Re: FWD: Re: Updated backslash consistency patch

On Thu, Jan 15, 2009 at 8:25 PM, Tom Lane <tgl(at)sss(dot)pgh(dot)pa(dot)us> wrote:
> Stephen Frost <sfrost(at)snowman(dot)net> writes:
>> gah, I find that to be terrible. If we wanted to compromise, I'd
>> rather have \df do what it does today, to keep backwards-compat and
>> not confuse users, and \dfU to do what I want 99% of the time.
>
> This seems to me to be the compromise most likely to dissatisfy everyone
> the least ...

This is more sensible than most of the alternatives that have been
proposed. At least I can do what I want, even if not with exactly the
easiest sequence to type.

I really wonder what is so terrible about the behavrior as implemented
in CVS HEAD. AFAICS, no one except maybe Tom has really specified WHY
they don't like it, just that they don't like it. I'm not sure
whether that's because (1) it's different, and they're used to the old
way; (2) it involves typing an extra character to get the behavior
they want; or (3) there's no way to search user and system functions
simultaneously.

I reply, with respect to (1), that the new behavior is more consistent
and we'll all get used to it given time; with respect to (2), if
someone is going to have to type an extra character it should be the
developers, not the end-users; with respect to (3), there's nothing
preventing us from adding yet another option to get that behavior.
But I may be trying to push water up a hill, so, I can live with
adding \dfU and keeping \df as-was.

...Robert