Re: Should we eliminate or reduce HUP from docs?

On Fri, Mar 10, 2017 at 1:02 PM, Alvaro Herrera <alvherre(at)2ndquadrant(dot)com>
wrote:

> Joshua D. Drake wrote:
>
> > I am a bad speaker, I am writing a talk three weeks before the conference
> > (as opposed to on the plane).
>
> Hah.
>
> > I noticed in the docs we still reference the
> > passing of SIGHUP for reloading conf file but we now have
> pg_reload_conf();
> >
> > It seems the use of pg_reload_conf() would provide a better canonical
> > interface to our users. Especially those users who are not used to
> > interacting with the OS (Windows, Oracle etc...) for databases.
>
> There are several ways to cause a config file reload (pg_ctl reload,
> pg_reload_conf, direct SIGHUP). We could have a section in docs listing
> them all, and then all the other places that say a reload needs to occur
> simply refer the reader to that section.
>

​19.1.2 contains a fairly comprehensive coverage of the topic ​- but
postgres.conf is not the only thing that gets reloaded. Specifically,
"Client Authentication" (chapter 20) is also affected.

One theory would be to consider "configuration reload" part of "18. Server
... Operation" and document the mechanics there with forward references to
19/Configuration and 20/Authentication. The existing content in those
chapters discussing reload would then send the reader back to 18 for "how
to reload" and just state "when to reload" in their particular situations.

Any other spots that warrant the same treatment?

If we are going to touch this area up it might be worth a fresh
consideration of index entries too.

David J.