Installing PostgreSQL on OS X using Fink

For a current project I am playing around with PostgreSQL.

Sidenote: I am very positively suprised about the documentation of PostgreSQL...

I chose to install PostgreSQL on my MacBook using Fink (I try to use Fink whenever possible, because I believe serious package management pays off in the long term).

However the installation did not run through as smoothly as possible...

Here are the necessary steps:

Step 0: Install Fink
Go to the Fink project and follow their installation instructions.

Step 1: Install PostgreSQL
Just type

sudo fink install postgresql82

into a terminal.

This takes a while and a lot of gibberish appears on your terminal...
In my case there was a warning at the end, telling something about not installing plpgsql. Since I am not planning to use PL/pgSQL, I just ignored that...

Step 2: Initialize the Database
According to the fink package description, this step should not be necessary. But in my case the installation process did not initialize the database, so I had to do it manually.

Type

sudo -u postgres initdb -D /sw/var/postgresql-8.2/data/

into a terminal.

Step 3: Start the dbms
Type

sudo pgsql.sh start

into a terminal.

This uses a script provided by fink. You could also start the dbms with the native command (i.e. pg_ctl, just look at the script...)

Step 4: Create a database
This is optional, you can do this also with pgAdmin (see below). But it is a good check, if the previous step worked.

Type

sudo -u postgres createdb testdb

into a terminal.

Step 5: Get pgAdmin and connect
PgAdmin is a client application to access postgres databases. You can get it here.

After starting pgAdmin you have to add the server (File->Add Server...):

To begin with connect as the user 'postgres' (which was created during the fink installation process), which has full administration privileges. Leave the password blank.

This should be it...

BTW: Fink installs the PostgreSQL documentation here:
/sw/share/doc/postgresql-8.2/html/index.html