Now that Amazon Web Services is supporting PostgreSQL I figured it’s about time I got around to getting it setup locally.
First step was to install PostgreSQL via MacPorts:
This file contains bidirectional Unicode text that may be interpreted or compiled differently than what appears below. To review, open the file in an editor that reveals hidden Unicode characters.
Learn more about bidirectional Unicode characters
| # install and select | |
| sudo port install postgresql93-server | |
| sudo port select –set postgresql postgresql93 | |
| # load at startup | |
| sudo port load postgresql93-server | |
| # create the default database | |
| sudo mkdir -p /opt/local/var/db/postgresql93/defaultdb | |
| sudo chown postgres:postgres /opt/local/var/db/postgresql93/defaultdb | |
| sudo su postgres -c '/opt/local/lib/postgresql93/bin/initdb -D /opt/local/var/db/postgresql93/defaultdb' | |
| # create a new user (or you can simply use the default user postgres which does not require a password) | |
| createuser –superuser your_username -U postgres -P | |
| # create a new database | |
| createdb database_name |
You should now be able to connect to your database using pgAdmin or a similar tool. If you’re having trouble, a quick reboot of your machine should get it working (assuming you set PostgreSQL to load at startup).
I also wanted to try out PostgresSQL Studio which requires Tomcat so that got installed next:
This file contains bidirectional Unicode text that may be interpreted or compiled differently than what appears below. To review, open the file in an editor that reveals hidden Unicode characters.
Learn more about bidirectional Unicode characters
| # install | |
| sudo port install tomcat6 | |
| # add -Djava.awt.headless=true to /opt/local/share/java/tomcat6/bin/tomcatctl (line 65) | |
| JAVA_OPTS="$JAVA_OPTS -Djava.util.logging.manager=org.apache.juli.ClassLoaderLogManager -Djava.awt.headless=true" | |
| # without this you’ll get this error in /opt/local/share/java/tomcat6/logs/catalina.err: | |
| # 2013-11-16 23:39:17.389 jsvc[1698:203] Apple AWT Java VM was loaded on first thread — can't start AWT. | |
| # Nov 16, 2013 11:39:17 PM org.apache.catalina.startup.Bootstrap initClassLoaders | |
| # SEVERE: Class loader creation threw exception | |
| # java.lang.InternalError: Can't start the AWT because Java was started on the first thread. Make sure StartOnFirstThread is not specified in your application's Info.plist or on the command line | |
| # load at startup | |
| sudo port load tomcat6 |
Installing Tomcat led to a momentary headache as it would not start, throwing the following error – Apple AWT Java VM was loaded on first thread — can’t start AWT. All of the OS X / MacPorts / Tomcat instructions on Google were pretty out of date so it took a bit of digging to figure out what was going on. Luckily the fix was rather simple – just edit tomcatctl with the change shown in the Gist above.
The final step was to download PostgreSQL Studio, unzip the file and drop pgstudio.war into /opt/local/share/java/tomcat6/webapps/.
After a few moments Tomcat will autodeploy the war and you’ll be able to browse the application at http://localhost:8080/pgstudio/.
Ramblings on startups, NYC, advertising and hacking (mostly Python) 
Nice simple guide, was floundering around with Macports and Postgres and this got me going. Thanks for this Chris.
Thanks for putting this together. I had some problems with bash_profile and had to delete it to allow port to work but other than that all went well. Great to see something like PostgreSQL Studio too.