PostgreSQL?

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I am in a bad situation at work. I was originally hired as a MySQL developer to fix a construction company's database system that had been poorly designed. At some point, the CEO of the company decided to branch into the tech industry because he thinks he has a great idea. He really didn't seem to understand and/or respect myself and the other developer so he went out and hired an IT salesperson and made her Director of IT. She's a terrible manager and doesn't really know anything about IT. The CEO doesn't know enough to know she's has no business being an IT manager of any sort.

We are currently working on a project in which we have 90 days to complete. This is about 90 days less than our development team would have told management had anyone actually consulted us. On top of that apparently the way things now work is she googles and/or talks to outside people about specific areas of the project and then presents her "salesperson's" interpretation (which is usually wrong) of this research to the CEO and VP, they then make ill informed decisions on this information and then she comes to our development team and tells us what to do without any discussion and very little information actually being dispensed. Sometimes these edicts are impossible to carry out. The level of ignorance is just astounding.

The latest and possibly last straw for me is apparently she spoke to the VP's cousin who works at some big web company and he must have mentioned or suggested PostgreSQL. Without speaking to me, the only database developer in-house, it was decided that we are definitely going with PostgreSQL for this project. Apparently, I'm so little a factor in this decision that she didn't even bother to tell me and instead told our web developer who mentioned it to me yesterday for the first time. I told him that it wasn't feasible under our current deadline, besides I've already been developing this in MySQL. He tells me today that he gave her reasons why switching to PostgreSQL would be a problem right now and that she threatened to fire him. (She's an army reserve lieutenant and thinks it's appropriate to be bossy and threatening.)

Anyway, that's the backstory... I'm not in a position to evaluate whether PostgreSQL is better or worse than MySQL (more specifically MariaDB). To me, that is secondary at this point. Bottom line is I am experienced with MySQL and have no experience with PostgreSQL. I can already see the commands are different. I'm not even sure what the "object" part of ORDBMS means in comparison to regular RDBMS. Boiled down it means it would take me longer to develop because I'd have to learn the differences and get used to it first. This director woman is big about deadlines and sticking to them and has no concept of running into code not working and losing time trying to figure it out. Past attempts to explain anything to her have been largely unsuccessful.

One of my co-workers talked me into writing a very neutral email to her stating that the web developer mentioned using this other database system and that I'm concerned as I don't have any experience working with it and I know we're on a tight deadline. I'm hoping this will help her realize it's not a road we want to go down right now. However....

If it doesn't dissuade her, are there any really good crash course tutorials/references/whatever on PostgreSQL?

Working with it today I notice the field types are different so I'll have to change out my existing MySQL code. I plan to keep a back up MySQL just in case we find some reason the PostgreSQL isn't working for us.
From what I read so far and considering the project I think MySQL was the better choice for the use case. The wider range of abilities the PostgreSQL seems to take a speed and scalability toll, which is exactly what we're going to need.

Gawd! that situation sucks....hard...i mean it REALLY blows!! !

it seems to be a no-win for you

have you considered leaving this mismanaged mess?

Yes, I actually have a job interview on Monday but I'm assuming there's a lot of candidates given the employer and that they said they're interviewing for 2 solid weeks.

There's another potential position coming up that would put me working for one of the vendors to the current company I'm with. There's the potential that a few people may jumps ship and that may aggravate my current employer and he might try to wave around our non-disclosure non-compete contracts. I think we could beat that as they're really not competition and what I would be doing there would be different.

Both of those would definitely be more sane workplaces and probably pay better than my current position, however, this current employer is dangling the carrot that it will likely be tremendously huge and that because we're the original developers we'd share in the large profits they anticipate. I'm not sure I believe that but if it does prove to be true I would be kicking myself that I quit over one person who may or may not be there down the road. So I'm kinda trying to stick it to see what happens over the next few months.

I really hope that the best option will come to fruition for you.
Be well and let us know what happens.