Re: PostgreSQL for Firefox Bookmarks?

On Fri, 14 Aug 2009, Philip Rhoades wrote:

> It would be nice to be able to use PostgreSQL as the storage for Firefox
> Bookmarks - anyone know if this would be possible? how it could be done?

Firefox uses SQLite to hold its bookmarks. It's certainly possible to
hack the code to use an alternate database instead; for example there's a
description of a port to use CouchDB at
http://www.kryogenix.org/days/2009/07/06/firefox-bookmarks-in-couchdb

PostgreSQL is not an inappropriate choice here though, as it's not
designed for embedded use. It's just not easy to have a captive
PostgreSQL postmaster process for a job like this that's managed by
another app, and the project at large is not interested in making that
easier. See http://wiki.postgresql.org/wiki/Todo#Features_We_Do_Not_Want
for more details.

The small advantages you'd get using PostgreSQL instead of SQLite (better
scalability with multiple clients, better handling of very large files,
less possiblity of data corruption) are pretty minor relative to how much
work it would take to make the code compatible, and the number of people
who could take advantage of it usefully (those who are already managing a
database server on the same system as the browser) is tiny.

--
* Greg Smith gsmith(at)gregsmith(dot)com http://www.gregsmith.com Baltimore, MD