Install and configure TimescaleDB on Postgres

This section shows you how to install the latest version of Postgres and TimescaleDB on a supported platform using source supplied by Tiger Data.

1. Install the latest Postgres source

2. At the command prompt, clone the TimescaleDB GitHub repository:

3. Change into the cloned directory:

4. Checkout the latest release. You can find the latest release tag on our [Releases page][gh-releases]:

This command produces an error that you are now in detached head state. It is expected behavior, and it occurs because you have checked out a tag, and not a branch. Continue with the steps in this procedure as normal.

1. Build the source

2. Bootstrap the build system:

For installation on Microsoft Windows, you might need to add the pg_config and cmake file locations to your path. In the Windows Search tool, search for system environment variables. The path for pg_config should be C:\Program Files\PostgreSQL\<version>\bin. The path for cmake is within the Visual Studio directory.

1. Build the extension:

2. Install TimescaleDB

3. Configure Postgres

If you have more than one version of Postgres installed, TimescaleDB can only be associated with one of them. The TimescaleDB build scripts use pg_config to find out where Postgres stores its extension files, so you can use pg_config to find out which Postgres installation TimescaleDB is using.

1. Locate the postgresql.conf configuration file:

2. Open the postgresql.conf file and update shared_preload_libraries to:

If you use other preloaded libraries, make sure they are comma separated.

1. Tune your Postgres instance for TimescaleDB

This script is included with the timescaledb-tools package when you install TimescaleDB. For more information, see [configuration][config].

1. Restart the Postgres instance:

2. Set the user password

3. Log in to Postgres as postgres

You are in the psql shell.

1. Set the password for postgres

When you have set the password, type \q to exit psql.