Re: development setup and libdir

Ivan Sergio Borgonovo wrote:
> On Sat, 30 Jan 2010 11:06:02 -0500
> Tom Lane <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us> wrote:
>
>   
>> Ivan Sergio Borgonovo <mail@webthatworks.it> writes:
>>     
>>> ... I can't make install (provided it works as expected, I
>>> didn't try yet) since I sincerely hope that my user doesn't have
>>> write right on whatever is pointed by $libdir.
>>>       
>> Why not?  In order to install a C function, you have to be
>> superuser, which means you already have the keys to the kingdom
>> database-wise. There is no reason to not give a developer of C
>> functions write access on $libdir.  He could do whatever he wanted
>> inside the C code anyway.
>>     
>
> It is becoming a more serious issue than what I thought...
> Debian install everything in
> /usr/lib/postgresql/8.3/lib/
> -rw-r--r-- 1 root root
> so definitively it would be hard to write there.
>
> Still I'd like to keep a standard installation of Debian and just
> compile my extension somewhere else where the postgres user can read.
>
> I just discovered that depending on the postgres version .so are
> created with different names (module.so vs libmodule.so) and then
> renamed. Since I'd like to use as much as possible of all the magic
> that pgxs and provided makefile do... and I may discover that the
> renaming is not the only change between versions, I'd prefer all
> this magic happens using make install.
>
> I've read I can use prefix.
> From my understanding you can set prefix from configure but:
> - maybe you've just installed debian -dev package
> - running configure for each extension you'd like to place in a
>   different path is just a pain especially if you would really like
>   to keep configuration identical with the exception of the install
>   dir
>
> I've tried to
> export USE_PGSX=1; make install /mydir
> export USE_PGSX=1; make install prefix=/mydir
> with no success. make still try to copy stuff
> in /usr/lib/postgresql/...
>
> What am I supposed to do to install modules where I want?
>
>
>   

pgxs is about building somrthing that will install in the configured 
locations. If you don't want to install in the configured locations 
don't build/install with pgxs.

For development purposes you would be far better off building a private 
version of postgres (with configure --prefix=/path) and using its pgxs 
to build, install and test your module.

cheers

andrew