Re: [PATCH] Log CSV by default

Hi,

On 2018-11-30 19:53:18 +0100, David Fetter wrote:
> This makes it much simpler for computers to use the logs while not
> making it excessively difficult for humans to use them.

While perhaps not excessively so, I think it increases the difficulty
sufficiently that I'm against such a proposal. Yes, a conversion into
something more readable can be done programatically, but that's another
step before analyzing a problem. And besides, a lot of log fragments are
embedded in email, screenshotted etc.

Secondarily, csvlog doesn't contain all the interesting information.

Thirdly, it often increases the log volume noticably.

I think having a bin/pg_logparse tool that can parse postgres' config
file and attempt to parse the log contents in whatever format they are
would be much much more useful. Obviously not every log_line_prefix can
be parsed unambiguously, but a lot of formats can, and a lot more
formats can be made unambiguous (e.g. adding escape logic to application
name logging would be very useful).

- Andres