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PostgreSQL compatibility

PostgreSQL 19 is the only supported kernel and on-disk cluster major in the current release.

Preserved behavior

PostGamma reuses PostgreSQL's parser, catalogs, planner, executor, transaction manager, WAL, crash recovery, SQL type system, simple protocol, extended protocol, and logical dump/restore implementations. Behavioral gates compare ordinary PostgreSQL/libpq execution with the in-process path.

Cluster directories

A PostGamma database path is a PostgreSQL cluster directory with additional embedded ownership rules. It is not a single-file format. PostGamma does not write a signalable host PID into postmaster.pid, change the host working directory, or permit two owners to open the same directory concurrently.

Do not run pg_ctl against a live embedded cluster. Use the PostGamma API for lifecycle and management.

Major upgrades

PostgreSQL data directories are not portable across major versions. To migrate:

  1. logically dump through the old supported PostGamma build;
  2. create a fresh instance with the new PostgreSQL-major build;
  3. logically restore the archive;
  4. run application-level verification before replacing the old directory.

Upgrade-audit support in the source repository measures how much adapter and ownership policy changes for a candidate PostgreSQL revision. Passing such an audit does not advertise candidate-major product support.

During the alpha series, direct cluster compatibility between PostGamma builds is promised only when the destination release notes say so. Otherwise use the same logical dump and restore procedure even when both builds embed PostgreSQL 19. See Releases and upgrades.

Extensions

Only extensions named in the build's reviewed bundled-extension manifest are available. An ordinary binary PostgreSQL extension is not ABI-compatible merely because its SQL and C sources compile against PostgreSQL 19. See the bundled extension SDK.

The first release includes pgvector 0.8.6. See Vector search with pgvector for the installation, index, parameter, and result contracts.