Re: PostgreSQL Certification

A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away, decibel(at)decibel(dot)org ("Jim C. Nasby") wrote:
> On Fri, Jun 24, 2005 at 08:42:00AM -0700, Joshua D. Drake wrote:
>> Tatsuo Ishii wrote:
>> >>Am Sonntag, 12. Juni 2005 05:24 schrieb Tatsuo Ishii:
>> >>
>> >>>Thank you for interested in PostgreSQL CE. There is a sample
>> >>>examination problems page:
>> >>>
>> >>>http://osb.sra.co.jp/postgresql-ce/sys/quiz.php?titleid=S74_en
>> >>
>> >>Regarding question 3,
>> >>
>> >> Select one incorrect statement regarding the installation of PostgreSQL.
>> >>
>> >>1 1. PostgreSQL is unable to use languages other than English unless the
>> >>"--enable-multibyte" option is specified at "./configure" time.
>> >>2 2. At least 60MB of free disk space is required for compilation.
>> >>3 3. GNU make is required.
>> >>4 4. "root" cannot execute "make check" properly.
>> >>5 5. "--no-locale" should be specified if English is the only language
>> >>to be used in PostgreSQL.
>> >>
>> >>Apparently, the correct answer is 1, but statement 5 is equally false.
>> >
>> >
>> >Really? I vaguley recall that someone who came from US complained
>> >about the sort order of en locale. I thought English speakers prefer C
>> >locale.
>>
>> And if you want to be really picky number 4 is wrong as well:
>>
>> root# su - postgres -c "make check"
>>
>> I know that is really picky but as someone who manages the number of
>> PostgreSQL systems that I do, I might have picked that one. Number 2 is
>> also confusing because am I compiling ALL of PostgreSQL? I just did a
>> check and it took 63 megs just to unpack it, let alone compile it.
>
> This is why I put very little faith in certifications; all that they
> prove is that you know how to pass some test.
>
> Tell me this, does knowing any of the info in this question really make
> you a better PostgreSQL admin or user, other than #1? I would consider
> #2-4 to be trivia, and as others have said #5 is misleading and
> misinformative.

... And while I have built PostgreSQL on numerous occasions, knowing
the size of the source tree has never turned out to be of any personal
importance.

I have always done builds in partitions with a few GB of space in
order that there *NOT* be space concerns about the possible multiple
builds of this, that, and the other thing that might appear there.

Knowing the size of the build has never been an issue. In modern
times, I haven't built anything that took more than $2 worth of disk
space.

An "optimization" that doesn't seem "too out there" is to make sure
you have the extra $10 worth of disk space so that you normally don't
need to care how big a PostgreSQL build is. I can get IDE disk for
not far from $1/GB, and $10 will therefore buy 10GB, which is
evidently enough space for around 50 PostgreSQL builds.

Seems sufficient to me...
--
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