Re: Deploy postgres - upgrade strategy

On Dec 19, 2007 11:12 AM, Sean Z. <sean09182006(at)yahoo(dot)com> wrote:
>
> Hi,
>
> I need your kind advice on postgres deployment strategy. My application is
> developed on 8.2.4 and need to be deployed to Windows server 2003. Clients
> may /may not have postgres installed. How can I deploy postgres silently on
> client machine? Specifically:
>
> 3. If there is an older version of the same version line (e.g., 8.2.3)
> installed, is it safe for me to upgrade it by running upgrade.bat, believing
> that it won't break existing application using the old version?

Under no circumstances should you simply do it. You should ask the
user if it's ok to do it. If I had a machine running a specific
version because that's what I'd tested and was deployed in other
places, and it got updated by some other app being installed I would
not be happy.

> 4. If there is a newer version installed (e.g. 8.3), can I still install
> 8.2.4 as a separate installation without touching the existing installation?

That may be your best bet if you're looking to use postgresql and your
app together as a kind of "bolted together" application.

I'd say that you should ask the user up front if they have another
postgresql server (it might not be on the same machine you're
installing your app on, btw) they want to use, or if they'd like you
to install a postgresql instance just for your application on the
local machine. Then make all decisions based on that one question.