Re: Allow backend to output result sets in XML

Tom Lane wrote:
> Brian Moore <brianmooreca(at)yahoo(dot)com> writes:
> > i would like to begin work on the TODO item
> > Allow backend to output result sets in XML
>
> I am not sure why it's phrased that way --- surely the code to hack
> on is the client side, not the backend. Otherwise you need a
> protocol revision to make this happen, which implies hacking *both*
> ends.
>
> psql already has some code to output results as HTML tables; I'd
> think adding functionality in that vicinity would be the way to go.

Converting a libpq result set (or a JDBC result set or ...) to an XML
document should be a trivial string concatenation job that anyone can
implement in half an hour. The more interesting questions are: what
XML schema do you want to use and why? What do you want to do with the
XML in the first place? Would a streaming interface be a better? Do
you want a text document or a preparsed structure? What good would a,
say, libpq implementation be if it's more work to make a wrapper in one
of the other language bindings than implement it from scratch there?

I think "output XML" is just buzz. Give us a real use scenario and an
indication that a majority also has that use scenario (vs. the other
ones listed above), then we can talk.