Re: pg_hba.conf pre-parsing change

Bruce Momjian <pgman(at)candle(dot)pha(dot)pa(dot)us> writes:
>> Would it make sense to do fstat calls on these files and reload whenever
>> we observe that the file modification time has changed? That'd be an
>> additional kernel call per connection attempt, so I'm not at all sure
>> I want to do it ... but it ought to be debated. Comments anyone?

> We could, but we don't with postgresql.conf so it made sense to keep the
> behavior the same for the two files.

I'm inclined to agree --- for one thing, this allows one to edit the
files in place without worrying that the postmaster will pick up a
partially-edited file. But I wanted to throw the issue out to pghackers
to see if anyone would be really unhappy about having to SIGHUP the
postmaster after changing the authorization conf files.

In any case, if we don't change the code, the change in behavior from
prior releases needs to be documented...

regards, tom lane