Re: postgres --help-config

Tom Lane wrote:
> Bruce Momjian <pgman@candle.pha.pa.us> writes:
> > ... Will Red Hat be upset if we
> > leave it unchanged for 7.4.X and rip this out and redo it in 7.5?
> 
> It'd be better if we could get it right the first time, with the
> understanding that the output format is not very negotiable at this
> late hour.  But as best I can tell, most of the unhappiness is with the
> design of the switch set, which is not something I want to defend in
> detail.  There's a lot there that isn't needed for the RHDB tool as I
> understand it, and I think that altering the switches used to get the
> output that the tool does need would still be a feasible change from the
> tool's point of view.
> 
> I would be in favor of simplifying the supported switch set to the
> minimum needed by Red Hat's tool (the equivalent of -G -M if I
> understood Fernando correctly), and re-adding complexity in future
> when and if it's shown to be needed.  But we need to make a decision
> about this now.  Preferably yesterday.

Oh, the raw output format should follow the COPY format output, meaning
literal newlines are \n and literal tabs are \<tab>, and double literal
backslash.  I am mentioning this now so we will not have to modify this
output format in the future in case we need literal tab/newlines.

--  Bruce Momjian                        |  http://candle.pha.pa.us pgman@candle.pha.pa.us               |  (610)
359-1001+  If your life is a hard drive,     |  13 Roberts Road +  Christ can be your backup.        |  Newtown Square,
Pennsylvania19073