Re: "GIN and GiST Index Types" page is about usage in full text search, but looks general purpose

From: Peter Geoghegan <pg(at)bowt(dot)ie>
To: piotrowski(at)prisma(dot)io, Pg Docs <pgsql-docs(at)lists(dot)postgresql(dot)org>
Subject: Re: "GIN and GiST Index Types" page is about usage in full text search, but looks general purpose
Date: 2022-04-12 19:34:52
Message-ID: CAH2-Wz=+5kzq8A6Uo_t7F0URwztb74-O+UuFcAh1iixTME-WXQ@mail.gmail.com
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On Tue, Apr 12, 2022 at 12:12 PM PG Doc comments form
<noreply(at)postgresql(dot)org> wrote:
> Even more effective would be to update the page title and/or headline to
> make clear that it is about using GIN and GiST indexes in context of full
> text search only.

I agree that the overall structure is unclear, and seems to be more of
an accident than a deliberate choice.

The page in question is "12.9. GIN and GiST Index Types", but it's
really supplementary information for "12.2.2. Creating Indexes". The
fact that the former has greater prominence than the latter (a general
discussion of FTS indexing) seems like a problem in itself.

At one point GiST was competitive with GIN for full text search
performance (or at least more competitive). These days use of GiST for
FTS should be rare. So the title should suggest that GiST FTS indexing
is the nonstandard choice.

--
Peter Geoghegan

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