Table partitioning?

I was browsing some database mailing lists and found this message available
at:

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(http://www.phpbuilder.com/forum/read.php3?num=2&id=139678&thread=139671)
I don't know MSSQL, but if it tries to compete with Oracle, it should have
this funcitonality (which oracle does):

divide tables into smaller tables that are searched on queries based on a
set field/rule.

An example of this would be: given the first character of a text column,
insert the row into the table partition that has other rows with the same
letter. When a query is done where mycol = 'axxs'; the first thing Oracle
does is decide which table partition to use and then does the rest of the
where statement.

You should be able to design a database application without ever caring how
many rows will be in each table...as I said, dealing with that is a DBA issue.
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It seems that, depending on how data is actually stored on disk and
accessed, this method of partitioning a table internally in the database
could be a benefit. Has anyone investigated this for PostgreSQL?