/' post-gres-kyu-el/ An enhancemeNT of the POSTGRESdatabase system. PostgreSQL is an advanced {relational database managemeNT system} with some {object orieNTed} approaches. PostgreSQL is developed and distributed as free software, and while retaining its freedom it remains technically and featurewise a worthy competitor to even the most advanced commercial alternatives. It was also one of the first databases to offer MVCC as opposed to row-level locking or table locking, thereby greatly improving multi-user performance. PostgreSQL implemeNTs an extended subset of ANSISQL and runs on many platforms. It also has iNTerfaces to many differeNTprogramming languages and database protocols, like ODBC and JDBC. Start . (1999-09-18)