Re: [HACKERS] Configuration patch

Here is an updated version of your patch. I removed the tablespace part
because we are going to have real tablespaces in 7.5 rather than
initlocation hacks. I added documention of the new guc parameters, and
a paragraph in the postmaster manual page describing the new -D/PGDATA
behavior. (Is that enough?) I see a few malloc/strup's in the
guc-file.l patch, but they seem OK. I cleaned up the patch to be more
intuitive in its use of variable names and structure.

I will apply it in a day or if I get other feedback.

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pgsql(at)mohawksoft(dot)com wrote:
> This patch incorporates a number of changes suggested by the group. The
> purpose of this patch is to move postgresql to a position where all
> configuration options are specified in one place. The postgresql.conf file
> could completely document a postgresql environment.
>
>
> It adds this functionality:
>
> The "-D' option will work as it always has if it is set to a standard
> postgresql database cluster directory. If it is set to a "postgresql.conf"
> file, it will use that file for configuration. If it is set to a directory
> which is not a cluster directory, i.e. "/somepath/etc" it will look for
> pg_hba.conf, pg_ident.conf, and postgresql.conf there.
>
> For postgresql to work only with a configuration file, some options have
> been added:
>
> include = '/etc/postgres/debug.conf'
> pgdata = '/vol01/postgres'
> hba_conf = '/etc/postgres/pg_hba_conf'
> ident_conf = '/etc/postgres/pg_ident.conf'
> runtime_pidfile = '/var/run/postgresql.conf'
> tablespace = '/somevol/somepath'
>
> "include" allows files with configuration parameters to be included.
>
> "pgdata" (used to be data_dir in old patch) tells PostgreSQL where it's
> database cluster directory is located.
>
> "hba_conf" tells PostgreSQL where to find pg_hba.conf file.
>
> "ident_conf" tells PostgreSQL where to find pg_ident.conf.
>
> "runtime_pidfile" tells postgres to write it's PID to a file that would be
> used by external applications. It is *NOT* the pid file which postgresql
> uses.
>
> "tablespace" allows postgresql to use alternate locations without
> environment variables. Using SIGHUP, tablespaces are reloaded. This allows
> you to add tablespaces to a running PostgreSQL process. (I know this has a
> limited lifetime, but it may make "CREATE DATABASE ... WITH LOCATION" a
> little bit more sane in the meantime.

--
Bruce Momjian | http://candle.pha.pa.us
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