Dirk Eddelbuettel RPostgreSQL: An R interface to the PostgreSQL database system
 

Overview

RPostgresql provides an interface between GNU R and the PostgreSQLl database. RPostgresql uses the standard DBI interface which is also used by the similar packages ROracle, RMySQL and RSQLite. Highlights include:
  • Implemented all the DBI features
  • Added support for transaction management
  • Added type mapping for dates & timestamps

RPostgresql was written by Sameer Kumar Prayaga during the summer of 2008 as part of the Google Summer of Code 2008 program. Dirk Eddelbuettel had suggested the topic, and acted as mentor and currently coordinates releases.

Current maintainer team

Sameer, the original GSoC student has vanished, but Dirk continues to maintain the code, in no small part thanks to the help of Neil Tiffin for all things OS X as well Google Code maintenance, Joe Conway for PostgreSQL issues and Jeff Horner for R, DBI and database smarts.

Availability and downloads

PostgreSQL is now released on the CRAN network in both source and as a Windows binary; see the RPostgreSQL page on CRAN for details.

The code, and additional information, are also accessible via the Google Code project page, and there are local copies of the sources.

ChangeLog

2009-10-19  Dirk Eddelbuettel  

	* DESCRIPTION: CRAN release 0.1-6

	* tests/connectWithNull.R: allow for port to be passed via an env. var.
	* tests/dataTypeTests.R: idem
	* tests/datetimeTests.R: idem
	* tests/dbExistsIssue.R: idem
	* tests/dbWriteTableTest.R: idem
	* tests/loadDriverAndConnect.R: idem
	* tests/selectWhereZero.R: idem
	* tests/selectWithAlias.R: idem

2009-10-16  Dirk Eddelbuettel  

	* R/PostgreSQL.R: Add missing paste() with thanks to João G.

2009-10-14  Dirk Eddelbuettel  

	* tests/selectWhereZero.R: Fix upper/lower case table name

2009-10-13  Dirk Eddelbuettel  

	* DESCRIPTION: CRAN release 0.1-5
	  + No new features but fixes for bugs #1, #2, #3 and #6 on the issue
	    tracker
	  + Both #4 and #5 are feature / enhancement request for which
	    patch contributions are greatly appreciated.
	  + Lastly #7 cannot be replicated.

	[ Neil Tiffin ]

	* configure.in: Added standard OS X / Fink location

	* src/RS-DBI.*: Consistent formatting via use of GNU indent
	* src/RS-PostgreSQL.*: idem
	* src/S4R.h: idem

	[ Dirk Eddelbuettel ]

	* src/RS-PostgreSQL.c: Apply fix by Joe Conway for seg.fault on
 	  alias'ed queries report as issue #1 in the issue tracker.
	* src/RS-PostgreSQL.c: Remove unused variables

	* R/PostgresSQL.R: Correction to dbExistsTable() to also recognise
	  queries of the form 'schemaname.tablename' which was reported as
	  issue #3 in the issue tracker following earlier emails by Prasenjit
	  Kapat -- thanks to Prasenjit and Joe Conway patches that I merged

	* R/PostgreSQLSupport.R: In dbConnect(), stop if any one of user,
  	  password, host, dbname, port or tty is NULL to prevent a seg.fault
	  which was reported as issue #2 on the issue tracker
	* R/PostgreSQLSupport.R: Wrap dbSendQuery() in try() to be more
	  fault-tolerant an queries with errors which was reported as
	  issue #6, thanks to Joe Conway for the suggested fix.

	* man/dbApply.Rd: Commented-out \usage thanks to new Rd parser
	* man/safe.write.Rd: Fixed cross-references thanks to R 2.10.0 parser
	* man/PostgreSQL.Rd: idem
	* man/dbReadTable-methods.Rd: idem

	* R/dbObjectId.R: Set missing SVN property Date
	* R/S4R.R: idem

	* tests/connectWithNull.*: added new test and comparison output
	* tests/dbExistsIssue.*: idem
	* tests/dbWriteTable.*: idem
	* tests/selectWhereZero.*: idem
	* tests/selectWithAlias.*: idem
	* tests/dataTypeTests.R: Remove correct temp. table

2009-01-26  Dirk Eddelbuettel  

	* DESCRIPTION: CRAN release 0.1-4

	* man/dbDataType-methods.Rd: small correction for error noticed
	  by the new R parser

2008-12-12  Dirk Eddelbuettel  

	* DESCRIPTION: CRAN release 0.1-3

	* src/RS-DBI.c: Fixed to small memory leaks, with thanks to
  	  Jeff Horner for a small patch to which we added a similar
	  fix

	* tests/*: Corrected a small typo in env.var

2008-11-02  Dirk Eddelbuettel  

	* DESCRIPTION: CRAN release 0.1-2

	* tests/*: Even more small fixes

	* configure.win: Test for $PG_HOME

2008-10-28  Dirk Eddelbuettel  

	* DESCRIPTION: CRAN release 0.1-1

	* tests/*: More cleanup on the tests

	* DESCRIPTION: URL fix

2008-10-21  Dirk Eddelbuettel  

	* tests/*: Tests are now run if and only if the environment variables
	POSTGRES_USER, POSTGRES_HOST and POSTGRES_DATABASE are set; the
	variable POSTGRES_PASSWD is also used.  This allows tests to run if
	the local admin wants them to run.
	Thanks to Uwe Ligges for the idea, and to Brian Ripley for supporting
	it. For now, CRAN won't run this though and it is effectively
	disabled in the default test during 'R CMD check' as the vars will
	presumably not be set.

	* configure{,.in}: no longer test for libpq.so as a second
	confirmation as OS X has it as libpq.dylib and would hence always
	fail. Thanks to Jan de Leeuw for the pointer.

2008-10-14  Dirk Eddelbuettel  

	* DESCRIPTION: Initial CRAN release 0.1-0

Last modified: Mon Oct 19 20:38:22 CDT 2009