Re: Documentation bug at: current/sql-vacuum.html, Notes

On Wed, Jul 26, 2023 at 10:39:41AM -0700, Christophe Pettus wrote:
> Isn't this backwards?
>
>> If index cleanup is not performed regularly, performance may suffer, because as the table is modified indexes will accumulate dead tuples and the table itself will accumulate dead line pointers that cannot be removed until index cleanup is completed.
>
> Indexes have line pointers, tables have tuples, so it should read:
>
>> If index cleanup is not performed regularly, performance may suffer, because as the table is modified indexes will accumulate dead line pointers and the table itself will accumulate dead tuples that cannot be removed until index cleanup is completed.

I believe the current phrasing is correct. VACUUM will be able to reclaim
the tuple space in the heap, but the line pointers must remain until their
corresponding index tuples are removed.

--
Nathan Bossart
Amazon Web Services: https://aws.amazon.com