Database Linting and Analysis for PostgreSQL(pglinter.readthedocs.io)
107 pointsby fljdin5 days ago13 comments
  • sherinjosephroy5 minutes ago
    Wow, a native PostgreSQL linter that runs as a real extension! That's a fantastic idea.

    Using Rust and pgrx seems like the perfect way to make this both fast and safe. It's exactly the kind of tool that's missing for developers who want to catch database performance and schema issues before they hit production.

    I'm definitely going to be checking this out for my own projects. The focus on CI integration is a huge win.

  • gurjeet15 hours ago
    Why does it have to be an extension? At a cursory glance I did not see any checks that cannot be performed by a client/application that connects to the database. Being an extension gives it privileges that wouldn't be available to a client application.
    • traceroute6610 hours ago
      > Why does it have to be an extension?

      Same sentiment here.

      Its 2025, the necessity of the principle of least privilege is greater than ever.

      I'm not installing random third-party postgres extensions. Even in dev environments. Sorry.

      • oefrha4 hours ago
        I run plpgsql_check extension (packaged by Debian) in a test-only container, which only live for the duration of automated tests. It’s alright.
    • plateboxbag7 hours ago
      Fair point, but can't it just be run in a container that has the schema applied? Can just run locally/in ci?
    • gazpacho10 hours ago
      Came here to say just this. I want this so bad! But I can’t run it on a cloud hosted Postgres…
  • phartenfeller10 hours ago
    We are also working on a database linter. Currently focusing on Oracle but we will support Postgres soon too.

    Rules can either run queries against the DB (e. g. foreign key without index) or use our parser to check code SQL, PL/SQL, and pgSQL soon (naming standards, security and performance issues, etc.). We currently have over 280 rules [1]. The tool runs as a lange server during development or as a CLI so you can use it in your automations. Its more enterprise focused, an admin can create configurations that get applied to all developmers.

    [1]: https://dblinter-rules.united-codes.com/all-rules/

  • thewisenerd11 hours ago
    mirroring all the comments about this _needing_ to be an extension..

    in theory, one should be able to extract the "rule" definitions [1] and have it run with a conn str; instead of this _needing_ to be an extension.

    in practice though, query plan analysis and missing indexes is a bigger use-case; since it's bad queries that take down the db.. and i see no rules here to help with that.

    [1] https://github.com/pmpetit/pglinter/blob/9a0c427fac14840a7d6...

  • davedx9 hours ago
    It’s a good idea, but this kind of thing is my problem with linters: “B006: Tables with uppercase names/columns”

    They usually end up expanding in scope into places they shouldn’t be. Consider also react linters, full of rules that shouldn’t always be blanket applied or create tons of pointless busywork.

    My ORM will decide the naming of my database tables, thank you very much. It’s much more qualified than a linter, which should stay in its lane.

    • evanelias28 minutes ago
      Generally speaking, table name capitalization linters are actually very useful for portability reasons.

      The exact rules for identifier case sensitivity vary across different DBMS, for example in Postgres it depends on whether quotes are used: https://www.postgresql.org/docs/current/sql-syntax-lexical.h...

      Meanwhile for MySQL/MariaDB it depends on whether the underlying OS/filesystem is case-sensitive or not: https://www.skeema.io/blog/2022/06/07/lower-case-table-names...

      And plenty of similarly weird behavior on other DBMS.

      ORMs tend to be generic / multi-DBMS, and you shouldn't always assume your ORM's behavior is more qualified than a DBMS-specific linter.

    • miniwark9 hours ago
      It look like easy to disable a rule : `SELECT pglinter.disable_rule('B006');`.

      That said, i agree with you than some of the default rules may be bad. For example : B001 & T001 recommend primary keys, but it will effectively kill a TimescaleDB hypertable (primary keys are not recommended).

  • clintonb17 hours ago
    Seems nice. It would be better if it could be run as a script or agent, instead of a plugin, so it could work against hosted installations on AWS or Google Cloud (both of which limit extensions).
    • bigiain16 hours ago
      While that'd be nice, I ended up deciding I probably didn't want something like this installed on my prod RDS Postgres, but instead I can easily run it on local dev/staging Postgres instances, and ensure I'm testing the prod config without having to run pg extensions on the prod instances. It looks like running this on a database dump from prod will be able to run all the tests except the Cluster Rules - which feels like a good tradeoff for me.
  • mannyv11 hours ago
    I expect that the thing that makes it an extension is "T005: Tables with potential missing indexes (high sequential scan usage)." Can you get that data on the outside?
    • wiredfool9 hours ago
      The pg_stat_io tables have a bunch of data that will tell you about index and table usage.
  • SteveLauC12 hours ago
    Interesting project. Has anyone tried adopting something like this in their database cluster? I would like to know how it performs in practice. Is it useful?
  • landsman8 hours ago
    Checks for DB migrations in GitHub Pull Request would be really nice!
  • fljdin5 days ago
    pglinter is a PostgreSQL extension that analyzes your database for potential issues, performance problems, and best practice violations. Written in Rust using pgrx, it provides deep integration with PostgreSQL for efficient database analysis.
  • ddxv15 hours ago
    Will this support Postgres18 soon? I see the docs say it currently supports Postgres18 beta 2, so possibly just the docs need to be bumped?
  • neves14 hours ago
    Looks nice. Do you know any similar tools that work for other databases?
    • evanelias10 minutes ago
      Schema management tools often include built-in linters. I added a linter engine to my MySQL/MariaDB schema management tool Skeema back in 2019 and it proved to be a popular feature [1]. A couple more recent entrants in this space include ByteBase [2] and Atlas [3].

      When selecting a linter, I'd just recommend ensuring the author(s) are deeply experienced in your particular DBMS. Otherwise they tend to cargo-cult bad advice that is either out-of-date, or only makes sense for some other DBMS. And nowadays, AI hallucinations are another source of nonsensical linters.

      [1] https://www.skeema.io/docs/features/safety/

      [2] https://docs.bytebase.com/sql-review/review-rules

      [3] https://atlasgo.io/versioned/lint