Talking Postgres with Claire Giordano

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Aug 2026

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Talking Postgres is a podcast for developers who love Postgres. Guests join Claire Giordano each month to discuss the human side of PostgreSQL, databases, and open source. With amazing guests such as Boriss Mejías, Melanie Plageman, Tom Lane, Simon Willison, Robert Haas, and Andres Freund, Talking Postgres is guaranteed to get you thinking. Recorded live on Discord by the Postgres team at Microsoft, you can subscribe to our calendar to join us live on the parallel text chat (which is quite fun!): https://aka.ms/TalkingPostgres-cal

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43 recent

August 14, 2026Episode 421 hr 30 min

How AI is changing software development with Simon Willison

What’s your gold standard for deciding whether AI-written code is ready for production? In Episode 42 of Talking Postgres, Simon Willison —creator of Datasette, co-creator of Django, and prolific open-source developer—joins Claire to share how AI is changing the way he builds software today. We dig into why his test for shipping AI-generated code is “Could I explain this to somebody else?”, how engineering management skills can be surprisingly useful when managing AI agents, and how the bottleneck is no longer writing code but understanding it. Also: personal credibility, deep research, the Winchester Mystery House, slop proxies, and Simon’s observation that “Features are cheap. That doesn’t mean you should build them all.” Previously on Talking Postgres: Talking Postgres podcast Ep 30: AI for data engineers with Simon Willison Links mentioned in this episode: Blog: Simon Willison’s Blog Project page: Datasette , for finding stories in data GitHub repo: sqlite-utils Blog post: Release of alchemy-utils 0.1a0 (featuring Postgres & DuckDB) Blog post: There are no lossless transformations of natural-language text , by Sophie Alpert Podcast episode: The Open Weight Revolution with Simon Willison , on Oxide and Friends Podcast episode: An AI state of the union , on Lenny’s Podcast Wikipedia: Winchester Mystery House Idea in Mythical Man-Month: Conceptual integrity Blog post: SQLite compressed text-history prototypes , by Simon Willison Tools: Simon’s miscellaneous tools repo In this episode, we covered: 00:00 Intro & music 04:00 A week of work before breakfast 09:12 Red-green TDD makes agents exercise every line 14:42 A million lines mean nothing if you don’t understand it 18:28 Finding low-hanging fruit among open PRs & issues 22:07 Getting work done while walking the dog 23:01 Gold standard: “Could I explain this to somebody else?” 28:27 Slop proxies add no value at all 30:49 Aggressive nitpicking reviews 35:01 Everything in software engineering is about trade-offs 41:16 Racoon heist game is only fun for 1 minute 15 seconds 43:46 New Year’s resolution to be more ambitious 48:11 You have to learn to throw things away 51:57 Features are cheap. That doesn’t mean you should build them all 1:00:45 Engineering management skills are so useful 1:04:44 QA specialists should be having a great time 1:07:53 Writing is thinking, don’t outsource it 1:08:23 Skill atrophy is a choice you make 1:10:07 I believe in people who are motivated 1:11:55 Systems are not set up to deal with this volume 1:18:48 Research agents stopped being absolute garbage 1:21:49 The whole point of the “human in the loop” 1:26:10 Dream: I want there to be more small businesses

July 17, 2026Episode 411 hr 13 min

Working on Postgres after 13 years on SQL Server with Panagiotis Antonopoulos

What happens when a database engineer spends 13 years on SQL Server and then starts working on Postgres? In Episode 41 of Talking Postgres, Distinguished Engineer Panagiotis “Panos” Antonopoulos of Microsoft joins Claire to share what surprised him most about making that transition. We explore why Postgres felt familiar from the start—and what shocked Panos about the clean and lean Postgres codebase. We also dig into how public mailing lists and AI can help explain why design decisions were made, why more people are asking “why not Postgres?”, and the shared-storage architecture behind Azure HorizonDB. Previously on Talking Postgres: Talking Postgres Ep 39: From MemSQL to HorizonDB, an engineer's journey with Adam Prout Talking Postgres Ep 38: How I went from Oracle to Postgres (with a big NoSQL detour) with Gwen Shapira Talking Postgres Ep 40: How I got started running a Postgres user group with Jeremy Schneider Links mentioned in this episode: SIGMOD: ACM SIGMOD-PODS Conference 2027 CMUDB talk: HorizonDB: Co-Designing Postgres and Azure for Cloud-Native OLTP , by Adam Prout PostgreSQL mailing list: pgsql-hackers PostgreSQL docs: pg_stat_slru (simple least-recently-used) Docs: Azure HorizonDB Poster: Postgres Happiness Hints

June 12, 2026Episode 401 hr 21 min

How I got started running a Postgres user group with Jeremy Schneider

Intensely local user groups have been part of Jeremy Schneider's story from the start—from Linux meetups at a Michigan coffee shop to a closet server running an Oracle database nobody knew anything about. In Episode 40 of Talking Postgres, Postgres engineer and Seattle Postgres User Group co-organizer Jeremy Schneider joins Claire to share how community led him to Postgres after 15 years with Oracle—and why "it's like I was born to be here." Plus: the newly-updated Postgres Happiness Hints poster, advice for starting your own user group, and his POSETTE 2026 talk on CloudNativePG. Previously on Talking Postgres: Talking Postgres Ep 38: How I went from Oracle to Postgres (with a big NoSQL detour) with Gwen Shapira Links mentioned in this episode: Seattle Postgres User Group: Meetup page Seattle Postgres User Group: YouTube channel User Group Map from PGConfEU 2025 talk: 48 Postgres User Groups during PG18 timeframe PostgreSQL.org: Listing of local Postgres User Groups Postgres Meetup For All (a virtual meetup): Meetup page Jeremy Schneider’s Blog: Ardent Performance Computing Poster: Postgres Happiness Hints PGConf.dev 2026: Posters from Poster Session PGConf.dev 2026 Poster Session: Talking Postgres poster POSETTE: An Event for Postgres 2026: Jeremy’s POSETTE 2026 talk with Leonardo Cecchi POSETTE 2026: Livestream 3 schedule & talks Oracle docs: Oracle Database Concepts PDF Book: Oracle Insights: Tales of the Oak Table

May 8, 2026Episode 391 hr 29 min

From MemSQL to HorizonDB, an engineer's journey with Adam Prout

What does it take to make Postgres and Azure fit together cleanly, like puzzle pieces? In Episode 39 of Talking Postgres, Adam Prout —distinguished engineer at Microsoft and a founding architect of Azure HorizonDB—joins Claire to trace his engineering journey from MemSQL to Postgres. We dig into shared-storage architecture and how HorizonDB pushes more work into the storage layer; why the team chose Rust; and what “good systems programming” looks like when being paranoid is a feature, not a bug. Along the way: startup vs big company tradeoffs, and how working on databases exposes you to so many interesting parts of computer science. Previously on Talking Postgres: Talking Postgres Ep29: How I got started leading database teams with Shireesh Thota Links mentioned in this episode: Blog post: Announcing Azure HorizonDB , by Charles Feddersen & Affan Dar CMUDB talk: HorizonDB: Co-Designing Postgres and Azure for Cloud-Native OLTP , by Adam Prout Research paper: Socrates: The New SQL Server in the Cloud Product page: Azure HorizonDB Video of POSETTE 2025 talk: Scaling Postgres to the next level at OpenAI Blog post: Scaling PostgreSQL to power 800 million ChatGPT users , by Bohan Zhang Blog post: Supporting ChatGPT on PostgreSQL in Azure , by Affan Dar, Adam Prout, & Panagiotis Antonopoulos Docs: Azure Database for PostgreSQL GitHub repo: pgrx Discord: PostgreSQL Hacking server Conference: PGConf.dev 2026 Conference Schedule: PGConf.dev 2026 Schedule

April 10, 2026Episode 381 hr 6 min

How I went from Oracle to Postgres (with a big NoSQL detour) with Gwen Shapira

It’s rare for developers to genuinely love their database, so why does Postgres earn that kind of loyalty? In Episode 38 of Talking Postgres, Gwen Shapira , co‑founder of Nile, joins Claire to trace her path from operating Oracle at scale, through a long NoSQL chapter, to co‑founding a Postgres company that wasn’t originally meant to be one—after discovering how much Postgres quietly gets right. Gwen shares how she spun up on Postgres after years with other databases (shout-out to the Happiness Hints and a strong sense of curiosity), and why Postgres has made her appreciate Codd. We also touch on blogging as a career catalyst, the upcoming PGConf.dev conference (where a lot of PG20 work gets discussed, and where we’ll celebrate 30 years of Postgres)—and the #1 rule of consulting: it’s always the consultant’s fault. Previously on Talking Postgres: Talking Postgres Ep15: My Journey to Explaining Explain with Michael Christofides Talking Postgres Ep24: Why mentor Postgres developers with Robert Haas Talking Postgres Ep30: AI for data engineers with Simon Willison Links mentioned in this episode: Gwen’s company: Nile Ardent Performance Computing blog: PostgreSQL Happiness Hints Book: Just Use Postgres! by Denis Magda GitHub repo: HypoPG Wikipedia page: Codd’s 12 rules Blog post: Transaction Isolation in Postgres , by Gwen Shapira Podcast: Postgres.FM Discord server: PostgreSQL Hacking Upcoming conferences & talks mentioned : Conference: PGConf.dev 2026 on May 19-22 in Vancouver Canada Conference Schedule: PGConf.dev 2026 schedule CFP deadline: PGConf.dev Community Discussion Sessions deadline on 14 Apr 2026 Conference: PGConf EU 2026 in Valencia Spain LinkedIn post: PGConf.dev 2026 conference t-shirt , celebrating 30 years of Postgres POSETTE 2026 talk: The Rise of PostgreSQL as the Everything Database , by Varun Dhawan PGConf.dev 2026 Panel: Real-Time Patch Idea Evaluation PGConf.dev 2026 Roundtable: Unexpected Successes & Epic Failures by PostgreSQL committers Calendar invite: LIVE recording of Ep39 of Talking Postgres to happen on Wed May 06, 2026

March 20, 2026Episode 371 hr 9 min

Building Postgres services on Azure with Charles Feddersen

Why does SQL feel so approachable to some developers, and why do some of them end up spending their careers in the data layer? In Episode 37 of Talking Postgres, Charles Feddersen , who leads product for Postgres at Microsoft, joins Claire to talk about building Postgres services on Azure. We explore his path from classic ASP apps on Microsoft Access to distributed Postgres with Citus, the moment he installed pgAdmin and got pulled deeper into Postgres, and what it takes to build for the many different ways people rely on Postgres today—from Flexible Server and Azure HorizonDB to developer tooling—and why it’s important to support the upstream Postgres open source project. Previously on Talking Postgres: Ep 22: Leading engineering for Postgres on Azure with Affan Dar: https://talkingpostgres.com/episodes/leading-engineering-for-postgres-on-azure-with-affan-dar Ep29: How I got started leading database teams with Shireesh Thota https://talkingpostgres.com/episodes/how-i-got-started-leading-database-teams-with-shireesh-thota Links mentioned in this episode: Video of CMUDB talk: HorizonDB: Co‑Designing PostgreSQL and Azure for Cloud‑Native OLTP , by Adam Prout Video of talk: Azure HorizonDB: Deep Dive into a New Enterprise-Scale PostgreSQL , by Adam Prout & Denzil Ribeiro Talk at SCALE 23x: Did VS Code Quietly Become a Go-To Postgres Tool? , by Phil Vacca Visual Studio Code Marketplace: VS Code extension for PostgreSQL Docs: Azure Database for PostgreSQL – Flexible Server GitHub repo: Citus open source Postgres extension: PostGIS Conference: PGConf India 2026 Upcoming conferences & talks mentioned : Conference: PGConf.dev 2026 in Vancouver Canada Conference: Microsoft Build 2026 Keynote at POSETTE: An Event for Postgres 2026: Driving Postgres forward at Microsoft POSETTE: An Event for Postgres 2026: Schedule Conference: Postgres Summit US 2026 (formerly PGConf NYC) Conference: PGConf EU 2026 in Valencia Calendar invite: LIVE recording of Ep38 of Talking Postgres to happen on Wed Apr 08, 2026

February 20, 2026Episode 361 hr 25 min

Why it's fun to hack on Postgres performance with Tomas Vondra

Why would anyone willingly spend weeks chasing a slow query, knowing they might hit dead ends along the way? In Episode 36 of Talking Postgres, Tomas Vondra —Postgres committer and long‑time performance contributor—joins Claire to explain why hacking on Postgres performance is not just hard, but also fun. We dig into the process of investigating why queries are slow, how iteration and “wrong turns” are part of performance work, and why Tomas prefers meaningful performance puzzles over toy problems. Along the way, we talk about using benchmarks to build an understanding of a problem. Tomas also shares how even small changes in code can have outsized impact when that code is used a lot, and how the mathematics embedded in the Postgres query planner/executor makes the work especially rewarding. Previously on Talking Postgres: Talking Postgres Ep31: What went wrong (& what went right) with AIO with Andres Freund Talking Postgres Ep24: Why mentor Postgres developers with Robert Haas Links mentioned in this episode: PGConf.dev 2026: Schedule GitHub repo: PostgreSQL Monthly Hacking Workshop , organized by Robert Haas Nordic PGDay 2026: Tomas talk on approximating percentiles Video of POSETTE 2025 talk: Performance Archaeology – 20 years of improvements Video of PGConf EU 2025 talk: Fast-path locking improvements in PG18 Conference: Prague PostgreSQL Developer Day Discord: PostgreSQL Hacking Discord GitHub repo: tvondra/tdigest Brendan Gregg’s site: perf Linux profiler examples Docs: pgbench for running benchmarks on PostgreSQL Blog: Tomas Vondra blog Postgres Patch Ideas: List on Tomas Vondra blog Calendar invite: LIVE recording of Ep37 of Talking Postgres to happen on Wed Mar 18, 2026

January 16, 2026Episode 351 hr 10 min

How I got started with DBtune (& why we chose Postgres) with Luigi Nardi

Are self-driving databases the Waymos of the future? In Episode 35 of Talking Postgres, Luigi Nardi —founder and CEO of DBtune and Stanford researcher—joins Claire Giordano to explore his journey from academic research to Level 5 autonomous database tuning. We dig into Luigi’s early days with a Commodore 64, how he began his PhD in Paris before he had learned to speak French, and how "professor privilege" in Sweden helped him bootstrap his startup. You’ll learn why the DBtune team chose database tuning and Postgres as their focus, what the Jevons paradox means for the future of developers, and how the “Level 5” vision fuels the DBtune team’s work toward a truly self-driving system. Previously on Talking Postgres: Talking Postgres Ep30: AI for data engineers with Simon Willison Talking Postgres Ep23: How I got started as a developer & in Postgres with Daniel Gustafsson Links mentioned in this episode: CFP: POSETTE: An Event for Postgres 2026’s CFP closes on Sun Feb 1, 2026 @ 11:59pm PST Video of POSETTE 2024 talk: Autotuning PostgreSQL on Azure Flexible Server, by Luigi Nardi Video of PGConf India 2025 talk: ML for Systems and Systems for ML, by Luigi Nardi PGConf India 2025: Round Table Discussion about AI Oxide and Friends podcast: Engineering Rigor in the LLM Age Wikipedia: Jevons paradox Wikipedia: Neuro-symbolic AI Conference: PGDay Lowlands (Boriss Mejías calls it the second-best Postgres conference in Europe) Calendar invite: LIVE recording of Ep36 of Talking Postgres to happen on Wed Feb 18, 2026

December 12, 2025Episode 341 hr 16 min

What Postgres developers can expect from PGConf.dev with Melanie Plageman

What do conference planning, hacking weddings, and cat-free coding sessions have to do with Postgres? In Episode 34 of Talking Postgres, Melanie Plageman —Postgres committer and major contributor from Microsoft—joins Claire for a lively deep dive into what developers can expect at PGConf.dev 2026 as Postgres turns 30. We explore new content formats, the role of travel grants, why Tuesday becomes a full conference day, and how the hallway track often shapes the next Postgres release. Plus: creating space for new contributors to get inspired and get involved. And yes—the CFP is open until Jan 16, 2026. Links mentioned in this episode: Podcast: Becoming a Postgres committer with Melanie Plageman Podcast: How I got started as a dev and in Postgres with Melanie Plageman & Thomas Munro Conference: PGConf.dev 2026 CFP for PGConf.dev: CFP will close on Jan 16, 2026 PGConf.dev 2026: About PGConf.dev 2026: Sponsorship levels PGConf.dev 2026: Travel grant program Social: LinkedIn account for PGConf.dev POSETTE: An Event for Postgres: POSETTE CFP is open until Feb 1, 2026 Meetup: Post about inaugural PostgreSQL Nairobi Meetup in Dec 2025 PGDay Lowlands 2025: Debate on Kubernetes, session details PGDay Lowlands 2025: Debate about autotuning, session details Conference talk at PGCon 2019: Intro to Postgres Planner Hacking , by Melanie Plageman Blog post: The Pac-Man Rule at Conferences , by Eric Holsher Discord invite for PostgreSQL Hacking Mentoring server: https://discord.gg/bx2G9KWyrY Cal invite: LIVE recording of Ep35 of Talking Postgres to happen on Wed Jan 14, 2026

November 7, 2025Episode 331 hr 18 min

Building a dev experience for Postgres in VS Code with Rob Emanuele

What do guitar busking, geospatial queries, and agentic coding have to do with Postgres? In Episode 33 of Talking Postgres, principal engineer Rob Emanuele at Microsoft shares his winding path from Venice Beach to building a new VS Code extension for PostgreSQL—that works with any Postgres, anywhere. We dig into GitHub Copilot, ask vs. agent mode, and how Rob now codes in English—and then spends even more time in code review to decide what’s good, what’s bad, and what’s dangerous. Also: how PyCon changed his life; his work on the Microsoft Planetary Computer with spatio-temporal queries and PostGIS; and how music, improv, and failure shape his approach to developer experience. Links mentioned in this episode: Visual Studio Marketplace: VS Code extension for PostgreSQL with ~261K downloads to date GitHub repo: VS Code extension for PostgreSQL (for issues/discussions) Docs: GitHub Copilot agent mode POSETTE 2025 Talk: Introducing Microsoft’s VS Code Extension for PostgreSQL , by Matt McFarland VS Code Live: Working with PostgreSQL databases with the Microsoft PostgreSQL VS Code extension , with Olivia Guzzardo & Rob Emanuele Talking Postgres Ep30: AI for data engineers with Simon Willison Postgres Meetup for All: VS Code Tools for Postgres , happening on Thu Dec 11, 2025 Wikipedia: Dogfooding Talking Postgres Ep07: Why people care about PostGIS and Postgres with Paul Ramsey & Regina Obe POSETTE 2024 keynote: The Open Source Geospatial Community, PostGIS, & Postgres , by Regina Obe Website: Microsoft Planetary Computer GitHub repo: PgSTAC Cal invite: LIVE recording of Ep34 of Talking Postgres to happen on Wed Dec 10, 2025