Entries tagged with sqlite
Migrating to SQLite
Small. Fast. Reliable. Choose any three.
I made the decision this week to migrate my personal sites and several other sites I host onto SQLite. Previously almost everything I hosted had been using Postgresql. The move was motivated by a couple factors:
- SQLite is awesome!
- Self-contained: does not require a separate server process
- Data is stored in a single file, simplifying backups
- Excellent Python (and peewee) support
- Full-text search
At times it has seemed to me that there is a tacit agreement within the Flask / Django communities that if you're using SQL you should be using Postgresql. Postgresql is an amazing piece of engineering. I have spent the last five years of my career working exclusively with it, and I am continually impressed by its performance and the constant stream of great new features.
So why change things?
Well, as my list indicates, there are a handful of reasons. But the primary reason was that I wanted something lightweight. I'm running a fairly low-traffic, read-heavy site, so Postgresql was definitely overkill. My blog is deployed on a VPS with very limited resources, so every MB of RAM counts. Additionally, I wasn't using any special Postgresql features so there was nothing holding me back.
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