The PostgreSQL Buildfarm is a global network of machines that continuously test PostgreSQL across a wide range of operating systems, architectures, compilers, and branches. Over the past few years, I have created and maintained several buildfarm members, each with its own quirks and strengths. In this post, I’ll share a status-update working on the following animals: alligator, dodo, woodpecker, leafhopper, massasauga, parula, and snakefly.
What is the Buildfarm?
The Buildfarm is essential for PostgreSQL development. It helps catch platform-specific bugs early, ensures code
quality, and provides confidence that new changes work everywhere. Each member reports results for multiple branches
(like master, REL_18_STABLE, etc.), using different OSes, compilers, and hardware.
About the Architectures
The Open Hardware Frontier: RISC-V
RISC-V is an open standard instruction set architecture (ISA) and unlike most other ISAs, RISC-V is provided under open source licenses that do not require fees to use.
- ovenbird is my first foray into this architecture, running on a VisionFive 2 board.
- It (hopefully) represents the future of open hardware, and ensuring PostgreSQL compiles and runs correctly on it is a long-term investment in the open-source ecosystem.
Bridging Windows and Linux: WSL2
Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL) lets developers run a GNU/Linux environment -- including most command-line tools, utilities, and applications -- directly on Windows, unmodified, without the overhead of a traditional virtual machine or dualboot setup.
- woodpecker runs inside a Debian container on WSL2.
- This setup is crucial for verifying that PostgreSQL behaves correctly in this increasingly popular development environment, which bridges the gap between Windows and Linux.
Small Scale, Big Impact: Raspberry Pi
Raspberry Pi revolutionized low-cost computing and is a fantastic platform for edge cases (pun intended) :)
- dodo runs on a Raspberry Pi 4 Model B.
- It helps identify performance regressions and race conditions that might be masked by faster hardware. It also ensures PostgreSQL remains viable for low-powered, IoT and edge computing use cases.
The Rise of ARM in the Cloud: Graviton
Several of the buildfarm animals I’ve created run on the Graviton processors. Graviton is Amazon’s custom ARM-based CPU family, designed for high performance and energy efficiency in AWS cloud environments.
- Graviton1 (first generation) was introduced in 2018, bringing ARM64 to AWS EC2.
- Graviton2 (second generation) launched in 2020, offering major improvements in performance and scalability.
- Graviton3 (third generation) arrived in 2022, further boosting compute, memory bandwidth, and energy efficiency—making it ideal for demanding workloads like database regression testing.
- Graviton4 (fourth generation) is the latest, offering even greater performance and efficiency for cloud-native workloads. The buildfarm animal 'leafhopper' is one of the first to test PostgreSQL on Graviton4.
Testing PostgreSQL on these platforms helps ensure the database runs smoothly on modern cloud hardware and takes advantage of ARM’s growing ecosystem.
Disclosure: The Graviton machines are provided by my employer. All other machines (including the WSL2, RISC-V, and Raspberry Pi instances) are my personal machines.
Meet the Buildfarm Animals
Here’s a quick overview of the machines I have created and recently worked on:
alligator
- OS: Ubuntu 24.04 LTS
- Arch: x86_64
- Compiler: gcc experimental (nightly build)
- Branches: master, REL_18_STABLE, REL_17_STABLE, REL_16_STABLE, REL_15_STABLE, REL_14_STABLE, REL_13_STABLE
- Notes: Tracks the latest GCC changes, often finds compiler regressions before anyone else.
dodo
- OS: Raspbian GNU/Linux 10
- Arch: armv7l
- Compiler: gcc experimental (nightly build)
- Branches: master, REL_18_STABLE, REL_17_STABLE, REL_16_STABLE, REL_15_STABLE, REL_14_STABLE, REL_13_STABLE
- Notes: ARM platform, useful for catching issues on lower-powered hardware.
woodpecker
- OS: Debian/WSL2@win11 12 (bookworm)
- Arch: x86_64
- Compiler: gcc 12.2.0
- Branches: master, REL_18_STABLE, REL_17_STABLE, REL_16_STABLE, REL_15_STABLE, REL_14_STABLE, REL_13_STABLE
- Notes: Runs inside WSL2 on Windows 11, great for testing integration with Windows environments.
leafhopper
- OS: Amazon Linux 2023
- Arch: aarch64/graviton4/r8g.2xl
- Compiler: gcc experimental (hourly build)
- Branches: master, REL_18_STABLE, REL_17_STABLE, REL_16_STABLE, REL_15_STABLE, REL_14_STABLE, REL_13_STABLE
- Notes: Created and managed in a work-based environment; leafhopper is one of the first buildfarm animals testing PostgreSQL on Graviton4 hardware.
massasauga
- OS: Amazon Linux 2
- Arch: aarch64 (Graviton1)
- Compiler: gcc experimental (nightly build)
- Branches: master, REL_18_STABLE, REL_17_STABLE, REL_16_STABLE, REL_15_STABLE, REL_14_STABLE, REL_13_STABLE
- Notes: Created and managed in a work-based environment; Graviton1 machine—one of the earliest ARM64 regression testers in the buildfarm, still running reliably after several years.
parula
- OS: Amazon Linux 2 (AL2) / Graviton3
- Arch: aarch64/Graviton3/c7g.2xl
- Compiler: gcc experimental (nightly build)
- Branches: master, REL_18_STABLE, REL_17_STABLE, REL_16_STABLE, REL_15_STABLE, REL_14_STABLE, REL_13_STABLE
- Notes: Created and managed in a work-based environment; focuses on the third generation of AWS Graviton hardware, useful for performance and compatibility.
snakefly
- OS: AmazonLinux@Graviton2 AL2
- Arch: aarch64 (Graviton2)
- Compiler: gcc experimental (nightly build)
- Branches: master, REL_18_STABLE, REL_17_STABLE, REL_16_STABLE, REL_15_STABLE, REL_14_STABLE, REL_13_STABLE
- Notes: Created and managed in a work-based environment; Graviton2-based member, helps ensure ARM64 stability across AWS generations.
ovenbird (newest member)
- OS: Ubuntu 24.04.3 LTS
- Arch: riscv64
- Compiler: gcc 13.3.0
- Branches: master, REL_18_STABLE, REL_17_STABLE, REL_16_STABLE, REL_15_STABLE, REL_14_STABLE, REL_13_STABLE
- Notes: The newest addition to the family, ovenbird brings riscv64 architecture to the buildfarm, helping ensure PostgreSQL is tested on cutting-edge open hardware.
Challenges and Rewards
Managing these buildfarm animals means keeping up with OS upgrades, compiler changes, hardware failures, and PostgreSQL branch updates. Some of these machines are especially aggressive about GCC: they check for updates from the GCC git repository every few hours, recompile a fresh GCC, and use it for the next buildfarm run. This helps catch compiler regressions and compatibility issues very early.
If you want to read more about how these GCC compiles work and see the open source repository, check out my blog post: Compiling Latest GCC to Test More.
Some of these machines have been running for 3-4 years, and their logs are a treasure trove for debugging tricky platform-specific issues. The diversity of hardware and software helps the PostgreSQL community maintain its reputation for reliability and portability.
Testing with the latest GCC is especially rewarding: it ensures that upstream GCC changes are in tandem with the expectations of the PostgreSQL community, and that PostgreSQL continues to compile and pass tests without surprises. A good example is an upstream GCC bug that was found, reported, and fixed—making sure that no GCC changes adversely affect PostgreSQL in the long run. Read more about this incident here: PostgreSQL mailing list discussion of a GCC bug.
Here's another email thread that exemplifies why testing gcc experimental is helpful in ensuring that PostgreSQL compiles and tests stay green: PostgreSQL mailing list - GCC experimental thread.
However, it is also important to note that aggressive testing of GCC HEAD needs to be balanced against the time of PostgreSQL developers. The current buildfarm system does not explicitly distinguish between "production" and "bleeding edge" machines, meaning failures on experimental setups can sometimes be distracting. As discussed in this mailing list thread, there is an ongoing conversation about how to best handle these "platform not believed stable" scenarios to ensure that transient failures on experimental toolchains don't unnecessarily burden the community.
Speaking of new architectures, a few months back I wrote about [Testing PostgreSQL on Debian/Hurd](https://www.thatguyfromdelhi.com/2025/08/testing-postgresql-on-debianhurd.html) and planned to add a Hurd machine to the buildfarm. It looks like I've been beaten to the punch! A new member, [fruitcrow](https://buildfarm.postgresql.org/cgi-bin/show_history.pl?nm=fruitcrow&br=master), is already up and running to test PostgreSQL on GNU/Hurd. This is fantastic news—having "competition" in adding diverse buildfarm members is exactly what we want. It shows that more people recognize that a wide array of test environments leads to a more stable PostgreSQL.
Final Thoughts
If you’re interested in contributing to PostgreSQL, running a buildfarm animal is a great way to help. It’s a hands-on way to learn about PostgreSQL internals, compilers, and operating systems, and it’s rewarding to see your machine’s name in the global test results.
