFERS) has to be executed on the same-size DB, with properly adjusted Postgres configuration. Interesting, that the machine you might using…
Comment linking /products/joe
on “PostgreSQL EXPLAIN Output Explained”Submitted Common Postgres schema change mistakes as a story · 5 points
HN discussionI do host a medium-sized PostgreSQL database, but i would love not to. I need the control you won't have with a cloud offering (you can't install extensions) but i don't want to do all the other steps, and you always have the fear that backups do not work correctly. And i am not the only one hosting it by my own, many people are using self-hosting PaaS like dokku, flynn or caprover. And all these solutions have a co…
Comment linking /
on “Ask HN: Do you self-host your database?”Submitted Database Lab Engine 2.0 for PostgreSQL as a story · 5 points
HN discussionJoe running in Slack is indeed a way to simplify and speed-up SQL optimization workflow for developers, as it takes seconds to get initial query execution plans and optimization recommendations. >... With a Slack interface, so you don't need to bother with connection, provisioning, credentials and decommissioning. It's worth noticing that Joe is a use case of Database Lab ( https://gitlab.com/postgres-ai/database-la…
Comment linking /docs/database-lab/6_cli_reference
on “Joe, a Postgres query optimization bot”Submitted Postgres query optimization assistant Joe now supports hypothetical indexes as a story · 5 points
HN discussionPostgres checkup ( https://postgres.ai/products/postgres-checkup ) produces very detailed and complete reports easily. This is my recommendation.
Comment linking /products/postgres-checkup
on “Cleaning Up Your Postgres Database”Submitted Postgres Schema Change Mistakes as a story · 4 points
HN discussionThere are several ways to process PII for use in the Database Lab, including masking and data obfuscation. The main approaches can be found here: https://postgres.ai/docs/database-lab/masking .
Comment linking /docs/database-lab/masking
on “Thin PostgreSQL Clones”Submitted Postgres.ai open-sourced Database Lab UI in DLE 3.0, a Postgres cloning tool as a story · 4 points
HN discussionThere are several public Case Studies of real users (from small teams to quite large companies): https://postgres.ai/resources/ For more real-life feedback, welcome to the Database Lab Community Slack: https://slack.postgres.ai/
Comment linking /resources/
on “Thin PostgreSQL Clones”Submitted Self-Driving Postgres as a story · 3 points
HN discussionYou are absolutely right. Depending on the current environment, you should think about the protection of sensitive data (for example, data masking and obfuscation, access control). Database Lab Engine provides some possible solutions to protect sensitive data: https://postgres.ai/docs/database-lab/masking By the way, the Database Lab Engine maintainer is here.
Comment linking /docs/database-lab/masking
on “Thin PostgreSQL Clones”Submitted Postgres.ai Bot. Towards LLM OS for Postgres as a story · 3 points
HN discussionyou could have a look at dblab[1] which (afaik, I've not yet tried using them) has some support for streaming in from a primary source and applying sanitisation functions/transforms The main value is the use of ZFS snapshots to give you almost-instant (2-3s for a 20G DB on my dev laptop) writeable clone of an import, which you can test your migrations etc against, and then just revert or destroy, which has been extr…
Comment linking /products/how-it-works
on “Ask HN: How do you manage direct updates to databases in a production system”Submitted Common DB schema change mistakes as a story · 3 points
HN discussionAnother approach is to use Database Lab ( https://gitlab.com/postgres-ai/database-lab ). Our tool allows deploying disposable Postgres databases in seconds using REST API, CLI, or GUI. The difference is that we provide clones with snapshots of full-sized data. For example, you may have dozens of clones of your production databases (with masked sensitive data) to use as staging servers, database migration verificatio…
Comment linking /products/database-migration-testing
on “Ephemeral Postgres Databases”Submitted Explain (ANALYZE) needs BUFFERS to improve the Postgres query optimization as a story · 3 points
HN discussionThis is great that you can do that. An experimental environment must be of the same size. Ideally, absolutely the same physically, to keep the same physical layout as on prod – bloat, etc – though, sometimes it's not allowed. Another problem here is that for each experiment, you might need a new environment. Plus, in larger teams, many people might want to do this work at the same time – so you end up combining effo…
Comment linking /resources/case-studies/gitlab
on “Optimizing Postgres queries at scale”Submitted Useful queries to analyze PostgreSQL lock queues as a story · 3 points
HN discussion
