Re: ODBC backward versions

> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Bruce Momjian
> > Sent: Sunday, February 11, 2001 11:01 AM
> > To: PostgreSQL-development
> > Subject: [HACKERS] ODBC backward versions
> > 
> > 
> > I checked the logs, and we released the new 6.4 backend protocol on
> > 1998-10-30.  That was 2.5 years ago.
> > 
> > We normally allow older clients to communicate with newer servers, but
> > often we don't support newer clients talking to older servers, sometimes
> > even servers one release in the past.  The reason is that the backend
> > communication code gets confusing.  For example, I know there were some
> > libpq releases that could not talk to servers from the previous release.
> 
> Libpq 2.x couldn't talk to pre-6.4 servers. Fortunately ODBC has never
> used libpq and could talk to wide range of versions. Should ODBC
> throw away the luck ?

Well, the ability to give users choices of old servers is confusing
them.  6.4 is so old, they assume they need a newer one to talk to 7.1,
and hopefully clearer code will help coders in the future.

> 
> > We did allow newer servers to talk to older clients because it is harder
> > to upgrade many clients than a single server.
> > 
> > Seems the <=6.3 compatibility code in our current ODBC is just adding
> > confusion for coders and users and should be removed.  Tom Lane agreed.
> > 
> 
> Where's real coders for psqlodbc driver in the first place ?
> Byron has been unavailable for a long time and I've seen 
> few improvements for a year or so. Does removing pre-6.4
> code improve the status ?  The problem is that there has
> been no maintainer of odbc driver.

We have some new people interested, like Julie Case and I think a few
others.  I just reformatted the entire odbc directory, which will
hopefully make it clearer and attract patches.  I know it is clearer for
me now.

So, no, removing 6.4 does not improve ODBC, but it makes it simpler, and
I doubt anyone wants to talk to a 6.3 server using 7.1 ODBC.

--  Bruce Momjian                        |  http://candle.pha.pa.us pgman@candle.pha.pa.us               |  (610)
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