PGCon2016 - 20180510

PGCon 2016
The PostgreSQL Conference

Speakers
Lakshmi Narasimhan Parthasarathy
Schedule
Day Talks - Day 2 - 2016-05-20
Room DMS 1110
Start time 11:00
Duration 00:45
Info
ID 922
Event type Lecture
Track Applications
Language used for presentation English

Building a BaaS using PostgreSQL

From schema to REST API instantly

The typical way to design a web or mobile application is to do the data modelling, create an API around it and wrap it as backend using a web framework of choice and serve the API.

Now, what if you could get everything done in the data modelling stage itself?

There is a new paradigm of web development called "noBackend". It doesn't mean that we completely eliminate the backend from our architecture. Its just that the server side components of our infrastructure become a swappable commodity. Developers no longer need to worry about your backend details. All they need is a REST API, which you can automatically generate from your SQL schema.

In this talk, We'll show you how to build a full fledged backend for an application without leaving the confines of your PostgreSQL console (well, almost!). We shall leverage a standalone tool called Postgrest, which will instantly convert your schema into a RESTful API.

We shall briefly go over:

  • How to build a RESTful API on top of your SQL schema
  • handling authentication
  • API versioning
  • debunking some myths surrounding this
  • advantages/limitations of this approach
  • Further improvements possible or in progress
  • How you can help!

This talk will also feature a demo application built and deployed using Postgrest.

Working knowledge of PosgreSQL and an awareness about REST APIs might be required to get the most out of this talk. You can get along fine without knowing any web framework.