Andrew Atkinson presenting at PgDay Chicago 2023 Andrew Atkinson presenting at PgDay Chicago 2023. Photo by Hettie D.

Hi 👋

I’m Andrew, and I’d love to help you with your 🐘 PostgreSQL databases and 💎 Ruby on Rails web applications.

Why work with me?

I’ve optimized multi-terabyte PostgreSQL databases running thousands of queries per second. I understand the kinds of challenges faced at that scale.

I love working with teams and providing educational content. I wrote a bestselling book High Performance PostgreSQL for Rails published by Pragmatic Programmers in 2024, to help more engineers learn these skills.

What will we work on?

📊 We can improve query performance, helping avoid unnecessary spending on larger instances
💾 Let’s optimize the schema design, queries, and indexes, for greater reliability and performance
🐘 I’ll perform data migrations for primary key conversions or partitioned table migrations, based on a plan we’ll review together in advance
👨 As a conference presenter and educator, I’m ready to train your team on PostgreSQL and Active Record topics. We can use existing materials or create a custom plan.

Recommendations 🤝

I wanted to fill some knowledge gaps on the team around some Postgres topics. Andrew’s book was the first thing we reached for but we also brought him in to deliver two sessions of live training on some advanced topics. This gave us the opportunity to ask questions, delve deeper, and ensure everyone understood the material. Jamie, CTO, Podia

We hired Andrew to help us better understand the PostgreSQL database operations for our Rails apps. Andrew helped us look at a variety of issues and provided guidance and recommendations. - Kevin, CTO, Clearscope

Andrew helped us tune PostgreSQL parameters, build our multi-database integration, and optimize queries. - Brendan, VP of Engineering

Andrew provided our team with training on query plans and indexes, then rewrote an important query, greatly improving the performance. - John, Director of Engineering

Let’s Talk

Schedule a 30-minute call at calendly.com/pgrailsbook below, or contact me for questions or to arrange a different time.

I’m looking forward to meeting you and working together.

F.A.Q.

What are off-the-shelf trainings?

Currently I’ve got Indexing Like a Pro Part I and Part II, ready to deliver as a live session with slides and live coding for your team. Each part is one hour, plus an optional Q&A.

How do I charge?

I offer a flexible structure based on competitive rates.

Tools and systems we'll use
  • I’ll need access to your databases or database observability tools (PgHero, PgAnalyze, Performance Insights, etc.). For databases, we can use a non-production instance or a read-replica, depending on your goals.
  • For code contributions, I’ll need access to your repositories, CI/CD system, and application observability tools (APM, exception tracking)
How I Work
  • I’ll provide a Independent Consulting Agreement
  • We can use Google Hangouts, Zoom, Tuple, or similar programs for synchronous calls
  • We can use Slack, email, and Google Docs for async work and statuses
  • I’ll track detailed time and provide regular invoices
My Qualifications