Re: REVIEW proposal: a validator for configuration files

Andy Colson <andy@squeakycode.net> writes:
> Where did the other warnings go?  Its right though, line 570 is bad.  It also seems to have killed the server.  I
havenot gotten through the history of messages regarding this patch, but is it supposed to kill the server if there is
asyntax error in the config file?
 

The historical behavior is that a configuration file error detected
during postmaster startup should prevent the server from starting, but
an error detected during reload should only result in a LOG message and
the reload not occurring.  I don't believe anyone will accept a patch
that causes the server to quit on a failed reload.  There has however
been some debate about the exact extent of ignoring bad values during
reload --- currently the theory is "ignore the whole file if anything is
wrong", but there's some support for applying all non-bad values as long
as the overall file syntax is okay.
        regards, tom lane