Install plone.pgcatalog¶

Install the package¶

pip install plone.pgcatalog
# or
uv pip install plone.pgcatalog

Requirements: Python 3.12+, PostgreSQL 14+ (tested with 17), zodb-pgjsonb >= 1.1.

Your zope.conf must use zodb-pgjsonb as the ZODB storage. plone.pgcatalog discovers its PostgreSQL connection from the storage layer.

%import zodb_pgjsonb

<zodb_db main>
  <pgjsonb>
    dsn dbname=zodb host=localhost port=5432 user=zodb password=zodb
  </pgjsonb>
</zodb_db>

plone.pgcatalog is autodiscovered via z3c.autoinclude – no %import needed for the catalog itself.

Install via Plone’s Add-on installer (Site Setup > Add-ons), or programmatically:

setup_tool = portal.portal_setup
setup_tool.runAllImportStepsFromProfile("profile-plone.pgcatalog:default")

The profile replaces portal_catalog with PlonePGCatalogTool. The install step automatically:

Snapshots existing index definitions and metadata columns (preserving addon indexes)
Replaces portal_catalog with a fresh PlonePGCatalogTool
Re-applies essential Plone catalog indexes (UID, portal_type, etc.)
Restores addon-provided indexes from the snapshot
Removes orphaned ZCTextIndex lexicons (no longer needed with PG-backed search)
Applies DDL schema to PostgreSQL (columns, functions, indexes)
Rebuilds the catalog by running clearFindAndRebuild() to index all existing content into PostgreSQL

Visit ZMI > portal_catalog – the class should show PlonePGCatalogTool and the meta type PG Catalog Tool.

Run a test query:

portal.portal_catalog(portal_type="Document")