Re: Reports on obsolete Postgres versions

On Tue, 2024-03-12 at 11:56 +0100, Daniel Gustafsson wrote:
> > I liked the statement from Laurenz a while ago on his blog
> > (paraphrased): "Upgrading to the latest patch release does not require
> > application testing or recertification". I am not sure we want to put
> > that into the official page (or maybe tone down/qualify it a bit), but I
> > think a lot of users stay on older minor versions because they dread
> > their internal testing policies.
>
> I think we need a more conservative language since a minor release might fix a
> planner bug that someone's app relied on and their plans will be worse after
> upgrading.  While rare, it can for sure happen so the official wording should
> probably avoid such bold claims.

I think we are pretty conservative with backpatching changes to the
optimizer that could destabilize existing plans.

I feel quite strongly that we should not use overly conservative language
there. If people feel that they have to test their applications for new
minor releases, the only effect will be that they won't install minor releases.
Installing a minor release should be as routine as the operating system
patches that many companies apply automatically during weekend maintenance
windows. They can also introduce bugs, and everybody knows and accepts that.

Yours,
Laurenz Albe