8.4.1 distinct query WITHOUT order by

All...

One of the groups where I work uses a homegrown C/C++ application that
was written back in 7.3 days which is now running on an 8.4.1 server
(which, until very recently, was running on an 8.1 server).
Unfortunately, they did not use an order by in the query and are now
dealing with a return dataset that is unsorted and difficult to use.
The current maintainer is unsure about being able to do the right
thing and recompile the code after fixing the query.

Aside from disabling enable_hashagg (which, according to the
documentation, is performance-expensive), what other options do I
have?

What are the ramifications of renaming the table (containing 8000
rows) and creating a view of the same name?

Assuming it's possible, would the efficiency of a rule to rewrite the
query be an acceptable alternative?

Thanks in advance for any insight and suggestions!

-- Gary Chambers

/* Nothing fancy and nothing Microsoft! */