Re: psql and Postgres 7.2

On 1/21/22 10:49 AM, Tom Lane wrote:
> Adrian Klaver <adrian.klaver@aklaver.com> writes:
>> src/bin/psql/command.c
>> /*
>>     * Ideally we should treat the arguments as SQL identifiers.  But for
>>     * backwards compatibility with 7.2 and older pg_dump files, we have to
>>     * take unquoted arguments verbatim (don't downcase them). For now,
>>     * double-quoted arguments may be stripped of double quotes (as if SQL
>>     * identifiers).  By 7.4 or so, pg_dump files can be expected to
>>     * double-quote all mixed-case \connect arguments, and then we can get rid
>>     * of OT_SQLIDHACK.
>> */
> 
>> Since Postgres 14 pg_dump only goes back to 8.0 and the \d commands in
>> psql go back to 7.4, is this something that needs to hang on?
> 
> Yeah, I was wondering about that the other day.  I agree that we
> probably don't need to worry anymore about reading 7.2 pg_dump
> output.  However, people may be used to/depending on the current
> behavior in other ways.  It's hard to be sure, but it is worth
> noting that it's been a long time since \connect arguments were
> only identifiers.  We'd have to consider the impact on the
> connstring case, too.

Maybe at this point it comes down to a revision to the documentation 
that indicates the downcasing rules don't apply to identifiers in \connect.

> 
>             regards, tom lane
> 


-- 
Adrian Klaver
adrian.klaver@aklaver.com