Postgres Is All You Need for Durable Workflow Execution

Durable execution is a method for creating reliable programs by regularly checkpointing progress to a database, allowing recovery from the last completed step in case of a crash. This approach is often used with external orchestration systems like Temporal and Apache Airflow, where a central orchestrator coordinates the execution of workflow steps. However, the text argues that using a central orchestrator is unnecessarily complex and proposes a simpler system where the database itself, specifically Postgres, serves as the orchestrator. In this model, application servers directly interact with Postgres to manage workflows, leveraging Postgres's capabilities for scalability, availability, observability, and security. By using Postgres's relational model, systems can monitor workflows in real-time and manage them efficiently without introducing new points of failure. This approach capitalizes on the robust solutions developed for Postgres over decades, making the system inherently more reliable and secure while eliminating the need for additional orchestration infrastructure.

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