Re: Review: Extra Daemons / bgworker

On 11/30/2012 01:59 PM, Andres Freund wrote:
> On 2012-11-30 09:57:20 -0300, Alvaro Herrera wrote:
>> One of the uses for bgworkers that don't have shmem connection is to
>> have them use libpq connections instead.  I don't really see the point
>> of forcing everyone to use backend connections when libpq connections
>> are enough.

Requiring a libpq connection is a good indication for *not* wanting the
process to run under the postmaster, IMO.

>> In particular, they are easier to port from existing code;
>> and they make it easier to share code with systems that still have to
>> support older PG versions.
> 
> They also can get away with a lot more crazy stuff without corrupting
> the database.

Exactly. That's a good reason to *not* tie that to the postmaster, then.
Please keep as much of the potentially dangerous stuff separate (and
advice developers to do so as well, instead of offering them a foot
gun). So that our postmaster can do its job. And do it reliably, without
trying to be a general purpose start/stop daemon. There are better and
well established tools for that.

Regards

Markus Wanner