Helping Rails developers learn Postgres with Andrew Atkinson | Talking Postgres Ep21

Have you ever achieved something remarkable because someone planted an idea in your mind? In this episode of Talking Postgres, host Claire Giordano talks with Andrew Atkinson—a Rails developer and Postgres user whose journey to becoming a published author began with a simple seed of inspiration. Andrew’s story started with an internal presentation on how to tackle tricky scalability challenges in Rails, grew into a Postgres conference talk at PGConf NYC—and ultimately evolved into his book, High Performance PostgreSQL for Rails. Also in this episode: what does cheese have to do with Postgres? Is writing a good way to think? What’s the connection between Postgres and swimming to Antarctica? And which chapter of his book does Andrew love the most? Chapters: ⏩ 00:00 Let’s get this started ⏩ 01:54 Power of suggestion ⏩ 14:53 Managing anxiety with excessive preparation ⏩ 19:01 Swimming to Antarctica connection ⏩ 32:34 Was it hard to write this book? ⏩ 53:56 Gratitude to reviewers & readers ⏩ 1:09:00 Favorite chapter (tl;dr on indexes) 📜 Full transcript available at: https://talkingpostgres.com/episodes/helping-rails-developers-learn-postgres-with-andrew-atkinson/transcript ✅ Listen to more episodes of Talking Postgres: https://talkingpostgres.com 💥 Subscribe to Talking Postgres, so you never miss an episode: https://talkingpostgres.com/subscribe Links mentioned in this episode: 🔹 Book: High Performance PostgreSQL for Rails, by Andrew Atkinson: https://andyatkinson.com/pgrailsbook 🔹 E-Book Discount: for Andrew Atkinson’s High Performance PostgreSQL for Rails book. Use discount code TalkingPostgres (all one word) to get 35% off discount: https://aka.ms/TalkingPostgres-AndyAtki-35off 🔹 Blog post: Readers get their copies of High Performance PostgreSQL for Rails, by Andrew Atkinson: https://andyatkinson.com/blog/2024/07/23/high-performance-postgresql-for-rails-readers-getting-books 🔹 Book: Swimming to Antarctica: Tales of a Long Distance Swimmer, by Lynne Cox: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/153727.Swimming_To_Antarctica 🔹 Talk Abstract: PGConf NYC 2021 talk by Andrew Atkinson: https://postgresql.us/events/pgconfnyc2021/schedule/session/916-how-we-made-pg-fitter-happier-more-productive/ 🔹 Slides: PGConf NYC 2021 talk by Andrew Atkinson: https://speakerdeck.com/andyatkinson/how-we-made-postgresql-fitter-happier-more-productive 🔹 Video: POSETTE 2024 talk by Andrew Atkinson about SaaS on Rails on PostgreSQL: https://youtu.be/RwXJ4s2pw1A?si=xA8t9IxtgtMsJ8vY 🔹 Ruby User Groups: List of upcoming user groups and meetups: https://rubyconferences.org/meetups/ 🔹 Blog post: Writing is Thinking annotated twitter thread by Steve Sinofsky: https://medium.learningbyshipping.com/writing-is-thinking-an-annotated-twitter-thread-2a75fe07fade 🔹 Talking Postgres podcast Ep19: Becoming a Postgres committer with Melanie Plageman: https://talkingpostgres.com/episodes/becoming-a-postgres-committer-with-melanie-plageman 🔹 Talking Postgres podcast E20: How I got started as a developer (& in Postgres) with David Rowley: https://talkingpostgres.com/episodes/how-i-got-started-as-a-developer-in-postgres-with-david-rowley 🔹 CFP open for: Prague PostgreSQL Developer Day 2025 (P2D2) CFP open until Nov 23 2024: https://p2d2.cz/ 🔹 CFP open for: FOSDEM PGDay 2025 CFP open until Nov 29 2024: https://2025.fosdempgday.org/callforpapers/ 🔹 CFP open for: Nordic PGDay 2025 CFP open until Dec 31 2024: https://2025.nordicpgday.org/cfp/ 🔹 CFP open for: pgDay Paris 2025 CFP open until Dec 31 2024: https://2025.pgday.paris/call-for-papers/ 🔹 CFP: PGConf.dev 2025 CFP open until Jan 1 2025: https://2025.pgconf.dev/cfp.html 🔹 CFP: POSETTE: An Event for Postgres 2025 CFP open until Feb 9 2025: https://posetteconf.com/2025/cfp/ 🔹 Cal invite for LIVE recording of next Ep22 of Talking Postgres podcast: https://aka.ms/TalkingPostgres-Ep22-cal #TalkingPostgres #podcast #PostgreSQL