Обсуждение: nomenclature
Just overheard one of my colleagues on the phone to one of our users taking them through the process of moving their PGDATA to a partition with space... With the various paths, service names, config files and environment variables PostgreSQL appears to have a multiple-personality disorder... Is it: postgresql (/etc/init.d/postgresql, postgresql.conf),or postmaster (main postmaster process),or postgres (postgres user),orpgsql (/var/lib/pgsql),or psql (psql SQL terminal),or pg (PG* environment variables, pg_* files)? I guess the point of this email is to point out the current proliferation of terms is not user friendly. Any plans/interest in standardisation? Thanks, Lee.
Hi Lee On Jan 16, 2004, at 8:09 PM, Lee Kindness wrote: > With the various paths, service names, config files and environment > variables PostgreSQL appears to have a multiple-personality > disorder... Is it: > > postgresql (/etc/init.d/postgresql, postgresql.conf), > or postmaster (main postmaster process), > or postgres (postgres user), > or pgsql (/var/lib/pgsql), > or psql (psql SQL terminal), > or pg (PG* environment variables, pg_* files)? > > I guess the point of this email is to point out the current > proliferation of terms is not user friendly. Any plans/interest in > standardisation? Don't forget pl/pgsql! :) In my way of thinking, different things should have different names, which is what is going on here. Two of these are more or less user-customizable: the user who owns the database cluster, and the directory where the cluster and files are usually stored. However, the others are distinct, as you've clearly pointed out. They have different names because they are different. I too was a little confused when starting out with PostgreSQL as to what the difference was between some of these things, but they need different names so people can distinguish between them. However, this is compounded by the fact that I see (and have probably used) PostgreSQL, postgres, or pgsql all to refer to the whole thing in general. Then you've got people coming up with their own, such as Postgress, and Postgrees, two of which I've seen bandied about recently. But again, there needs to be names to refer to these different things. Michael Glaesemann grzm myrealbox com
> I too was a little confused when starting out with PostgreSQL as to > what the difference was between some of these things, but they need > different names so people can distinguish between them. > You make a good point, and I think that's easier for developers to work with. However, why do no other OSS projects use different names like that? "Postmaster" is particularly confusing for those new to PostgreSQL, since it's not clear that it belongs to PostgreSQL, and, indeed, seems more like a clever name for an MTA. If you look at apache, and mysql, they seem to be consistant (Red Hat apparently renames apache to httpd, however that is just generalizing the name, not making a new one). Simpler daemons tend to be consistant (like ftp, etc), but those don't really count because there aren't very many parts. MTAs usually have their own name, but sometimes steal the "sendmail" name. Bind calls itself named (another general name). Samba has sbmd. I can't point to any OSS project that completely renames its parts. I think a shortened version of the name makes sense (in this case "postgres" works well, but so does "pgsql"), and other projects do similar things. "Psql" for the client and "postmaster" for the daemon are the ones that really confuse people, I think. Now, is it worth changing? I doubt it. It doesn't take long to figure out, and would certainly cause confusion on the mailing lists. And, as you pointed out, it helps developers distinguish the parts, and maybe adds a little character to the software. Unless there's some kind of advocacy issue (i.e. people are avoiding the database because of perception), I can't think of much reason. Regards, Jeff Davis
On Jan 16, 2004, at 9:39 PM, Jeff Davis wrote: > I can't point to any OSS project that completely renames its parts. I > think a shortened version of the name makes sense (in this case > "postgres" works well, but so does "pgsql"), and other projects do > similar things. "Psql" for the client and "postmaster" for the daemon > are the ones that really confuse people, I think. I'd agree with you there. I think they may be confusing for two different reasons: postmaster because there's no obvious connection (besides POSTmaster and POSTgreSQL), and psql because it's so close to pgsql and pl/pgsql. People may not realize psql is just one client (of other possible clients). They think it's tied much more closely to PostgreSQL than it actually is. (Well, it is packaged with the whole shebang and it can do a lot.) This may be one of the reasons for the discussions regarding the psql slash commands (e.g., \d). They may think it's just an SQL interface to the database, when it's more than that. In a way it's like saying phppgadmin shouldn't have buttons because it's not SQL-like enough :) But I digress. > Now, is it worth changing? I doubt it. It doesn't take long to figure > out, and would certainly cause confusion on the mailing lists. And, as > you pointed out, it helps developers distinguish the parts, and maybe > adds a little character to the software. Unless there's some kind of > advocacy issue (i.e. people are avoiding the database because of > perception), I can't think of much reason. I agree. Michael Glaesemann grzm myrealbox com
On Fri, 16 Jan 2004, Jeff Davis wrote: > I can't point to any OSS project that completely renames its parts. I > think a shortened version of the name makes sense (in this case > "postgres" works well, but so does "pgsql"), and other projects do > similar things. "Psql" for the client and "postmaster" for the daemon > are the ones that really confuse people, I think. I don't know, doesn't one of the databases out there use 'monitor' as their equivalent to psql? ---- Marc G. Fournier Hub.Org Networking Services (http://www.hub.org) Email: scrappy@hub.org Yahoo!: yscrappy ICQ: 7615664
On Fri, 16 Jan 2004, Michael Glaesemann wrote: > > On Jan 16, 2004, at 9:39 PM, Jeff Davis wrote: > > I can't point to any OSS project that completely renames its parts. I > > think a shortened version of the name makes sense (in this case > > "postgres" works well, but so does "pgsql"), and other projects do > > similar things. "Psql" for the client and "postmaster" for the daemon > > are the ones that really confuse people, I think. > > I'd agree with you there. I think they may be confusing for two > different reasons: postmaster because there's no obvious connection > (besides POSTmaster and POSTgreSQL) This one I have to agree with also ... 'postmaster' always makes me think of the mail system ... *but* ... for those that are dealing with the database server, and who many never have seen a mail system in their life, the same may not be true ... The funny thing is that the "postmaster" doesn't really do anything, its the postgres process that does all the work ... if you think about it, the "postmaster" is actually aptly named, since it is the process that sorts out the incoming connections and assigns them to backend processes ... just like the postmaster does with your mail ... ---- Marc G. Fournier Hub.Org Networking Services (http://www.hub.org) Email: scrappy@hub.org Yahoo!: yscrappy ICQ: 7615664
Marc G. Fournier wrote: >On Fri, 16 Jan 2004, Michael Glaesemann wrote: > > > >>On Jan 16, 2004, at 9:39 PM, Jeff Davis wrote: >> >> >>>I can't point to any OSS project that completely renames its parts. I >>>think a shortened version of the name makes sense (in this case >>>"postgres" works well, but so does "pgsql"), and other projects do >>>similar things. "Psql" for the client and "postmaster" for the daemon >>>are the ones that really confuse people, I think. >>> >>> >>I'd agree with you there. I think they may be confusing for two >>different reasons: postmaster because there's no obvious connection >>(besides POSTmaster and POSTgreSQL) >> >> > >This one I have to agree with also ... 'postmaster' always makes me think >of the mail system ... *but* ... for those that are dealing with the >database server, and who many never have seen a mail system in their life, >the same may not be true ... > > > In all honesty, when I first installed Linux system with Postgresql I couldn't help but wonder why I had two different MTA's. >The funny thing is that the "postmaster" doesn't really do anything, its >the postgres process that does all the work ... if you think about it, the >"postmaster" is actually aptly named, since it is the process that sorts >out the incoming connections and assigns them to backend processes ... >just like the postmaster does with your mail ... > > > Perhaps postgresd, postgresqld, or pg_daemon might be a little more intuitive? >---- >Marc G. Fournier Hub.Org Networking Services (http://www.hub.org) >Email: scrappy@hub.org Yahoo!: yscrappy ICQ: 7615664 > >---------------------------(end of broadcast)--------------------------- >TIP 5: Have you checked our extensive FAQ? > > http://www.postgresql.org/docs/faqs/FAQ.html > >
On Fri, 16 Jan 2004, Thomas Swan wrote: > Perhaps postgresd, postgresqld, or pg_daemon might be a little more > intuitive? I think at this late stage in the game (almost 10 years), changing could be a bit difficult and confusing, no? :) I'd go with something like pgsqld myself though, keeps it short ... or we could go even shorter with just pgd ... But, I'm not, in any stretch of the imagination, advocating for change on this ... ---- Marc G. Fournier Hub.Org Networking Services (http://www.hub.org) Email: scrappy@hub.org Yahoo!: yscrappy ICQ: 7615664
Marc G. Fournier writes:> I think at this late stage in the game (almost 10 years), changing could> be a bit difficult andconfusing, no? :) I'd go with something like> pgsqld myself though, keeps it short ... or we could go even shorter with>just pgd ...> > But, I'm not, in any stretch of the imagination, advocating for change on> this ... If it's ever going to happen then the likely place would be in a Linux distribution or a re-package of PostgreSQL. I'm sure no one would be suprised if Red Hat had a new release with dbd, ~db, sql (or keeping PostgreSQL in it pgsqld, ~pgsql, pgsql)... Indeed a lot of the current inconsistencies are packaging issues... L.
Marc G. Fournier wrote: >On Fri, 16 Jan 2004, Thomas Swan wrote: > > > >>Perhaps postgresd, postgresqld, or pg_daemon might be a little more >>intuitive? >> >> > >I think at this late stage in the game (almost 10 years), changing could >be a bit difficult and confusing, no? :) I'd go with something like >pgsqld myself though, keeps it short ... or we could go even shorter with >just pgd ... > >But, I'm not, in any stretch of the imagination, advocating for change on >this ... > > > Agreed, to change it would be a bit insane. Although a little insanity often surrounds a major version release... I just thought the anecdote of confusing it for an MTA was a little funny. Thomas
Thomas Swan wrote: >I just thought the anecdote of confusing it for an MTA was a little funny. > > > Funny yes, but unfortunatly all too common for newbies I think.
"Marc G. Fournier" <scrappy@postgresql.org> writes: > if you think about it, the "postmaster" is actually aptly named, > since it is the process that sorts out the incoming connections and > assigns them to backend processes ... just like the postmaster does > with your mail ... Right, hence the witty pun :-) IMHO this whole debate is largely academic: it really wouldn't be practical to start renaming components at this point, whether they are perfectly named or not. -Neil