Re: Plans for 8.2?

Sigh. This old chestnut.

On Fri, Jan 13, 2006 at 03:15:06PM +0100, Mikael Carneholm wrote:
>
> Citing Baldur Norddahl
> (http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2006-01/msg00597.php)
>
> "I will also point out that none of the replication solutions have
> the same solid reputation as postgresql. As long the postgresql
> team will not endorse a replication solution, you can not expect
> people to put the same trust in these solutions as we put into
> postgresql itself."

1. Define "postgresql team". What, CORE members? Like Jan,
perhaps? Or maybe you mean active developers? Like the ones doing
the coding on the project?

2. Define "endorse". Does that mean "in the backend"? So
everyone has to pay the performance penalty even though they won't
all use it? Even though no other database system makes you make that
compromise?

3. Define "solid reputation". Does this mean "has been around
10 years?" I gots news for you: until the pg_timemachine module is
ready, we're not going to be able to add things retrospectively to
the history of Postgresql. And does this mean that WAL isn't solid,
because it's not 10 years old? Hmm. What about PITR?

4. Define "trust". You mean that people are just picking up
Postgres and using it because it has a good reputation, and doing no
testing? Well, I wish them lots of luck, whatever system they use.

If you think there is something wrong with some bit of code, in Slony
or any other project, it would be _really nice_ to see a proposal to
fix it, rather than claim that there's some magic "in the core" bit
that is somehow the thing which makes code reliable. Or, if you
think that there is some all-others-killing set of packages that
needs to be put together as a world-domination solution, please start
a project on pgfoundry to build the integrated distribution. That's
what free software is for.

If the complaint is instead, "Company O and Company I have big giant
marketing departments that turn 85 modules into 85*85 different
products! How come we don't?" then I suggest you have failed to
grasp exactly where the strengths of community based development lie.

(I'm also more than a little impatient with people who moan about how
this or that replication system isn't a substitute for Oracle's RAC
orgrid computing or whatever. I guess we oughta get to work, eh? A
Mere Matter of Programming, that one. But I think I've ranted
enough.)

A

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