Re: [HACKERS] bytea_output output of base64

On Thu, Feb 23, 2017 at 07:09:57PM -0500, Andrew Dunstan wrote:
> 
> 
> On 02/23/2017 06:52 PM, David Fetter wrote:
> > On Thu, Feb 23, 2017 at 05:55:37PM -0500, Bruce Momjian wrote:
> >> On Thu, Feb 23, 2017 at 04:08:58PM -0500, Tom Lane wrote:
> >>> Bruce Momjian <bruce@momjian.us> writes:
> >>>> Is there a reason we don't support base64 as a bytea_output output
> >>>> option, except that no one has implemented it?
> >>> How about "we already have one too many bytea output formats"?
> >>> I don't think forcing code to try to support still another one
> >>> is a great thing ... especially not if it couldn't be reliably
> >>> distinguished from the hex format.
> >> Is there a reason we chose hex over base64?
> > Whether there was or not, there's not a compelling reason now to break
> > people's software.  When people want compression, methods a LOT more
> > effective than base64 are common.  Gzip, for example.
> >
> 
> 
> What's the use case anyway? It's already supported by the encode() and
> decode() functions if you need that format.

I was just curious because it seems more compact than hex and many
exchange formats use it, like SSL certificates and keys.  I know you can
encode() but I thought it might help make pg_dump output smaller. 

--  Bruce Momjian  <bruce@momjian.us>        http://momjian.us EnterpriseDB
http://enterprisedb.com

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