Postico – A modern PostgreSQL client for OS X | Hacker News Reader

Postico – A modern PostgreSQL client for OS X

eggerapps.at

178 pointstortilla59 comments

I use Intellij Idea with Database plugin and it works perfectly. SQL syntax highlighting (for PostgreSQL dialect), autocomplete (using actual table definitions from the database), visual table editor. I can run SQL query, edit some cell in the result table and that edit will update the database.

There's a dedicated cheaper product called 0xDBE if you don't own Idea and don't need Java support.

Postico looks nice and I like the fact that it's a native app. But without highlighting and autocomplete it's not very interesting for me, I'm SQL guy.

Likewise, I'm somewhat excited by what 0xDBE, the upcoming database "IDE" for DBAs and devs, from JetBrains...

I'm perfectly fine with pgAdmin. It's not pretty, but it does everything I need. And it's free and cross-platform.

I've solely used the command line client for the last few years. I stopped using pgAdmin because it did not gracefully handle flakey network connections (i.e. vpn restarts). Has this improved recently?

This has not improved. However, instead of using screen in a terminal to do a long create table query, I'll now just kick it off in pgAdmin and yank my ethernet. This causes the query to just hang out there indefinitely until it's done. Stupid, yes. But it's kinda fun.

I also abandoned pgAdmin because of flaky connection handling, as well as several annoying bugs on the Mac version. I was happy with psql for a while (and still sometimes use it), but IntelliJ's DB plugin is by far my favorite now. Its autocomplete is really smart, which makes a big difference in writing queries without having to constantly check various table definitions.

Yep, any varient of jetbrains with their awesome sql +++ support beats this and most others hands down. Especially if you're someone who'd actually use this for real work. Like a statistician/analyst

This is very helpful comment. Reading that this new product does not have highlight, I know that I don't need to investigate it any further for now.

For the web, TeamPostgreSQL[1] does most of these, like SQL autocomplete including schema object names, live editing query results, table editing, etc. It also has click-through foreign key references, look up rows that reference this one, and other smart features.

[1a] http://www.teampostgresql.com

[1b] http://teampostgresql.herokuapp.com/ (demo)

Yep, started using it recently. Stupid name, great product. Way better than I expected

I was using the database navigator plugin for a while for webstorm. It worked okay.

http://plugins.jetbrains.com/category/index?pr=webStorm&cate...

So far so good on 0xDBE. I was happy to see this come out.

https://www.jetbrains.com/dbe/eap/

I recently discovered pgcli, it is pretty slick

I use the PyCharm plugin. It doesn't look like much to start with but now i've used it a bit it's actually one of the best DB clients i've ever used, especially for editing SQL queries thanks to great sytnax highlighting and completions.

Could be promising but falls short for my use cases, which mainly consists of running ad hoc queries. I don't like Squirrel, but here are a few things squirrel does that are nice that I wish this did:

1. Auto limit

2. Syntax highlighting

3. Multiple queries can be written in the editor; spaces separate them. This seems to run the first query in the editor afaict.

4. Key bindings (I discovered that cmd-enter appears to run the query, but I didn't see these documented anywhere nor are the configurable.)

Also, stylistically it's a little spare. Alternating textures per row might be nice.

I do like the live table editing and the quick auto-querying of tables (though, there are cases where I might not like that.) Another thing I like is the query history -- one thing that would be nice would be to highlight those queries that failed due to syntax errors in red or something, to help you read the list, but even more importantly, a search feature (like Sublime's cmd-P).

1. I don't really want to modify the SQL the user types in the query

2. Syntax highlighting is hard to get right, but I'll add it eventually.

3. Postico by default runs all the queries, you can use the popup menu at the bottom to toggle between results. Select some text (even discontinuous selection using ⌘) and only the selected part is executed.

4. Key bindings are shown as tooltips (hover over buttons for a few seconds), and you can find more keybindings by looking throught the menus.

5. The history search totally makes sense and I just haven't gotten around to implement it yet.

An alternative to syntax highlighting might be query structuring/beautifying (on command, not by default).

And +1 from me for search history. Thanks for building these apps. Sequel Pro nails it for MySQL, but up until lately there seemed to be a void on the PG side. I've been using PG Commander for about 5 months and am excited I can use my license on Postico. So far the app works as I expect it to, and looks fantastic.

Can you say more about using your PG Commander license? I have one too but don't understand the connection with Postico.

edit: I figured it out. Sorry for the noise.

Casting another vote for 2 and 5. Thanks for all your hard work!

I've been wanting a better Postgres client. Pgadmin works but it's a bit dated. Postico looks promising. Download and setup went seamlessly and the ssh tunnel functionality worked great. This error message was shown when I connected to the database and I wasn't able to browse catalogs, etc.: PostgreSQL said: syntax error at or near "num_total_pages" To be fair, the Postgres server I was connecting to is old and obsolete (8.3.7). I'll look forward to trying this more!

I think I found the problem. Had a query missing "AS" for a column alias. Could you try if this build works? https://s3-eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/eggerapps.at/postico/post...

Yes, that's awesome! Thank you.

Check out Datazenit[0]

[0] https://datazenit.com/

For the same price, you can get Navicat Essentials, which has syntax highlighting, import/export, and more. If you want to spend $160, you get the version that can talk to MySQL, SQL Server, SQLite, and more.

I'm a single dev; I can't compete with Navicat on features. But I can try to make an app that does a limited set of things really well.

For example, I'm really proud of the table view in Postico. It's really easy to filter rows by keywords. You can edit multiple rows at once in the sidebar. You can rearrange columns, filters and sort order are remembered automatically...

If you have a workflow where you don't often use the table view, you might not get a lot of value out of Postico. But fortunately there are a few people out there who do like the stuff Postico does!

I see what you're saying about the table filtering! Very slick. Dragging columns around feels very fluid. Great work, I think I might have to go ahead and purchase this one!

That was the main sell for me. Purchased!

I've been using Navicat Essentials for years and I still get frustrated with it on a regular basis. Only after bdcravens' comment did I find the section of the UI that allows syntax highlighting. Years ago, when I first tried, Navicat failed to import a standard pg_dump file so I've given up on it for import/export. Which is fine, I prefer the command line most of the time for things like that anyway.

I gave PGAdmin a shot, but it does not support left-right scrolling from a Magic Mouse. Getting to table views is cumbersome, 5-6 whole clicks. On the up side it does visualize explain queries really well. But 99% of the time I just want to browse some data to see what data is there.

I've spent 3-4 hours using Postico today and really like it. I can see it being really useful in my normal workflow. I can move data from the command line, browse tables and make quick updates in Postico and if I really need to dig into a query use PGAdmin. Syntax highlight would be nice, but I've been without it for so long (due to my own inability to find a button in Navicat) that it's a nice to have at this point.

Keep up the great work! I do hope there is a way to transfer my license over to the AppStore version when it comes along.

Agreed. I was really hesitant to buy Navicat Essentials when pgAdmin is available and free. But once I tried the trial I was converted - and it's only $10. It's well worth that for the increase in my productivity.

How would you compare it to http://www.psequel.com?

It's pretty similar.

Psequel doesn't currently offer anything for schema editing, so you have to write your own queries for ALTER, CREATE INDEX, etc.

PSequel also doesn't show you the execution time of a query, which seems minor, and yes I know you can use EXPLAIN ANALYZE, but it bugs me pretty much every time I use it.

Neither one provides any way to add, view, or remove indexes

It's hard to call something "modern" if it doesn't even do syntax highlighting. But I applaud the fact that it handles multiple query results.

I was underwhelmed by Postico when I tried it. On the other hand, I've been underwhelmed by pretty much every one of these tools over the past few years.

Some minor complaints about Postico:

1) Most of the time I am not changing ddl. Postico over emphasizes the infrequent tasks and under emphasizes the things I do every day.

2) Everything I do should be automatically logged, and not something that I have to explicitly save.

3) Syntax highlighting would be nice. It has been around in other SQL tools for many years. Why would a new tool not include it?

4) It is a common task for me to compare the schema and data between two databases. This tool didn't seem to make that any easier.

5) I also will log in with various identities and different times. After you have a dozen or so databases and two or three users on each - this did not strike me as a tool that would let me organize them very well.

6) It still doesn't see Foreign tables. None of the tools I've tried allow for visual interaction with foreign tables. A new tool should definitely include support for it.

7) In spite of its emphasis on table structure, it doesn't seem to show indexes, comments, size, dependencies, ownership, and other details that are on the table besides just the columns. (that I could find)

Without having the time to write my own, I'm sticking with the legacy and really feeling old, SQLExplorer (based on Eclipse). It gives me most of the features I need (and for multiple data sources, not just PG). I would love to find something more modern and better, so I'll keep looking...

Is this a PG Commander fork? The UI is nearly identical: http://i.imgur.com/QHeo54Z.png

sort of. It's not a fork, it's just the next version of PG Commander (by the same author)

This has a pretty nice look and feel to it, but I've yet to find something that competes with DBVisualizer (http://www.dbvis.com/). Connect to anything with a JDBC driver, auto-completion, SQL history, auto-generate insert statements using a table's data, etc. Great product.

I'm running PG Commander and it's great. Extra praise must be given to Jakob for the excellent support he provides. I will definitely upgrade to Portico.

Same here. Great product.

I am not trolling, but what's the problem with psql? I didn't get the point of a GUI, it cannot help you write SQL anyway.

In 15 years of database centric roles, it's certainly the most beautiful SQL client I have used, so bravo for that. (Currently in Sybase hell, so switching to playing with this when I get home is a real joy.) I don't use Postgres outside of that of a hobbyist, but I'll be certainly trying it out where I can. Thanks!

What's wrong with Sybase? Quite a powerful database.

Is there a way to get rid of the blank space between rows in the structure view? Besides being a poor use of space, it has twice as many horizontal lines as necessary: visual clutter. The content view with single thin separating lines is much preferred.

You can type column comments in the blank space.

I'll be recommending this to my coworkers as an alternative to Navicat for PostgreSQL. The time limit on the trial version of Navicat makes it hard to recommend to contractors and designers who think the price is too high for commercial use.

I picked up Navicat Essentials for PostgreSQL in the Mac App Store for something like $14 when it was on sale. It's more than enough for my needs when I want to visually view my data.

BTW, Postico is a successor to PG Commander

http://eggerapps.at/

I got Navicat Premium Essentials for $20 back in December 2013. Just checked and it's now $160!

Been using this app for months and love it. Really nice to have a native GUI for Postgres.

This is the missing piece in my dev environment. Thanks for a great app!

I might be a bit overkill because it has the modeling tools as well, but I really like pgModeler: http://pgmodeler.com.br/

I also recommend Induction (https://github.com/Induction/Induction).

This project seems pretty much dead.

Last meaningful commit on Induction was 2 years ago. It's probably a dead project.

Last time I tried to get Induction working, it refused to load any of my databases :/

Looks interesting but more like those light-weight SQLite clients (SQLiteman etc.); pgAdmin seems to work mostly alright for me.

I've been looking for a more straightforward PostgreSQL client since... forever. This looks great. Keep up the good work!

What's the change over the previous PGCommander? Why the new app rather than new version?

It's fast. Seems great for quick tasks, which is most of the time for me.

Nice! Finally a good client

Can I interest you in developing this for MongoDB?

Can I interest you in using PostgreSQL? jsonb got you covered by your mongo needs.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com