
> > > we've almost totally rewrite gist.c because old code and algorithm
> > > were not suitable for variable size keys. I think it might be
> > > submitted into 7.1 beta source tree.
> >
> > Urgh.  Dropping in a total rewrite when we're already past 
> beta3 doesn't
> > strike me as good project management practice --- especially if the
> > rewrite was done to add features (ie variable-size keys) not merely
> > fix bugs.  I think it might be more prudent to hold this for 7.2.
> 
> OK. If our changes will not go to 7.1, is't possible to create
> feature archive and announce it somewhere. It would be  nice if
> people could test it. Anyway, I'll create web page with all
> docs and patches. I'm afraid one more year to 7.2 is enough for
> GiST to die :-)

I think featureism is the the most prominent argument for PostgreSQL.
Thus standing before a decision to eighter fix GiST bugs and risc a new 
bug (limited to GiST) because of an added feature or shipping a known 
broken GiST, my vote would definitely be to add Oleg's patch.

Andreas

Thu, 11 Jan 2001 11:25:25 +0100
Zeugswetter Andreas SB  <ZeugswetterA@wien.spardat.at>
AW: Re: GiST for 7.1 !! 
On Thu, 11 Jan 2001, Zeugswetter Andreas SB wrote:

>
> > > > we've almost totally rewrite gist.c because old code and algorithm
> > > > were not suitable for variable size keys. I think it might be
> > > > submitted into 7.1 beta source tree.
> > >
> > > Urgh.  Dropping in a total rewrite when we're already past
> > beta3 doesn't
> > > strike me as good project management practice --- especially if the
> > > rewrite was done to add features (ie variable-size keys) not merely
> > > fix bugs.  I think it might be more prudent to hold this for 7.2.
> >
> > OK. If our changes will not go to 7.1, is't possible to create
> > feature archive and announce it somewhere. It would be  nice if
> > people could test it. Anyway, I'll create web page with all
> > docs and patches. I'm afraid one more year to 7.2 is enough for
> > GiST to die :-)
>
> I think featureism is the the most prominent argument for PostgreSQL.
> Thus standing before a decision to eighter fix GiST bugs and risc a new
> bug (limited to GiST) because of an added feature or shipping a known
> broken GiST, my vote would definitely be to add Oleg's patch.

Definetely, our changes limited to GiST insert algorithm only.
Other changes are bugfixes. I encourage people interested in GiST
to test my submission. Our implementation of RD-Tree which we used
to support of indexing of int4 arrays will works only with our
version of gist.c (actually our interest to GiST was motivated by
index support of int4 arrays).

	Regards,

		Oleg

>
> Andreas
>
_____________________________________________________________
Oleg Bartunov, sci.researcher, hostmaster of AstroNet,
Sternberg Astronomical Institute, Moscow University (Russia)
Internet: oleg@sai.msu.su, http://www.sai.msu.su/~megera/
phone: +007(095)939-16-83, +007(095)939-23-83




Thu, 11 Jan 2001 13:54:06 +0300 (GMT)
Oleg Bartunov <oleg@sai.msu.su>
Re: AW: Re: GiST for 7.1 !! 
Hannu Krosing <hannu@tm.ee> writes:
> That's my vote too, specially if there will be some regression tests 
> accompanying the patches. The current (pre-patch) state of affairs with 
> GiST could probably be described as security-by-obscurity anyhow i.e. 
> "we have't tried it so we think it probably works" ;-)

Au contraire, there *are* a few users of GiST out there now, Gene Selkov
to name one.  So there is a definite risk of breaking things that worked
in 7.0 and before, in the name of adding new features.

If I thought that we had adequate ability to test the new GiST
implementation during the remaining beta period, I wouldn't be
so worried.  But at this point, Oleg's changes could not appear
in the beta series before beta4, and between the late date, the
lack of regression test, and the few interested people to test it,
I doubt that we'll get any useful coverage.

I would recommend that Oleg do like Ryan K. did for awhile with the
Alpha patches: make them available as a set of diffs to be applied
to the official distribution.  We'll be happy to merge them in for
7.2, but the calendar says it's too late for 7.1.

			regards, tom lane

Thu, 11 Jan 2001 10:01:47 -0500
Tom Lane <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us>
Re: AW: Re: GiST for 7.1 !! 
Hannu Krosing <hannu@tm.ee> writes:
>> ... the calendar says it's too late for 7.1.

> Even for the _real_ bugfixes in gist.c ?

If he were submitting only bugfixes, we wouldn't be having this
discussion.

Look, I don't like postponing improvements either.  But if we don't
adhere to project management discipline, we are never going to get
releases out the door at all --- or if we do, they'll be too buggy
to be reliable.  It's not like "no new features during beta" is such
a draconian or difficult-to-understand rule.

The RelFileNodeEquals() bug we found on Monday proves that no one had
yet done enough stress-testing on 7.1 to discover that multiple
databases were broken.  Think about that for awhile before you campaign
for inserting untested new features at this point.  We need to focus on
TESTING, people, not new features.

			regards, tom lane

Thu, 11 Jan 2001 11:06:09 -0500
Tom Lane <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us>
Re: AW: Re: GiST for 7.1 !! 
Oleg Bartunov wrote:
> 
> On Thu, 11 Jan 2001, Zeugswetter Andreas SB wrote:
> 
> > I think featureism is the the most prominent argument for PostgreSQL.

Exactly! Altough it has already lost much of it ;( 

> > Thus standing before a decision to eighter fix GiST bugs and risc a new
> > bug (limited to GiST) because of an added feature or shipping a known
> > broken GiST, my vote would definitely be to add Oleg's patch.

That's my vote too, specially if there will be some regression tests 
accompanying the patches. The current (pre-patch) state of affairs with 
GiST could probably be described as security-by-obscurity anyhow i.e. 
"we have't tried it so we think it probably works" ;-)

Also I suspect there are still only a few users, most of them capable of 
fixing inside gist.c if something nasti turns up. 
They will be much more motivated to do so if it is in "official" sources 
and not in the sources from postgresql-gist.org or somesuch ;)

> Definetely, our changes limited to GiST insert algorithm only.
> Other changes are bugfixes. 

So applying _only_ bugfixes may also not be an option as they are not 
well tested without the changed gist.c

-----------------
Hannu

Thu, 11 Jan 2001 16:06:41 +0000
Hannu Krosing <hannu@tm.ee>
Re: AW: Re: GiST for 7.1 !!
Tom Lane wrote:
> 
> Hannu Krosing <hannu@tm.ee> writes:
> > That's my vote too, specially if there will be some regression tests
> > accompanying the patches. The current (pre-patch) state of affairs with
> > GiST could probably be described as security-by-obscurity anyhow i.e.
> > "we have't tried it so we think it probably works" ;-)
> 
> Au contraire, there *are* a few users of GiST out there now, Gene Selkov
> to name one.

Yes, he is the only one (except Oleg) whom I know to use it too ;)

>  So there is a definite risk of breaking things that worked
> in 7.0 and before, in the name of adding new features.

True. Could we ask Gene to test 7.1 with Oleg's patches ?

> If I thought that we had adequate ability to test the new GiST
> implementation during the remaining beta period, I wouldn't be
> so worried.  But at this point, Oleg's changes could not appear
> in the beta series before beta4, and between the late date, the
> lack of regression test, and the few interested people to test it,
> I doubt that we'll get any useful coverage.

Or if in fact there _are_ only a few people using it now we could 
get _all_ the coverage to be sufficiently sure we don't break anyones
code. GiST being such an obscure and underused feature I'm pretty sure 
that most (all?) active users are on Hackers list and read everything 
that has GiST in subject.

> I would recommend that Oleg do like Ryan K. did for awhile with the
> Alpha patches: make them available as a set of diffs to be applied
> to the official distribution.  We'll be happy to merge them in for
> 7.2, but the calendar says it's too late for 7.1.

Even for the _real_ bugfixes in gist.c ?

----------------
Hannu

Thu, 11 Jan 2001 17:35:12 +0000
Hannu Krosing <hannu@tm.ee>
Re: AW: Re: GiST for 7.1 !!
On Thu, 11 Jan 2001, Hannu Krosing wrote:

> I make a personal promise to spend at least 5 hours of testing new GiST
> functionality during this weekend if it is commited to 7.1 CVS.
> (ok, I do it anyhow, just that currently I'm testing it using the
> patches ;)

Hanny,

latest version is available at http://www.sai.msu.su/~megera/postgres/gist/
nothing changed in code (in compare with my submission), just added some
info and regression test. Let me know if you need some help.

	Oleg

>
> -------------------------
> Hannu
>

	Regards,
		Oleg
_____________________________________________________________
Oleg Bartunov, sci.researcher, hostmaster of AstroNet,
Sternberg Astronomical Institute, Moscow University (Russia)
Internet: oleg@sai.msu.su, http://www.sai.msu.su/~megera/
phone: +007(095)939-16-83, +007(095)939-23-83


Thu, 11 Jan 2001 22:22:09 +0300 (GMT)
Oleg Bartunov <oleg@sai.msu.su>
Re: AW: Re: GiST for 7.1 !!
Tom Lane wrote:
> 
> Hannu Krosing <hannu@tm.ee> writes:
> >> ... the calendar says it's too late for 7.1.
> 
> > Even for the _real_ bugfixes in gist.c ?
> 
> If he were submitting only bugfixes, we wouldn't be having this
> discussion.

But he had very little incentive to fix bugs in the version he 
would not use.

> Look, I don't like postponing improvements either.  But if we don't
> adhere to project management discipline,

But should we do that _blindly_?
I'd think that improving/fixing things in seldom-visited corners of
postgres should be a little more tolerable than messing around in core.

> we are never going to get
> releases out the door at all --- or if we do, they'll be too buggy
> to be reliable.  It's not like "no new features during beta" is such
> a draconian or difficult-to-understand rule.

I'd rather describe his changes as "a (bug)fix that required a major
rewrite" ;)

> The RelFileNodeEquals() bug we found on Monday proves that no one had
> yet done enough stress-testing on 7.1 to discover that multiple
> databases were broken.

BTW, What do people use for stress-testing ?
 
> Think about that for awhile before you campaign for inserting untested
> new features at this point. 

Rather new variants of little-tested features ;)

> We need to focus on TESTING, people, not new features.

I make a personal promise to spend at least 5 hours of testing new GiST 
functionality during this weekend if it is commited to 7.1 CVS. 
(ok, I do it anyhow, just that currently I'm testing it using the
patches ;)

-------------------------
Hannu

Thu, 11 Jan 2001 21:10:01 +0000
Hannu Krosing <hannu@tm.ee>
Re: AW: Re: GiST for 7.1 !!