Debra Cerda Blog Posts

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Are you interested in learning about the latest developments and best practices in PostgreSQL? 

Then you won’t want to miss next week’s Postgres Conference Silicon Valley 2023! This annual conference brings together experts and enthusiasts from around the world to share their knowledge and experiences with the PostgreSQL community.

This year's conference will be held in San Jose April 20 and 21, 2023, at the San Jose Hilton, and promises to be another exciting and informative event. Attendees can expect a wide range of presentations, mini-tutorials, and networking opportunities, covering Postgres and open source related topics such as high availability, migration, security, machine learning, AI and much more.

Whether you're a seasoned PostgreSQL developer, a database administrator, or just curious about this powerful open-source database system, Postgres Conference Silicon Valley is the perfect place to learn and connect with like-minded individuals.

So why should you attend? For starters, you'll get to hear from some of the brightest minds in the PostgreSQL community. You'll learn about the latest trends and technologies, and gain valuable insights from real-world use cases and case studies. Check out our full program.

In addition, you'll have the opportunity to network with other PostgreSQL professionals and enthusiasts, and build relationships that can benefit you and your organization long after the conference is over. 

Be sure to stop by the exhibit area and chat with our incredible sponsors and partners, including our Conference sponsors CoreDB and Amazon Web Services (AWS) as well as our Cloud sponsor Google Cloud and Distributed SQL Summit (DSS) sponsor YugabyteDB. Our Conference Partners for this year include Airbyte, Command Prompt, Inc., DBeaver, Fujitsu, Neon, Nutanix, Percona, pgEdge and Community Partner OnGres.

Postgres Conference Silicon Valley is also a great chance to explore the local area, with plenty of opportunities for sightseeing, dining, and entertainment. A Welcome Reception will be hosted by YugabyteDB on Thursday evening for all registered attendees. 

So if you're looking to expand your knowledge of PostgreSQL, connect with other experts and enthusiasts, and have some fun along the way, be sure to register for Postgres Conference Silicon Valley today. We can't wait to see you there!

 

Debra Cerda     April 10, 2023
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Postgres Conference 2025 in Orlando, held March 18–21, brought together PostgreSQL professionals from around the world for a week of deep technical learning, professional development, and intentional networking. With expanded tracks and thoughtfully curated sessions, this year’s gathering balanced core database expertise with a growing focus on holistic professional growth.

Event Highlights

  • Expanded Tracks: In addition to the core DevOps, and Essentials tracks, the conference introduced Professional Development and Variants & Cloud tracks. These additions reflected the complexity of today’s tech environments and the evolving needs of those who manage them.

  • Keynote Address: Malika Boukhelifa’s keynote, “Code Your Way Out of Burnout,” addressed the role of mental health in sustainable tech careers and provided attendees with strategies for long-term success.

  • Technical Deep Dives: Popular sessions on pg_vector, analytics with DuckDB, and PostgreSQL partitioning strategies demonstrated the community’s interest in advanced features and real-world applications.

  • Professional Development: The new track featured sessions on leadership, communication, and soft skills. Certified Wellness Coaches were also available onsite, offering support and tools to help attendees prioritize mental wellness alongside technical growth.

  • Community and Networking: Conversations flowed freely in workshops, hallway meetups, and evening events like the tropical-themed buffet. The size and format of the event allowed for stronger peer connections and genuine knowledge exchange.

This year’s more focused format was intentional. The smaller scale fostered deeper discussion, better engagement, and more actionable takeaways. Whether tackling database replication or burnout prevention, attendees walked away with tools they could apply immediately. We would not be able to accomplish this without the generous support of our sponsors and partners.

Looking ahead, we plan to cap attendance in future years to preserve the quality and depth of the experience. Postgres Conference is no longer designed to be the largest event. Its goal is to be the most effective.

Want to stay updated on future Postgres Conferences and community news?
Subscribe to the PostgresWorld Substack for first access to upcoming events, announcements, and insights from the PostgreSQL ecosystem.

Debra Cerda     April 17, 2025     #community #postgresconf

Early bird registration is now live for Postgres Conference 2026, and the savings are significant. Lock in your ticket at just $299 before January 31st—a $300 discount off the regular general admission price of $599.

What to Expect in San Jose

Join us April 21-23 at the Hilton San Jose for three days dedicated to the Postgres community. Since 2007, Postgres Conference has been more than a technical event—it's been a gathering place where hundreds of thousands of people have advanced their skills, built lasting professional relationships, and contributed to strengthening the entire Postgres ecosystem.

This year's conference theme, "Energizing People with Data and Creativity," reflects our core belief that community drives innovation. We've designed the experience to be intentionally focused and professional, creating space for meaningful connections alongside world-class technical education.

Six Tracks for Every Interest

Whether you're a Postgres power user or new to the technology, we've structured tracks to meet you where you are:

  • Postgres Extensions Day dives deep into the ecosystem of extensions that expand PostgreSQL's capabilities
  • The Dev track focuses on advanced development practices and optimization
  • The Ops track covers deployment, scaling, and operational excellence
  • The Essentials provides foundational knowledge for those getting started
  • Life and Fun celebrates the human side of technology—networking, culture, and community building
  • The Professional Development & Wellness emphasizes career growth, leadership, and well-being

Plan Ahead for Training

Beyond the main conference, specialized pre-conference training sessions will be available as add-ons for Monday, April 20th. Training tickets are sold separately, allowing you to customize your experience with expert-led workshops.

Why Early Bird?

The early bird pricing is a limited-time opportunity. At just $299, you're investing in three days of education, professional growth, and community connection—all while supporting the events that have shaped the Postgres ecosystem for nearly two decades. After January 31st, the general admission price increases to $599, so now is the time to register.

Location Details

Hilton San Jose
300 Almaden Boulevard
San Jose, CA 95110
United States

Stay Tuned

We will be sharing more updates in the coming months on what's in store for 2026! We're excited to see you in San Jose. Whether you're looking to deepen your technical expertise, connect with colleagues, or discover what's possible with Postgres, we've built an experience designed for your growth.

Register Now for Early Bird Pricing

Debra Cerda     November 20, 2025     postgresql training conference

In the spirit of fun and creativity, we’re kicking off 2026 with an invitation to bring your whole self to the Postgres community. Happy New Year from the Postgres Conference team. 

January may be wrapping up, but New Year's resolutions are still top of mind. Gym memberships. Dry January. Finally learning that language.

Here’s one resolution we can get behind: let the fun and creative parts of you take the mic.

The Life & Fun track at Postgres Conference 2026 has nothing to do with PostgreSQL, and that's exactly the point.

We spend so much of our lives thinking about databases, deployments, and deadlines. But who are you when you close the laptop? What lights you up when you're not troubleshooting queries?

Maybe you're a beekeeper. You understand colony management, seasonal cycles, and the delicate art of not getting stung.

Maybe you went solar. You researched panels, navigated permits, and now you watch your energy meter spin backward.

Maybe you're building a homestead. Chickens, gardens, rainwater collection. You're learning skills your grandparents knew and your coworkers don't.

Maybe you restore classic cars. Carburetors, body work, and the satisfaction of an engine turning over after months of weekends in the garage.

Maybe you build terrariums. Tiny ecosystems in glass. Living art that requires patience and precision.

Things like this are what make you a whole person. And whole people make better colleagues, better problem-solvers, and better community members.

Topics in the Life & Fun Track

  • Hobbies and passion projects
  • DIY and maker culture
  • Outdoor adventures
  • Creative pursuits
  • Sustainability and self-sufficiency
  • Anything that brings joy

Register for Postgres Conference: 2026

Postgres Conference 2026 takes place April 21-23 in San Jose, California. 

The theme, Energizing People with Data and Creativity, recognizes that the most powerful systems are built by people who are curious, fulfilled, and energized beyond their day jobs. The Life & Fun track celebrates that truth by making space for the passions, projects, and pursuits that recharge us and shape how we show up for our communities and our work.

Early bird registration is available now! Purchase your General Admission tickets here

Call for Postgres Conference 2026 Speakers & Trainers

We’re also welcoming proposals across all tracks, including Life & Fun. The Call for Speakers and Trainers is an invitation to bring your whole self to the conference stage. Share what excites you, what you’ve built, or what you’ve learned outside the database.

CFP closes January 30, 2026. Submit here

Debra Cerda     January 28, 2026     call for proposals

Welcome to January. The inbox is overflowing. Q1 goals just dropped. Everyone's talking about resolutions. Here's one worth keeping: Take care of yourself this year.

Not the vague "self-care" that means eye masks and bubble baths (though those are fine). Real, sustainable wellness. The kind that keeps you energized and passionate.

Let's be honest. Tech is hard on people.

Burnout is real. The always-on culture. The 2 AM pages. The pressure to constantly learn, constantly ship, and constantly perform. It catches up with everyone eventually.

Work-life balance is a myth. We've been chasing a fantasy. Integration is more realistic: finding ways to make work and life coexist without one consuming the other.

The Professional Development & Wellness Track at Postgres Conference: 2026

The Professional Development & Wellness track at Postgres Conference 2026 tackles the human side of technical careers. Learn from practitioners who've navigated these challenges and come out stronger.

Topics include:

  • Managing and recovering from burnout
  • Career advancement strategies
  • Leadership development
  • Communication skills for technical professionals
  • Mental health in tech
  • Work-life integration (not balance—integration)
  • Building resilience
  • Mentorship and sponsors
  • Navigating career transitions
  • Finding meaning in your work

These aren’t soft skills - these are survival skills. The technical skills that get you hired and motivate you. The human skills keep you going.

Postgres Conference 2025 Professional Development Track Highlights

Listen or watch sessions from the Postgres Conference 2025: Professional Development Track on YouTube.

Register for Postgres Conference: 2026

Postgres Conference: 2026 takes place April 21-23 in San Jose, California. The theme is Energizing People with Data and Creativity, and nothing needs more energy than the people doing the work.

Early bird registration is available now! Purchase your General Admission tickets here.

Call for Postgres Conference 2026 Speakers & Trainers

If you've navigated career challenges and can share lessons from your professional journey, we want to hear from you. The CFP is open across all tracks. Share what you've learned.

CFP closes January 30, 2026: Submit here.

Debra Cerda     January 13, 2026     professional development

Santa Claus DBA created by Ildefonso Camargo with AI

In the spirit of fun and creativity, we offer this whimsical view of operations excellence. No matter what holidays you observe—or if you observe none at all—we hope this season brings you time for bonding, joy, and repose. Happy holidays from the Postgres Conference team. 

Let's talk about the greatest operations professional of all time: Santa Claus.

Think about it. Every December 24th, Santa executes a global deployment with a one-night SLA. Zero downtime tolerance. No rollback option. The whole world is watching, and failure is not an option. His operations credentials are impeccable:

Global Distribution Network. Billions of deliveries across every time zone in a single maintenance window. Try explaining that SLA to your stakeholders.

Real-Time Monitoring. He sees you when you're sleeping. He knows when you're awake. Santa's observability game is unmatched. He knows if you've been bad or good—that's behavioral analytics at scale.

Massive Database Management. The naughty/nice list is a production database with billions of records, updated continuously throughout the year. Annual refresh cycle. No data loss. Ever.

Failover Systems. Remember when the weather nearly took down Christmas? Rudolph wasn't just a reindeer with a shiny nose. Rudolph was a failover solution implemented under pressure. That's incident response.

Capacity Planning. Cookies and milk at every stop. Presents for every child. Sleigh weight distribution. Santa doesn't wing it. Santa has a plan.

Workforce Management. Elves are working year-round across multiple workshops. Reindeer training programs. Quality assurance on every toy. That's operational excellence.

The Ops Track at Postgres Conference: 2026

If Santa ran PostgreSQL, he'd be attending—or presenting at—the Ops track.

The Ops track at Postgres Conference: 2026 is for everyone managing PostgreSQL in production. You'll learn from practitioners sharing hard-won operational wisdom. Topics include:

  • Deployment strategies and automation
  • Monitoring and observability
  • Performance tuning
  • Backup and recovery
  • High availability and replication
  • Capacity planning
  • Security hardening
  • Automation and orchestration
  • Managing PostgreSQL at scale

Postgres Conference 2025 Ops Track Highlights

Listen or watch sessions from the Postgres Conference 2025: Ops Track on YouTube.

Register for Postgres Conference: 2026

Postgres Conference: 2026 takes place April 21-23 in San Jose, California. The theme is Energizing People with Data and Creativity. Nothing says creativity like keeping production databases running smoothly under pressure. 

Early bird registration is available now! Purchase your General Admission tickets here

Call for Postgres Conference 2026 Speakers & Trainers

Want to share your expertise? If you like managing PostgreSQL in production and can help others learn from your operational experience, we want to hear from you. The CFP is open across all tracks. Share what you've learned.

CFP closes January 30, 2026. Submit here

Debra Cerda     December 22, 2025     operations

Core PostgreSQL knowledge compounds over time. Understanding data types, indexing strategies, query optimization, and transaction behavior provides value regardless of framework, application architecture, or PostgreSQL version.

The Essentials track at Postgres Conference: 2026 is dedicated to core PostgreSQL knowledge. If it's in the documentation or should be, this is where we explore it thoroughly.

This isn't beginner content. Every core concept has complexity worth understanding.

What You'll Learn in the Essentials Track

Data types beyond the basics. PostgreSQL's type system includes arrays, JSONB, ranges, and custom types that solve problems other databases punt to the application layer. Learn how to leverage these types effectively.

Indexing strategies that actually work. B-tree, GIN, GiST, BRIN, and hash indexes each exist for specific reasons. Understand when to use which, how to read EXPLAIN output, and when indexes hurt more than they help.

Query optimization fundamentals. Go beyond adding indexes. Understand the query planner, statistics, joins, and execution strategies to write performant queries from the start.

Transaction isolation in practice. MVCC, isolation levels, and locking behavior aren't just academic concepts. Learn how they affect real applications and how to prevent production incidents.

Documentation deep dives. PostgreSQL's documentation is legendary, but dense. Sessions in this track surface buried knowledge and make it actionable.

Topics in the Essentials Track

  • Data types deep dives (JSONB, arrays, ranges, custom types)
  • Indexing strategies and trade-offs
  • Query optimization and EXPLAIN analysis
  • Transaction management and isolation
  • Constraints and data integrity patterns
  • Configuration and tuning fundamentals
  • Backup, restore, and recovery basics
  • Security fundamentals
  • SQL features that PostgreSQL does better
  • And more!

Postgres Conference 2025 Essentials Track Highlights

Check out how presenters tackled complex PostgreSQL topics and get a preview of what to expect in 2026. Listen and watch Essentials track highlights in our Postgres Conference YouTube playlist.

Register for Postgres Conference: 2026

Postgres Conference 2026 takes place April 21-23 in San Jose, California. The theme is Energizing People with Data and Creativity. Understanding the fundamentals gives you the foundation to be creative.

Early bird registration is available now! Purchase your General Admission tickets here

Call for Postgres Conference 2026 Speakers & Trainers

Want to share your expertise? If you like to dive deep into PostgreSQL fundamentals and can help others understand them, we want to hear from you. The CFP is open across all tracks. Share what you've learned.

CFP closes January 30, 2026. Submit here

Debra Cerda     December 10, 2025     #postgresconf essentials

PostgreSQL is more than a database. It's the foundation developers build on.

Every application has a data layer. The decisions you make there—schema design, query patterns, extension choices, performance trade-offs—shape everything that comes after.

What You'll Learn in the Dev Track

 The Dev track at Postgres Conference 2026 is where developers share what they've learned building real applications with PostgreSQL.

This isn't theory. This is practice.

Real architectural decisions. When to denormalize. How to handle multi-tenancy. Whether to push logic into the database or keep it in the application layer. Hear how experienced developers made these choices and what they learned.

Modern stack integrations. GraphQL APIs. Event-driven architectures. Microservices. Serverless functions. PostgreSQL fits into all of them, and you'll learn the patterns that actually work.

Extensions in production. pg_vector for semantic search and AI applications. PostGIS for location features. Full-text search that scales. Custom data types that model your domain perfectly. Learn from teams using these in real applications.

Performance that matters. Query optimization from the developer's perspective. Schema designs that perform at scale. Lessons learned when users actually showed up..

Topics in the Dev Track

  • Application architecture patterns with PostgreSQL
  • Schema design and data modeling
  • Query optimization for developers
  • ORMs, query builders, and database access patterns
  • Building APIs backed by PostgreSQL
  • Testing strategies for database-backed applications
  • Lessons learned from production applications

Postgres Conference 2025 Highlights

Check out how presenters tackled PostgreSQL topics and get a preview of what to expect in 2026. Listen and watch highlights in our Postgres Conference 2025 YouTube playlist.

Register for Postgres Conference: 2026

Postgres Conference 2026 takes place April 21-23 in San Jose, California. The theme is Energizing People with Data and Creativity, and the Dev track is where data meets the applications that innovate and make it useful.

Early bird registration is available now! Purchase your General Admission tickets here

Call for Postgres Conference 2026 Speakers & Trainers

If you like building applications with PostgreSQL and can help others learn from your development experience, why not share your experience? The CFP is open across all tracks. Share what you've learned.

CFP closes January 30, 2026. Submit here

Debra Cerda     January 27, 2026     call for speakers