Re: proposal: multiple psql option -c

On 11/15/2015 08:50 AM, Catalin Iacob wrote:
> On Sun, Nov 15, 2015 at 1:27 AM, Andrew Dunstan <andrew(at)dunslane(dot)net> wrote:
>> That seems to me to get rid of the main motivation for this change, which is
>> to allow multiple such arguments, which together would as as if they were
>> all written to a file which was then invoked like -f file.
> It seems to me the motivation is not "multiple command line arguments"
> but sending multiple statements to the backend in one psql invocation
> without needing bash specific here docs or a temporary file for -f.
> Most combinations of such multiple statements can already be sent via
> -c which sends them in one query, the backend executes them in one
> transaction but the backend rejects some combinations like SELECT +
> VACUUM.
>
> I think the proposal was mislead by the apparent similarity with -c
> and said "if -c can't do SELECT + VACUUM let's do a sort of repeated
> -c and call that -C SELECT -C VACUUM". But why not do the same with -C
> "SELECT 1; VACUUM" which works just like having a file with that
> content works today but handier for scripts? Doesn't this solve the
> exact need in this thread?
>
> I'm arguing that sending multiple statements and executing each in one
> transaction (the current proposed semantics of -C) is not like -c and
> doesn't need to be "repeated -c" it's exactly like reading stdin or
> file passed to -f and solves the original problem.But maybe I'm
> missing something.
>

I suggest you review the original thread on this subject before a line
was ever written. "multiple" (see subject line on this whole thread) is
clearly what is being asked for. Making people turn that into a single
argument is not what was envisaged. See for example Pavel's original
example involving use of xargs where that's clearly not at all easy.

cheers

andrew