Embedded PostgreSQL (pglite/wasmtime)

Run the full ɳSelf stack without a Docker postgres container — PostgreSQL executes inside a WebAssembly runtime on the same host process.

How it works

nself start --embedded-pg replaces the Docker postgres container with a pglite WebAssembly module executing inside wasmtime (via wasmtime-go). A Unix-domain socket bridge proxies the Postgres wire protocol between Hasura, Auth, and the WASM runtime. From the perspective of any service that talks to postgres, the connection is identical to a standard socket connection.

Hasura / Auth
     │
     │  Postgres wire protocol (Unix socket)
     ▼
PGSocketBridge  ─── intercepts unsupported commands (COPY, LISTEN, NOTIFY)
     │
     │  Postgres wire protocol (internal socket)
     ▼
EmbeddedPGRuntime (wasmtime + pglite WASM)
     │
     │  WASI filesystem preopen
     ▼
$NSELF_RUNTIME_DIR/pgdata/   ← durable Postgres data directory

pglite v0.2.17 ships with pgvector support included. No separate extension install is needed.

Requirements

• macOS (darwin/amd64 or darwin/arm64) or Linux (amd64 or arm64)
• Internet access on first run to download the pglite WASM binary (cached at ~/.nself/cache/pglite/)
• CGO_ENABLED=1 build (the CLI binary from Homebrew satisfies this automatically)

The Docker postgres image is NOT required. Docker is still needed for Hasura, Auth, and Nginx.

First run

On the first nself start --embedded-pg, the CLI:

1. Downloads pglite.wasm from ping.nself.org/assets/pglite/0.2.17/pglite.wasm (verifies sha256)
2. Compiles the WASM module to native machine code via wasmtime (takes 5-15 seconds on cold start)
3. Caches the compiled module at ~/.nself/cache/pglite/0.2.17/pglite.wasm.compiled
4. Starts the pglite runtime with data at .nself/embedded-pg/pgdata/
5. Starts the socket bridge at .nself/embedded-pg/pglite.sock.bridge
6. Proceeds with the normal stack startup (Hasura, Auth, Nginx)

Subsequent starts reuse the compiled module cache. Warm start time is typically under 5 seconds.

Environment variables

Variable	Default	Purpose
NSELF_EMBEDDED_PG	false	Set to true to enable embedded PG without passing --embedded-pg every run
NSELF_RUNTIME_DIR	.nself/embedded-pg (project-relative)	Override the runtime directory path

Data persistence

Postgres data lives in $NSELF_RUNTIME_DIR/pgdata/ — by default .nself/embedded-pg/pgdata/ inside the project directory. This directory persists across restarts.

To start fresh, stop the stack and remove the pgdata/ directory:

nself stop
rm -rf .nself/embedded-pg/pgdata
nself start --embedded-pg

Backup

nself backup works with embedded PG. When NSELF_EMBEDDED_PG=true, the backup command targets the Unix-domain socket instead of the Docker container. It attempts pg_dump --format=custom first (producing a file compatible with pg_restore), then falls back to a SQL plain-text dump if pg_dump is not on PATH.

Backup files are written to ~/.nself/backups/ by default.

Limitations

• COPY TO / COPY FROM, LISTEN, and NOTIFY are not supported via the bridge. Any attempt returns SQLSTATE 0A000 (feature not supported). Standard INSERT/UPDATE/DELETE/SELECT work without restriction.
• Windows is not supported. The prebuilt libwasmtime static library is available for macOS and Linux only.
• The embedded runtime uses a single-process WASM instance. High-concurrency workloads may see higher latency than a native Postgres process.

Troubleshooting

"pglite WASM not found" — run nself start --embedded-pg with internet access to trigger the download. Or set PGLITE_WASM_PATH to an existing pglite.wasm file.

"Socket already in use" — a previous embedded PG instance did not shut down cleanly. Remove the socket file: rm -f .nself/embedded-pg/pglite.sock*

Slow warm start — delete the compiled module cache to force recompile: rm -f ~/.nself/cache/pglite/*/pglite.wasm.compiled

Related pages

• cmd-start — nself start flag reference
• Architecture — full ɳSelf stack architecture
• backup — backup and restore

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