Configuration PostgreSQL Database On Heroku

Introduction

Heroku offers a free plan for PostgreSQL databases hosting on their server. It's a very effective and easy way to quickly host a free PostgreSQL database on a server for experimentation or prototyping. In this article, we will learn the effective configuration of PostgreSQL over the Heroku server.

Learn more details on Heroku PostgreSQL Documentation,

What is PostgreSQL?

PostgreSQL is an open-source and free relational database management for general purpose and SQL compliance. It's the most advanced open source database. PostgreSQL is used as a data store or data warehouse for many web, geospatial, analytics, and mobile applications.

What is Heroku?

Heroku is a cloud platform as a service supporting several programming languages that allow companies to build, deliver, monitor, and scale apps. Earlier Heroku supported only the Ruby programming language but now supports, Node.js, Java, Clojure, Python, PHP, Scala, etc. Heroku server provides free resource management of PostgreSQL database but Heroku server is in price.

Learn more details on Heroku Pricing.

Let's Getting Started

Step 1 - Logged into Heroku

Log in into Heroku server by opening https://id.heroku.com/login, If you don't have any account then you can create your account by signing up.

Step 2 - Create new Heroku application

After logging in you will be redirected to your personal app dashboard, where you can create a new app. There is a `New` button on the top-right corner of the dashboard which allows you to create a new app.

In order to configure PostgreSQL over Heroku server, you need to first, create one app in which you need to add PostgreSQL as a resource. So let's ger started step by step to configure it.

Since you need to create a new app, you need to add your desired app name and select your region. Heroku provides a custom automated name for app - if you don't want to add any specific name then ypou just need to click on Create app button.

Step 3 - Add PostgreSQL database as a resource

To add PostgreSQL as a resource, there is a Resources tab in header section - please navigate to that tab, once you're on the resource page there will be a search box for resource to search, type Heroku Postgres in that search box which will display Heroku Postgres option in the dropdown list. Now click on that option.

After clicking on an option, a new popup related to a pricing plan will appear where you need to select Hobby Dev - Free plan and then click on submit button.

Step 4 - Retrieve created database credentials and connection URL

Now your PostgreSQL database resource has been added successfully, now click on resource name which will redirect to the resource dashboard. This is the configuration screen of your PostgreSQL database on Heroku server.

There are several navigation options in header you need to click on Settings option from header.

Here, now click on the View Credentials button to see the credentials of your PostgreSQL database,

So now you can use these credentials or connection URL of PostgreSQL of Heroku server to configure of PostgreSQL in your application. There are several other options provided in the dashboard, like Reset Database and Destry Database which allows your PostgreSQL database to reset or destroy.

Summary

PostgreSQL is a highly stable database system that provides a resolution to high levels of resilience, correctness, and integrity. So to take advantage or best use of PostgreSQL resource as a free resource over Heroku server is the best platform to work with. This article taught you the configuration of PostgreSQL over Heroku server by performing a few steps.