RE: Perform streaming logical transactions by background workers and parallel apply

On Thu, Jun 23, 2022 at 16:44 PM Amit Kapila <amit(dot)kapila16(at)gmail(dot)com> wrote:
> On Thu, Jun 23, 2022 at 12:51 PM wangw(dot)fnst(at)fujitsu(dot)com
> <wangw(dot)fnst(at)fujitsu(dot)com> wrote:
> >
> > On Mon, Jun 20, 2022 at 11:00 AM Amit Kapila <amit(dot)kapila16(at)gmail(dot)com>
> wrote:
> > > I have improved the comments in this and other related sections of the
> > > patch. See attached.
> > Thanks for your comments and patch!
> > Improved the comments as you suggested.
> >
> > > > > 3.
> > > > > +
> > > > > + <para>
> > > > > + Setting streaming mode to <literal>apply</literal> could export invalid
> > > LSN
> > > > > + as finish LSN of failed transaction. Changing the streaming mode and
> > > making
> > > > > + the same conflict writes the finish LSN of the failed transaction in the
> > > > > + server log if required.
> > > > > + </para>
> > > > >
> > > > > How will the user identify that this is an invalid LSN value and she
> > > > > shouldn't use it to SKIP the transaction? Can we change the second
> > > > > sentence to: "User should change the streaming mode to 'on' if they
> > > > > would instead wish to see the finish LSN on error. Users can use
> > > > > finish LSN to SKIP applying the transaction." I think we can give
> > > > > reference to docs where the SKIP feature is explained.
> > > > Improved the sentence as suggested.
> > > >
> > >
> > > You haven't answered first part of the comment: "How will the user
> > > identify that this is an invalid LSN value and she shouldn't use it to
> > > SKIP the transaction?". Have you checked what value it displays? For
> > > example, in one of the case in apply_error_callback as shown in below
> > > code, we don't even display finish LSN if it is invalid.
> > > else if (XLogRecPtrIsInvalid(errarg->finish_lsn))
> > > errcontext("processing remote data for replication origin \"%s\"
> > > during \"%s\" in transaction %u",
> > > errarg->origin_name,
> > > logicalrep_message_type(errarg->command),
> > > errarg->remote_xid);
> > I am sorry that I missed something in my previous reply.
> > The invalid LSN value here is to say InvalidXLogRecPtr (0/0).
> > Here is an example :
> > ```
> > 2022-06-23 14:30:11.343 CST [822333] logical replication worker CONTEXT:
> processing remote data for replication origin "pg_16389" during "INSERT" for
> replication target relation "public.tab" in transaction 727 finished at 0/0
> > ```
> >
>
> I don't think it is a good idea to display invalid values. We can mask
> this as we are doing in other cases in function apply_error_callback.
> The ideal way is that we provide a view/system table for users to
> check these errors but that is a matter of another patch. So users
> probably need to check Logs to see if the error is from a background
> apply worker to decide whether or not to switch streaming mode.

Thanks for your comments.
I improved it as you suggested. I mask the LSN if it is invalid LSN(0/0).
Also, I improved the related pg-doc as following:
```
When the streaming mode is <literal>parallel</literal>, the finish LSN of
failed transactions may not be logged. In that case, it may be necessary to
change the streaming mode to <literal>on</literal> and cause the same
conflicts again so the finish LSN of the failed transaction will be written
to the server log. For the usage of finish LSN, please refer to <link
linkend="sql-altersubscription"><command>ALTER SUBSCRIPTION ...
SKIP</command></link>.
```
After improving this (mask invalid LSN), I found that this improvement and
parallel apply patch do not seem to have a strong correlation. Would it be
better to improve and commit in another separate patch?

I also improved patches as suggested by Peter-san in [1] and [2].
Thanks for Shi Yu to improve the patches by addressing the comments in [2].

Attach the new patches.

[1] - https://www.postgresql.org/message-id/CAHut%2BPtu_eWOVWAKrwkUFdTAh_r-RZsbDFkFmKwEAmxws%3DSh5w%40mail.gmail.com
[2] - https://www.postgresql.org/message-id/CAHut%2BPsDzRu6PD1uSRkftRXef-KwrOoYrcq7Cm0v4otisi5M%2Bg%40mail.gmail.com

Regards,
Wang wei