[postgis-users] Where does Postgres end and PostGIS begin?

[Brent Wood]

Hi Patrick,

The native Postgres spatial data support is primitive & of little use if you actually need to manage spatial data. It is non standard, & unsupported by virtually every mapping or analytical tool that allows you to work with spatial data. For most of these tools, when they say Postgres support, they actually mean Postgis support. 


If you do have spatial data (geometries: points, lines & polygons) to manage & query, you should install & use Postgis. If you don't have spatial data, just the usual text, numbers & maybe dates & times, you just need Postgres.

Cheers,

 Brent Wood



________________________________
From: Patrick Gostovic <pg at phranq.com>
To: postgis-users at postgis.refractions.net
Sent: Sunday, July 24, 2011 2:50 AM
Subject: [postgis-users] Where does Postgres end and PostGIS begin?

Hi.

I've installed the postgresql 9.0 macports package and it seems like I have some spatial features already without explicitly installing PostGIS; I created a table with column of type POINT.  I've noticed that macports does have a postgis package.  Do I actually need it?  I guess I'm just really fuzzy as to exactly what PostGIS is relative to Postgres.

Any info would be appreciated.  Thanks!

Patrick
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