PostgreSQL has four primary documentation
formats:
Plain text, for pre-installation information
HTML, for on-line browsing and reference
Postscript, for printing
man pages, for quick reference.
Additionally, a number of plain-text README-type files can be found
throughout the PostgreSQL source tree,
documenting various implementation issues.
The documentation is organized into several "books":
Tutorial: introduction for new users
User's Guide: documents the SQL implementation
Reference Manual: reference pages for programs and SQL commands
Administrator's Guide: installation and server maintenance
Programmer's Guide: programming client
applications and server extensions
Developer's Guide: assorted information
for developers of PostgreSQL proper
All books are available as HTML and Postscript. The
Reference Manual contains reference entries which
are also shipped as man pages.
HTML documentation and man pages are part of a
standard distribution and are installed by default. Postscript
format documentation is available separately for download.
The documentation sources are written in
DocBook, which is a markup language
superficially similar to HTML. Both of these
languages are applications of the Standard Generalized
Markup Language, SGML, which is
essentially a language for describing other languages. In what
follows, the terms DocBook and SGML are both used, but technically
they are not interchangeable.
DocBook allows an author to specify the
structure and content of a technical document without worrying
about presentation details. A document style defines how that
content is rendered into one of several final forms. DocBook is
maintained by the OASIS group. The official DocBook
site has good introductory and reference documentation and
a complete O'Reilly book for your online reading pleasure. The
FreeBSD
Documentation Project also uses DocBook and has some good
information, including a number of style guidelines that might be
worth considering.
