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Configuring your Database

Deploio supports a variety of databases, including MySQL, MariaDB and PostgreSQL. You can find more information on the different databases available here and information about pricing here.

Protecting Database Access​

To access the database, you must set up SSH key authentication. You will need to pass the public key to the --ssh-keys flag when creating the database and use the private key to gain access.

You also need to add your IP address to the --allowed-cidrs flag. If you wish to allow all IP addresses, you can set this to 0.0.0.0/0.

Common database creation settings​

There are a number of configurations we can apply when creating our database. You can see more information on these arguments by running -h for the desired database. For example nctl create mysql -h for MySQL.

Below, we note a few important configuration options.

Name​

The name of the instance can be freely chosen, but must be unique. Once created, the name cannot be changed.

Location​

Depending on available resources, instances can be created in two locations within the "ColoZüri" data center or the "NTT" data center in Rümlang. The location cannot be changed later.

This can be set by the --location flag and the default is cz41.

Machine type​

Note

We recommend nine-db-s or larger sizings for production workloads.

Machine TypeVirtual CPU (VCPU)RAMStorage SpaceMonthly Fees
nine-db-xs24 GB20 GBCHF 65
nine-db-s48 GB20 GBCHF 97
nine-db-m412 GB20 GBCHF 117
nine-db-l616 GB20 GBCHF 149
nine-db-xl824 GB20 GBCHF 201
nine-db-xxl1032 GB20 GBCHF 253

Additional storage space per 10 GB: CHF 1.50 per month.

Machine types can be changed after creation. After an adjustment, the database instance will be restarted and will be unavailable for a few minutes.

Allowed IP addresses​

IPv4 addresses and address ranges from which connections to the service can be established. Access from our Kubernetes products NKE (Nine Kubernetes Engine) and GKE (Google's Kubernetes Engine), as well as from deplo.io, is already enabled.

The access restriction can be adjusted at any time. Adjustments are made non-disruptively moments after the form is submitted.

We can set the allowed CIDRs by passing the --allowed-cidrs={CIDR} flag.

Backup Retention Policy​

The backup retention period in days can be selected between 0 and 365 days by passing the --keep-daily-backups={X} flag.

If 0 days is selected, the backup routine will be disabled and all existing backups will be deleted. The default retention period is 10 days.

Please note that the storage space requirement increases if the local retention period is long. This may result in higher instance costs.

For more information about backing up your databases on a daily basis, accessing the backups, and how to create your own backups if needed, see the section about backups.

SSH Public Keys​

Configure the public keys to access the database backups via SSH. The keys can be adjusted at any time.

These can be set via the --ssh-keys flag or the --ssh-keys-file flag.

Version​

You can select your desired version when creating the database instance. The version cannot be adjusted after the instance is created.

You can view the available versions below for your desired database.

Database specific creation settings​

Versions available​

In the following table you can find the support period of each PostgreSQL version:

PostgreSQL VersionSupport End
16November 09, 2028
15November 11, 2027
14November 12, 2026
13November 13, 2025

Extensions​

Nine provides a variety of extensions that you can activate as needed. The following extensions are available:

Extensions
  • address_standardizer
  • address_standardizer_data_us
  • btree_gin
  • btree_gist
  • citext
  • cube
  • dict_int
  • earthdistance
  • fuzzystrmatch
  • hstore
  • intarray
  • isn
  • lo
  • ltree
  • pg_prewarm
  • pg_stat_statements
  • pg_trgm
  • pgcrypto
  • plpgsql
  • postgis
  • postgis_tiger_geocoder
  • postgis_topology
  • seg
  • tablefunc
  • tcn
  • tsm_system_time
  • tsm_system_rows
  • unaccent
  • uuid-ossp

Creating the Database​

Considering the creation settings above, we run the following command to create the database server:

nctl create postgres {DATABASE_NAME} \
  --postgres-version={X} \
  --machine-type=nine-db-s \
  --allowed-cidrs={IP_ADDRESS}/0 \
  --ssh-keys={PUBLIC_KEY}

Please adjust the flags as you need.

We can now access the server using the FQDN and generated user and password. We can find this information as follows:

  • FQDN: Run nctl get postgres {DATABASE_NAME}
  • User: Run nctl get postgres {DATABASE_NAME} --print-user
  • Password: Run nctl get postgres {DATABASE_NAME} --print-password

Now we want to create the database on the server. We can run the following command:

createdb -U dbadmin -h {FQDN} {DATABASE_NAME}

You will be prompted to enter the password.

We can check that this database was created by entering the server using psql -U dbadmin -h {FQDN} -d postgres and then running the command \l to list the databases on the server.

Interacting with databases​

Connecting​

The connection information (FQDN, user, and password) for your instance can be found in Cockpit under Access Information. The database servers are accessible via their standard ports.

The instance will only accept TLS connections. Depending on the client or library, you may need to explicitly enable TLS.

psql -h FQDN -d postgres -U dbadmin
# at first you can use the default database 'postgres' to be able to connect.
Basic commands​

Creating a new database named app_prod:

postgres=> CREATE DATABASE app_prod;

Creating a new user named app_prod:

postgres=> CREATE USER app_prod WITH PASSWORD 'strongpassword';

Granting the user app_prod privileges to the database app_prod:

postgres=>  GRANT ALL ON app_prod TO app_prod;

For granting more specified privileges, find the details in the official postgres documentation: DDL privileges.

Changing the user app_prod's password:

postgres=> ALTER USER app_prod WITH PASSWORD 'newstrongpassword';

Deleting the database app_prod:

postgres=> DROP DATABASE app_prod;

Deleting the user app_prod:

postgres=> DROP USER app_prod;

Use the official Postgres documentation for additional info about user and database management.

Monitoring for health and performance​

Deploio database instances run on Nine’s managed infrastructure. Nine monitors basic infrastructure-level availability, however you are responsible for observing database-level performance and load.

You can view the current status of the system here.

Nine monitors the instance with a monitoring system 24x7. In the event of a malfunction, an (on-call) technician from Nine is automatically alerted and restores proper operation as quickly as possible.

You can also view the current status of a database via the Cockpit, as well as information such as version, backup retention policy and "Allowed IP Addresses". This information can help when trying to assess and connection issues.

⚠️ Resource saturation (e.g., full CPU/memory/disk) is not considered a malfunction. You are responsible for monitoring performance and scaling your instance as needed.

What is Monitored by Nine​

Nine monitors the availability and infrastructure health of the database node, such as:

  • Instance accessibility (e.g. FQDN ping)
  • Hardware failures
  • Backup completion status
  • Disk thresholds (for automatic storage expansion)

However, application-level metrics like query latency, connection count, or CPU load are not exposed via Cockpit today. This feature is currently WIP and will be available soon.

What You Can Monitor Yourself​

To monitor your PostgreSQL database performance, you can connect via psql and use built-in extensions:

  • pg_stat_statements – View expensive queries by total time
  • pg_stat_activity – List active sessions and queries
  • pg_stat_bgwriter – Monitor I/O activity and checkpoint behavior

Example to get top slow queries:

SELECT * FROM pg_stat_statements
ORDER BY total_time DESC
LIMIT 5;

To monitor connections:

SELECT * FROM pg_stat_activity;
Best Practices for PostgreSQL​
  • Enable pg_stat_statements at instance creation or shortly after
  • Use tools like psql, pgAdmin, or DBeaver for live inspection
  • Log slow queries from your app for long-term insights
  • Regularly check backup status and instance disk growth
  • Scale machine type via nctl update if your app outgrows the current size

Backup and Restore​

See Backup Retention Policy section for configuration options.

Nine backs up the databases daily between 01:00 and 02:00. These backups are kept locally for 10 days (configurable) and on a remote backup system for seven days.

Backups are stored in the /home/dbadmin/backup directory. All backups are versioned in directories with the following time scheme (example, exact timestamp will vary): 2022-11-18-0134.

/home/dbadmin/backup/latest always points to the latest backup.

Backups are stored in the customer directory. The database schema can be found in the structure directory.

Create additional backups​

Additional backups can be created by running:

dbadmin@managedvirtualmachine-xxxxxxx:~ $ sudo nine-postgresql-backup
2022-11-18T09:54:19+01:00 Dumped and compressed database 'frontend_production' in 53 seconds
2022-11-18T09:55:04+01:00 Dumped and compressed database 'frontend_staging' in 45 seconds
Storage requirements of the backups​

The backup routine creates compressed backups. Depending on the size of the database, this may still result in backups that require a lot of disk space.

To ensure that sufficient disk space is always available, the On Demand database environments have a mechanism that automatically monitors and performs a disk space expansion if required.

Number of backups kept​

The number of backups kept can be adjusted via Cockpit. The duration of the retention period can be freely selected between one and 365 days.

Please note that a long retention period requires more storage space, which may result in additional costs.

Disabling backups​

To disable backups, the retention time can be adjusted to 0.

In this case, the creation of further backups is deactivated. All backups already created will be deleted shortly after the adjustment.

Access to the created backups​

Using the system user dbadmin you can access the created backups via an SSH connection.

SSH access for the user is controlled by storing an SSH key in Cockpit.

Restoring and working with the created backups​

The backup routine used is the same as the one we use for our managed servers. We have described how to work with the backups as well as more information about restoring backups in the following support articles:

Automatic storage space expansion​

To provide the most robust environment possible, the available storage space is monitored at 5 minute intervals. If our monitoring detects that the available storage space falls below a threshold, an expansion of the storage quota is automatically performed.

Thresholds​

For a total storage size below 50 GB, the threshold is 5 GB of free storage space.

For a total storage size above 50 GB, the threshold is 10% free storage space.

Expansion of the storage space​

The expansion of the storage space is done automatically in steps of 25 GB.

Reduction of storage space​

It is not currently possible to reduce the disk size of database instances. The only way to reduce disk usage is to download a backup of the current instance and restore it to a new instance.

Billing of the storage space expansion​

The additional storage space is charged automatically.

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