Re: Request for comment on setting binary format output per session

On 04.10.23 21:10, Robert Haas wrote:
> On Wed, Oct 4, 2023 at 10:17 AM Peter Eisentraut <peter(at)eisentraut(dot)org> wrote:
>> I think intuitively, this facility ought to work like client_encoding.
>
> I hadn't really considered client_encoding as a precedent for this
> setting. A lot of my discomfort with the proposed mechanism also
> applies to client_encoding, namely, suppose you call some function or
> procedure or whatever and it changes client_encoding on your behalf
> and now your communication with the server is all screwed up. That
> seems very unpleasant. Yet it's also existing behavior. I think one
> could conclude on these facts either that (a) client_encoding is fine
> and the problems with controlling behavior using that kind of
> mechanism are mostly theoretical or (b) that we messed up with
> client_encoding and shouldn't add any more mistakes of the same ilk or
> (c) that we should really be looking at redesigning the way
> client_encoding works, too.

Yeah I agree with all three of these points, but I don't have a strong
opinion which is the best one.