Re: pg_dump restore time and Foreign Keys

Simon Riggs wrote:
> On Sat, 2008-06-07 at 13:08 -0400, Robert Treat wrote:
>
>> On Thursday 05 June 2008 08:56:35 Simon Riggs wrote:
>>
>>> On Thu, 2008-06-05 at 07:57 -0400, Andrew Dunstan wrote:
>>>
>
>
>> Heh, I would have argued that the idea should go the other way and
>> just make this part of the normal syntax. Oracle DBA's have been
>> doing this for years (MS SQL supports it too actually) and it really
>> helps working around having to hold locks on large relations for
>> lengthy periods of times. Heck, I'd like to see a no check option for
>> all constraints really.
>>
>
> Interesting that SQL Server does it also.
>
> Holding the lock for a long period is just one more problem. :-)
>
> I'm always torn between the I-know-what-Im-doing-so-give-me-the-option
> viewpoint and the some-dumbass-will-abuse-it viewpoint. I see the
> results of both viewpoints daily.
>
> Perhaps we need a GUC that says expert_mode = on. In expert_mode we are
> allowed to do a range of things that are normally avoided - there would
> be an explicit list. Managers can then take a single considered decision
> as to whether the situation warrants extreme action and their DBA is
> good enough to handle it. That might resolve our continued angst about
> whether our users our smart enough to avoid the gotchas, or just smart
> enough to win a DBA's Darwin Award.
>
> The UNIX philosophy has always been to allow the power to exist, yet
> seek to minimise the number of people who exercise it. Another idea
> might be to make such command options superuser only, to ensure the
> power is available, yet only in the hands of, by-definition, the trusted
> few.
>
>

If we go down this road then I would far rather we tried to devise some
safe (or semi-safe) way of doing it instead of simply providing expert
(a.k.a. footgun) mode.

For instance, I'm wondering if we could do something with checksums of
the input lines or something else that would make this difficult to do
in circumstances other than pg_restore.

cheers

andrew