Re: pg_config --version-num

Craig Ringer <craig(at)2ndquadrant(dot)com> writes:
> On 31 May 2017 9:36 am, "Michael Paquier" <michael(dot)paquier(at)gmail(dot)com> wrote:
>> Is the data in Makefile.global unsufficient?

> It's a pain in the butt because then you need to find or get passed the
> name of Makefile.global. Then you have to template it out into a file. Or
> parse the Makefile. Or create a wrapper program to emit it.
> It's beyond me why we don't expose this at runtime for use in scripts and
> tools. (Then again, the same is true of reporting it in the startup message
> and we know how that's gone).

Hm, but with this you're trading that problem for "is the right version
of pg_config in my PATH?". I can't see using this in TAP testing, for
instance, because it would never work in "make check" scenarios.

This idea might well be useful for external packages which are always
built/tested against installed versions of Postgres. But it seems like
we need to think harder about what to do for our own usages, and that
may lead to a different solution altogether.

regards, tom lane