Re: 8.5 TODO: Add comments to output indicating version of pg_dump and of the database server

On Fri, 2009-09-25 at 16:59 -0400, Tom Lane wrote:
> "shakahshakah(at)gmail(dot)com" <shakahshakah(at)gmail(dot)com> writes:
> > From pg_dump/pg_restore section (9.2 of the Todo page on the
> > PostgreSQL Wiki), is the following item
> > "Add comments to output indicating version of pg_dump and of the
> > database server"
> > simply asking for a change to the pg_dump header from:
>
> I think so, but what's not clear is whether this is a good idea to do
> in the default output. It might only be appropriate in "verbose" mode,
> so as not to introduce unnecessary diffs between logically identical
> dumps.

Well, a diff of the same database made by different (major) versions of
pg_dump will already be different in most situations, so adding the
pg_dump version number in it is essentially free from this perspective.

What is the use case for adding the server version?

I can imagine something like wanting to know exactly where the dump came
from, but then host name and such would be better. (And then you can
infer the server version from that.)

> Another issue is that it's not all that clear what to do or how to do it
> for archive dumps --- do you then want both pg_dump and pg_restore to
> tell you about themselves?

I don't see a good reason for pg_restore to get involved.