From Disk to Data: Exploring PostgreSQL's Buffer Management
Presented by:
Lalit Choudhary
For over 15 years, my career has revolved around a passion for database internals and reliability, with hands-on roles spanning DBA work, QA, and testing. Through my contributions at Percona and with Oracle MySQL, I've been deeply involved in the PostgreSQL and MySQL ecosystems. This journey is driven by a mission to empower the community and help enterprises unlock the full potential of open-source database projects.
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Get a high-level Overview of why the Buffer Manager is critical for performance, acting as the gateway between disk and memory.
Explore the core Buffer Manager Structure, including the shared buffer pool and the key data structures that manage it.
Understand the role of Buffer Manager Locks in maintaining consistency in a highly concurrent multi-process architecture.
Walk through the essential algorithm of How the Buffer Manager Works to fulfill a data request, from cache hit to disk read.
Discover the specialized roles of the Ring Buffer for large sequential operations and the Local Buffer for specific internal operations.
Learn how PostgreSQL intelligently manages Flushing Dirty Pages to disk, balancing performance with data durability.
Attendees will leave with a clear mental model of how these components work together to make your database fast, efficient, and reliable.
- Date:
- Duration:
- 25 min
- Room:
- Conference:
- PGConf India, 2026
- Language:
- Track:
- Database Engine Developers
- Difficulty:
- Medium