Re: PG 16 draft release notes ready

On Thu, May 18, 2023 at 6:44 PM Bruce Momjian <bruce(at)momjian(dot)us> wrote:
> > I don't understand what you mean by that. The changes to
> > *_till_end_of_wal() (the way that those duplicative functions were
> > removed, and more permissive end_lsn behavior was added) is unrelated
> > to all of the other changes. Plus it's just not very important.
>
> I see what you mean now. I have moved the function removal to the
> incompatibilities section and kept the existing entry but remove the
> text about the removed functions.

Your patch now has two separate items for "[5c1b66280] Rework design
of functions in pg_walinspect", but even one item is arguably one too
many. The "ending LSN" item (the second item for this same commit)
should probably be removed altogether. If you're going to keep the
sentences that appear under that second item, then it should at least
be consolidated with the first item, in order that commit 5c1b66280
isn't listed twice.

Note also that the patch doesn't remove a remaining reference to an
update in how pg_get_wal_block_info() works, which (as I've said) is a
brand new function as far as users are concerned. Users don't need to
hear that it has been updated, since these release notes will also be
the first time they've been presented with any information about
pg_get_wal_block_info(). (This isn't very important; again, I suggest
that you avoid saying anything about any specific function, even if
you feel strongly that the "ending LSN" issue must be spelled out like
this.)

> > There is pretty much one truly new piece of functionality added to
> > pg_walinspect (the function called pg_get_wal_block_info was added) --
> > since the enhancement to rmgr description output applies equally to
> > pg_waldump, no matter where you place it in the release notes. So not
> > sure what you mean.
>
> I see what you mean now. I have removed the mention of
> pg_get_wal_block_info() and moved the three items back into the
> extension section since there are only three pg_walinspect items now.

The wording for this item as it appears in the patch is: "Improve
descriptions of pg_walinspect WAL record descriptions". I suggest the
following wording be used instead: "Provide more detailed descriptions
of certain WAL records in the output of pg_walinspect and pg_waldump".

--
Peter Geoghegan