This book is the official documentation of Postgres-XC. It has been written by the Postgres-XC developers and other volunteers in parallel to the development of the Postgres-XC software. It describes all the functionality that the current version of Postgres-XC officially supports.
Postgres-XC is essentially a collection of multiple PostgreSQL database to provide both read and write performance scalability. It also provides full-featured transaction consistency as PostgreSQL provides, at the exception of SSI which is incomplete.
Postgres-XC inherits almost all major features from PostgreSQL. This document is also based upon PostgreSQL reference manual.
To make the large amount of information about Postgres-XC manageable, this book has been organized in several parts. Each part is targeted at a different class of users, or at users in different stages of their Postgres-XC experience:
Part I is an informal introduction for new users.
Part II documents the SQL query language environment, including data types and functions, as well as user-level performance tuning. Every PostgreSQL user should read this.
Part III describes the installation and administration of the server. Everyone who runs Postgres-XC servers, be it for private use or for others, should read this part.
Part IV describes the programming interfaces for Postgres-XC client programs.
Part V contains information for advanced users about the extensibility capabilities of the server. Topics include user-defined data types and functions.
Part VI contains reference information about SQL commands, client and server programs. This part supports the other parts with structured information sorted by command or program.
Part VII contains assorted information that might be of use to Postgres-XC developers.