Mac OS X, starting with Lion, has PostgreSQL built-in. For some projects being able to use this build-in PostgreSQL server is a very handy feature. We could start it through Terminal but there are easier approaches, for sure.

In fact, the easiest approach I’ve found so far is Postgres.app. It’s just a menubar-application that starts PostgreSQL and shows you the port listened by PostgreSQL, a shortcut to psql command line, documentation and the ability to automatically start the server on system start up.

A direct access to PostgreSQL configuration would be nice, but even without it Postgres.app is very useful. And it’s free!