Re: BUG #5118: start-status-insert-fatal

Tom Lane <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us> wrote:

> [ thinks... ]  Maybe we could have the postmaster generate a random
> number at start and include that in both the postmaster.ports file
> and its pg_ping responses.  That would have a substantially lower
> collision probability than PID, if the number generation process
> were well designed; and it wouldn't risk exposing anything sensitive
> in the ping response.

Unless two postmasters could open the same server socket within a
microsecond of one another, a timestamp value captured on opening the
server socket seems even better than a random number.  Well, I guess
if someone subverted the clock it could mislead, but is that really
more likely to cause a false match than a random number?

-Kevin