Postgres Writing Guidelines

When to Use

• Starting a new PostgreSQL application database from scratch
• Adding tables, views, functions, procedures, or triggers to an existing schema following this methodology
• Reviewing PL/pgSQL for type safety, RLS coverage, and structural enforcement
• Writing migrations that must be idempotent and safe to rerun
• Designing table hierarchies (base/subtype, parent-child composite keys)
• Implementing background job queues backed by Postgres tables (FOR UPDATE SKIP LOCKED)

When NOT to use: one-off ad-hoc queries, read-only reporting databases, or any non-Postgres engine. Examples and syntax throughout are PostgreSQL/PL-pgSQL.

snake_case Everywhere

Postgres folds unquoted identifiers to lowercase. Using PascalCase forces double-quoting ("PascalCase") on every reference, forever. Use snake_case for everything: tables, columns, views, functions, procedures, types, constraints, parameters.