{"id":112213,"date":"2026-07-31T11:48:05","date_gmt":"2026-07-31T11:48:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.red-gate.com\/simple-talk\/?post_type=collection&#038;p=112213"},"modified":"2026-07-31T15:05:10","modified_gmt":"2026-07-31T15:05:10","slug":"how-to-get-started-with-postgresql-a-complete-set-of-hands-on-classes","status":"publish","type":"collection","link":"https:\/\/www.red-gate.com\/simple-talk\/collections\/how-to-get-started-with-postgresql-a-complete-set-of-hands-on-classes\/","title":{"rendered":"How to get started with PostgreSQL (complete step-by-step walkthrough)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong>This is Grant Fritchey&#8217;s complete set of step-by-step walkthroughs (guides) for getting started with PostgreSQL, designed for any IT professional or hobbyist who wants to add PostgreSQL to their existing skillset.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Originally intended to be proctored classes given in a live, in-person environment, Grant has aimed to make the documentation and scripts clear enough to walk through them independently from home.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<section id=\"articles-list-block_ed1a90c71c761e51f75a9375bd174470\" class=\"articles-list my-5xl\">\n    <div class=\"grid gap-3xl\">\n                    <p>Sorry, no articles were found!<\/p>\n            <\/div>\n<\/section>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-what-do-i-need-to-follow-this-walkthrough\">What do I need to follow this walkthrough?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>You must have:<\/p>\n\n\n<div class=\"block-core-list\">\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>git<br><br><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>a local copy of this repository<br><br><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>an app that runs Docker containers<br><br><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>a general understanding of data and data platforms<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<p>Let&#8217;s talk about these requirements in a little more detail. First, download a copy of this repository to your machine (or in git terms, clone the repository). These walkthroughs assume you have the code locally. The command is:<br><code>git clone https:\/\/github.com\/ScaryDBA\/GettingStartedWithPostgreSQL.git<\/code><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Second: you must be running an operating system capable of running <a href=\"https:\/\/www.red-gate.com\/simple-talk\/devops\/containers-and-virtualization\/a-quick-guide-on-how-to-containerize-your-application-using-docker\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Docker containers<\/a>. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.redhat.com\/en\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Red Hat<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/fedoraproject.org\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Fedora<\/a> have <a href=\"https:\/\/podman.io\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Podman<\/a> built in, so there&#8217;s nothing you need to do there. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.debian.org\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Debian<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/ubuntu.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Ubuntu<\/a> or <a href=\"https:\/\/www.raspberrypi.com\/software\/operating-systems\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Raspberry Pi OS<\/a>, however, <em>will<\/em> require installation of an engine such as the aforementioned Podman or <a href=\"https:\/\/docs.docker.com\/engine\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Docker Engine<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>For Windows, you&#8217;ll need to make <a href=\"https:\/\/www.red-gate.com\/simple-talk\/databases\/oracle-databases\/virtualization\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">virtualization<\/a> possible on your system by first <a href=\"https:\/\/learn.microsoft.com\/en-us\/windows\/wsl\/install\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">installing Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL)<\/a>. Your Windows machine may also require a <a href=\"https:\/\/support.hp.com\/us-en\/document\/ish_3894564-1633733-16\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">BIOS<\/a> update to run virtualization.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>After that, you can install <a href=\"https:\/\/podman-desktop.io\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Podman Desktop<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/rancherdesktop.io\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Rancher Desktop<\/a> or <a href=\"https:\/\/www.docker.com\/products\/docker-desktop\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Docker Desktop<\/a>. For Mac, you can choose between Podman or Podman Desktop, <a href=\"https:\/\/colima.run\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Colima<\/a>, Docker Desktop for Mac, or Rancher Desktop.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>You&#8217;ll need to know how (and be able to) run a Docker container to follow these walkthroughs. Additionally, during the initial &#8220;pull&#8221; stage of the walkthrough, you&#8217;ll need internet connectivity to retrieve the PostgreSQL images from the Docker Hub.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-docker-commands-how-to-check-that-you-can-run-them\">Docker commands: how to check that you can run them<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>You can validate that you can run Docker commands by running the following:&nbsp;<code>docker info<\/code><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you&#8217;re running Podman, just substitute&nbsp;<code>podman<\/code>&nbsp;for&nbsp;<code>docker<\/code> and run all the other commands the same way. For Rancher Desktop or Colima, you can either run&nbsp;<code>docker<\/code>&nbsp;<em>or<\/em> &nbsp;<code>nerdctl<\/code>&nbsp;commands. I&#8217;ll only be providing&nbsp;<code>docker<\/code>&nbsp;commands throughout this walkthrough, however, so you&#8217;d have to change them for your own syntax.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Once that&#8217;s running successfully, you can validate internet connectivity by running the following:&nbsp;<code>docker run hello-world<\/code><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>That should pull an image and then create a container that shows &#8220;Hello from Docker!&#8221; along with some other text, suggestions and alternate commands.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>One other requirement worth mentioning is a general, functional knowledge of the operating system you&#8217;re using. It&#8217;s also going to be assumed that you have some knowledge of what a data platform is, databases, and general data management. The purpose of these walkthroughs is to introduce you to a new data platform (PostgreSQL), not teach the fundamentals of databases and data management.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>You&#8217;re still (nearly) in the right place, however, as <a href=\"https:\/\/www.red-gate.com\/simple-talk\/articles\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Simple Talk has an extensive series of guides and tutorials<\/a> for databases, data management, and much more. You can learn everything you need to know on this site.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-one-final-point-on-commands\">One final point on commands<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>The majority of commands will be run from the command line on whatever operating system and hardware you choose to use. I recommend using <a href=\"https:\/\/code.visualstudio.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Visual Studio Code (VSCode)<\/a> as it has a <a href=\"https:\/\/code.visualstudio.com\/docs\/sourcecontrol\/overview\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">very tight integration with source control<\/a>, making it easier to get the project locally. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This is Grant Fritchey&#8217;s complete set of hands-on labs for getting started with PostgreSQL &#8211; designed for any IT professional or hobbyist who wants to add PostgreSQL to their existing skillset. &hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":343608,"featured_media":0,"template":"","tags":[4168,4170,159410,158978],"coauthors":[159208],"class_list":["post-112213","collection","type-collection","status-publish","hentry","tag-database","tag-database-administration","tag-gettingstartedpostgresgrant","tag-postgresql"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.red-gate.com\/simple-talk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/collection\/112213","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.red-gate.com\/simple-talk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/collection"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.red-gate.com\/simple-talk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/collection"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.red-gate.com\/simple-talk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/343608"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.red-gate.com\/simple-talk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=112213"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.red-gate.com\/simple-talk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=112213"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.red-gate.com\/simple-talk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=112213"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}