Re: GUC names in messages

On Tue, Nov 07, 2023 at 10:33:03AM +0100, Alvaro Herrera wrote:
> On 2023-Nov-01, Nathan Bossart wrote:
>> +1, IMHO quoting GUC names makes it abundantly clear that they are special
>> identifiers. In de4d456, we quoted the role names in a bunch of messages.
>> We didn't quote the attribute/option names, but those are in all-caps, so
>> they already stand out nicely.
>
> I like this, and I propose we codify it in the message style guide. How
> about this? We can start looking at code changes to make once we decide
> we agree with this.

> + <para>
> + In messages containing configuration variable names, quotes are
> + not necessary when the names are visibly not English natural words, such
> + as when they have underscores or are all-uppercase. Otherwise, quotes
> + must be added. Do include double-quotes in a message where an arbitrary
> + variable name is to be expanded.
> + </para>

І'd vote for quoting all GUC names, if for no other reason than "visibly
not English natural words" feels a bit open to interpretation. But this
seems like it's on the right track, so I won't argue too strongly if I'm
the only holdout.

--
Nathan Bossart
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