max_wal_senders must die

Hackers,

What purpose is served, exactly, by max_wal_senders?

In order for a standby to connect, it must have a superuser login, and 
replication connections must be enabled in pg_hba.conf.  How is having 
one more setting in one more file you have to enable on the master 
benefitting anyone?

Under what bizarre set of circumstances would anyone have runaway 
connections from replicas to the master?

Proposed that we simply remove this setting in 9.1.  The real maximum 
wal senders should be whatever max_connections is.

--                                   -- Josh Berkus                                     PostgreSQL Experts Inc.
                           http://www.pgexperts.com