Re: [patch] Proposal for \crosstabview in psql

Hi

> I just rechecked the thread. In my reading, lots of people argued
> whether it should be called \rotate or \pivot or \crosstab; it seems the
> \crosstabview proposal was determined to be best. I can support that
> decision. But once the details were discussed, it was only you and
> Daniel left in the thread; nobody else participated. While I understand
> that you may think that "silence is consent", what I am afraid of is
> that some committer will look at this two months from now and say "I
> hate this Hcol+ stuff, -1 from me" and send the patch back for syntax
> rework. IMO it's better to have more people chime in here so that the
> patch that we discuss during the next commitfest is really the best one
> we can think of.
>

I have not a feeling so we did some with Daniel privately. All work was
public (I checked my mailbox) - but what is unhappy - in more mailing list
threads (not sure how it is possible, because subjects looks same). The
discus about the design was public, I am sure. It was relative longer
process, with good progress (from my perspective), because Daniel accepts
and fixed all my objection. The proposed syntax is fully consistent with
other psql commands - hard to create something new there, because psql
parser is pretty limited. Although I am thinking so syntax is good, clean
and useful I am open to discuss about it. Please, try the last design, last
patch - I spent lot of hours (and I am sure so Daniel much more) in
thinking how this can be designed better.

> Also, what about the business of putting "x" if there's no third column?
> Three months from now some Czech psql hacker will say "we should use
> Unicode chars for this" and we will be forever stuck with \pset
> unicode_crosstab_marker to change the character to a ☑ BALLOT BOX WITH
> CZECH. Maybe we should think that a bit harder -- for example, what
> about just rejecting the case with no third column and forcing the user
> to add a third column with the character they choose? That way you
> avoid that mess.
>

These features are in category "nice to have". There are no problem to do
in last commitfest or in next release cycle. It is not reason why to block
commit of this feature, and I am sure so lot of users can be pretty happy
with "basic" version of this patch. The all necessary functionality is
there and working. We can continue on development in other cycles, but for
this cycle, I am sure, so all necessary work is done.

>
> > This feature has only small relation to SQL PIVOTING feature - it is just
> > form of view and I am agree with Daniel about sense of this feature.
>
> Yes, I don't disagree there. Robert Haas and David Fetter also
> expressed their support for psql-side processing, so I think we're good
> there.
>
>
great. Personally, I have not any objection against current state. If
anybody has, please do it early. We can move to forward. This is nice
feature, good patch, and there is not reason why stop here.

Regards

Pavel

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> Álvaro Herrera http://www.2ndQuadrant.com/
> PostgreSQL Development, 24x7 Support, Remote DBA, Training & Services
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