Re: timezone GUC

Robert Haas <robertmhaas@gmail.com> writes:
> On Thu, May 19, 2011 at 12:12 PM, Tom Lane <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us> wrote:
>> We could do that, but the issue that this code is trying to avoid is
>> that identify_system_timezone can easily add several seconds to the
>> postmaster startup time. �So one of the reasons why someone would be
>> putting a timezone setting into postgresql.conf in the first place is
>> to not pay that startup overhead. �I'm not thrilled with the idea
>> of defeating that in order to cover the corner case where they remove
>> the setting later.

> Yeah, I'm not thrilled with that either.  However, I'm also not
> thrilled with the existing behavior.  Consistency is the hobgoblin of
> small minds, and also mine.

What would make everybody happy is to find a way of identifying the
system timezone that isn't such a massive, expensive kluge.  Any ideas?
        regards, tom lane