Re: Do we need "Diagnostics" sections of SQL command reference pages?

Tom,

> I'm starting to look at updating the docs to match 7.4 error message
> spellings. I find that a large part of the work I'll have to do is in
> updating the "Diagnostics" (formerly "Outputs") section of the command
> reference pages. I am wondering if it wouldn't be better to just rip
> out these sections entirely. They seem like nearly content-free fluff
> to me --- the listings of possible error messages are always incomplete,
> often out of date, and arguably useless. If there is an error message
> that's not clear enough by itself, we'd better fix the error message
> instead of putting a gloss on it in the reference page.
>
> Comments?

I agree that we don't need descriptions of the meaning of each error message
in the command documentation.

However, the listing of potential error messages is *very* useful to
application coders for doing automated handling of errors. Since we are now
supporting SQLSTATE responses, perhaps we could have error code ranges for
the commands? Or is that totally unreasonable?

--
-Josh Berkus
Aglio Database Solutions
San Francisco