Re: replace plugins directory with GUC

On Tue, 2012-10-09 at 20:45 -0400, Peter Eisentraut wrote:
> About that plugins directory ($libdir/plugins) ... I don't think we
> ever
> really got that to work sensibly.  I don't remember the original
> design
> discussion, but I have seen a number of explanations offered over the
> years.  It's not clear who decides what to put in there (plugin
> author,
> packager, DBA?), how to put it there (move it, copy it, symlink it? --
> no support in pgxs), and based on what criteria.
>
> It would seem to be much more in the spirit of things to simply list
> the
> allowed plugins in a GUC variable, like
>
> some_clever_name_here = $libdir/this, $libdir/that

Here is a patch, with some_clever_name = user_loadable_libraries.

There are obviously some conflict/transition issues with using
user_loadable_libraries vs the plugins directory.  I have tried to
explain the mechanisms in the documentation, but there are other choices
possible in some situations.