Re: generic options for explain

Joshua Tolley <eggyknap@gmail.com> writes:
> The Oracle version, as it fills the table of explain results, gives
> each number an id and the id of its parent row, which behavior we
> could presumably copy.  I'm definitely keen to keep a human-readable
> EXPLAIN such as we have now, to augment the table-based proposal, but
> a table would provide the more flexible output we'd need for more
> detailed reporting, a simple interface for applications to consume the
> EXPLAIN data without human intervention, and a convenient platform
> from whence the data can be transformed to XML, JSON, etc.  for those
> that are so inclined.

I would think a table would be considerably *less* flexible --- you
could not easily change the output column set.  Unless you're imagining
just dumping something equivalent to the current output into a text
column.  Which would be flexible, but it'd hardly have any of the
other desirable properties you list.
        regards, tom lane