Re: WAL file location

> > I've developed patches to be able to specify the location of the WAL
> > directory, with the default location being where it is now. The patches
> > define a new environment variable PGXLOG (a la PGDATA) and postmaster,
> > postgres, initdb and pg_ctl have been taught to recognize a new command
> > line switch "-X" a la "-D".
> What's the advantage of this over just using a symlink?

It is supported by the installation environment, and does not require
the explicit three steps of

1) creating a new directory area
2) moving files to the new area
3) creating a symlink to point to the new area

The default behavior for the patch is exactly what happens now, with the
location plopped into $PGDATA/pg_xlog/

> > I'm intending to head towards finer control of locations of tables and
> > indices next by implementing some notion of named storage area, perhaps
> > including the "tablespace" nomenclature....
> This I would really love to have.

Yup. These are all pieces of overall resource management for PostgreSQL.
                   - Thomas