Using an externally hosted postGreSQL as a gnu cash backend?

[Wm]

[This followup was posted to gmane.comp.gnome.apps.gnucash.user and a 
copy was sent to the cited author.]

In article <CAPT=E1L944jY+CHUG8oVAUmusT-
YAArey_RfuxNHCiUd38zpSg at mail.gmail.com>, mikepwagner at mikepwagner.net 
says...
> 
> I have been using postGres for my data store for gnucash for some time now,
> and I am pretty happy with the results.

It works well as a good local or local (or similarly reliable) network 
store, it is not intended as a server - client application in the way 
people that understand grown-up databases do thinngs.  It is just a 
backend.  All the actual data is held in local memory and written out 
and in as a whole.

I repeat, postgres, mysql, sqlite, xml, it is just a store!  The fact 
that the store is a db is co-incidental.

> 
> I ave been using a postGres server running on the same box as gnucash
> ("localhost").
> 
> I have been thinking of trying use an externally hosted (ie, "Postgres as a
> service") postGres as my data store.
> 
> I am thinking of this for two reasons:
> 
>     1) Right now, I do manual backups (a postGres dump encrypted with PGP
> an copied to a local disk and to GoogleDrive). Having someone else deal
> with that would be very nice.

postgres can do that for you locally if you set it up right

>     2) It would be nice to have gnucash installed on several of my 
laptops
> and be able to get to the same data on an machine when I am traveling. I
> could do the same thing by setting up a postGres server on my home network
> and allowing external connections, doing so securely would require more
> time than I fee like allocating.

Have you thought this through?  I maintain a number of GnuCash installs 
and keeping them all in line is a bigger deal than sharing the data file 
or postgres db around, a partiular gnucash instance has other bits and 
pieces that need to travel with it too.  Have you considered those?

> It seems as though a number of sites that offer postGres hosting have 
plans
> for a small single DB for less than $10/month.
> 
> What questions do I need to ask the postGres hosting site about how to get
> this to work? If I describe gnuacash as a financial program that used
> liddbi with a postGres driver to talk to postGres, will they even know what
> I am talking about.

Probably not.  A connection is a connection as far as postgres is 
concerned.  The url is left as an exercise for the person doing it.

> [ PS I'd like to hear from folks who have some experience and want to 
help
> me move forward on this. Last year, I asked a question about postGres, and
> I got a number of "Why would anyone want to use posGres?", "gnucash doesn't
> support a postGres back end!", and "You'll need to pay an experiences
> postGres DBA $100,000 to set up a system like that", etc.

you misrepresent the conversation ... a lot

> I have a year's worth of evidence that suggests that those were more 
or
> less balderdash. :-) A somewhat wonky can in fact sit down with a couple of
> postGres books and "how to" sites on the web and install, configure and
> maintain postGres and use it as a gnucash backend.

sure, the developers made it easy to do locally

> So if you're first response to this topic is a rant against postGres 
(or a
> rant against me for using postGres), I'd like to suggest that you start a
> new thread. :-) ]

I'm not ranting against postgres, I like it.

Now, where were we?

I know what you're trying to do, but, if I were you, I wouldn't start 
from there ... which is why you were unhappy with myself and others in 
the first place.

-- 
Wm