Re: Overhauling GUCS

Am Mittwoch, 4. Juni 2008 schrieb Tom Lane:
> * Can we present the config options in a more helpful way (this is 99%
> a documentation problem, not a code problem)?

ack

> * Can we build a "configuration wizard" to tell newbies what settings
> they need to tweak?

Some questions to clarify this:

- What settings do "newbies" (or anyone else) typically need to change?  
Please post a list.

- What values would you set those settings to?  Please provide a description 
for arriving at a value, which can later be transformed into code.  Note that 
in some cases, not even the documentation provides more than handwaving help.

- If we know better values, why don't we set them by default?

Another orthogonal stumbling block on the way to making all of this automatic 
is that the surely criticial shared_buffers setting will in any useful 
configuration require messing around with kernel settings that no PostgreSQL 
tool can really help with.