Re: Remove fsync ON/OFF as a visible option?

From: Greg Stark <stark(at)mit(dot)edu>
To: Euler Taveira <euler(at)timbira(dot)com(dot)br>
Cc: Josh Berkus <josh(at)agliodbs(dot)com>, Michael Paquier <michael(dot)paquier(at)gmail(dot)com>, Peter Geoghegan <pg(at)heroku(dot)com>, "Joshua D(dot) Drake" <jd(at)commandprompt(dot)com>, pgsql-hackers <pgsql-hackers(at)postgresql(dot)org>
Subject: Re: Remove fsync ON/OFF as a visible option?
Date: 2015-03-22 21:50:16
Message-ID: CAM-w4HMz=sQpsKxu1h7sgqxEMSPoY8HtUFUqmscSqFKnX9ksYw@mail.gmail.com
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On Sun, Mar 22, 2015 at 3:34 PM, Euler Taveira <euler(at)timbira(dot)com(dot)br> wrote:
> On 21-03-2015 17:53, Josh Berkus wrote:
>> Now, I have *long* been an advocate that we should ship a "stripped"
>> PostgreSQL.conf which has only the most commonly used settings, and
>> leave the rest of the settings in the docs and
>> share/postgresql/postgresql.conf.advanced. Here's my example of such a
>> file, tailored to PostgreSQL 9.3:
>>
> +1. I agree that common used settings in a postgresql.conf file is
> useful for newbies. How do we ship it?

Fwiw I disagree. I'm a fan of the idea that the default should be an
empty config file. You should only have to put things in
postgresql.conf if you want something unusual or specific. We're a
long way from there but I would rather move towards there than keep
operating under the assumption that nobody will run Postgres without
first completing the rite of passage of reviewing every option in
postgresql.conf to see if it's relevant to their setup.

Apache used to ship with a config full of commented out options and
going through and figuring out which options needed to be enabled or
changed was the first step in installing Apache. It was awful. When
they adopted a strict policy that the default config was empty so the
only things you need in your config are options to specify what you
want to serve it became so much easier. I would argue it also
represents a more professional attitude where the job of the admin is
to declare only what he wants to happen and how it should differ from
the norm and the job of the software is to go about its business
without needing to be set up for normal uses.

--
greg

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