> > I don't think that enough votes are needed to reverse 
> > the change. You broke the discussion first rule.

Are you subscribed to general?  We had a big discussion there and there
was almost universal agreement that the LIMIT #,# syntax is too
error-prone, and the only reason to have it was for MySQL compatibility. 
Of course, our syntax is backward, so is it not a compatibility but an
incompatibility.

Everyone thought LIMIT # OFFSET # was preferred.

I don't mind reversing out all of this but I can't make everyone happy.

-- 
  Bruce Momjian                        |  http://candle.pha.pa.us
  pgman@candle.pha.pa.us               |  (610) 853-3000
  +  If your life is a hard drive,     |  830 Blythe Avenue
  +  Christ can be your backup.        |  Drexel Hill, Pennsylvania 19026

Mon, 22 Oct 2001 21:40:08 -0400 (EDT)
Bruce Momjian <pgman@candle.pha.pa.us>
Re: [GENERAL] To Postgres Devs : Wouldn't changing the  selectlimit
...
> Are you subscribed to general?
...
> Everyone thought LIMIT # OFFSET # was preferred.

I think Hiroshi's point is the same as mine: discussions of feature
changes need to happen on -hackers before being implemented.
Subscriptions to other mailing lists should not be required to stay up
with mainstream development issues.

I'm recently subscribed to -general, to allow me to respond to email
threads, but it has a lot of traffic and I may not stay subscribed for
long...

                    - Thomas

Tue, 23 Oct 2001 01:47:50 +0000
Thomas Lockhart <lockhart@fourpalms.org>
Re: [GENERAL] To Postgres Devs : Wouldn't changing the  

OK, then why did Tom tell me to have the discusion on general?  Don't we
ask the general users about user-visible feature removal?  The is not an
implementation issue but a simple, "What do users want?"  I agree it
would be good on hacker too, but how do we have a discussion on both?

> ...
> > Are you subscribed to general?
> ...
> > Everyone thought LIMIT # OFFSET # was preferred.
> 
> I think Hiroshi's point is the same as mine: discussions of feature
> changes need to happen on -hackers before being implemented.
> Subscriptions to other mailing lists should not be required to stay up
> with mainstream development issues.
> 
> I'm recently subscribed to -general, to allow me to respond to email
> threads, but it has a lot of traffic and I may not stay subscribed for
> long...
> 
>                     - Thomas
> 

-- 
  Bruce Momjian                        |  http://candle.pha.pa.us
  pgman@candle.pha.pa.us               |  (610) 853-3000
  +  If your life is a hard drive,     |  830 Blythe Avenue
  +  Christ can be your backup.        |  Drexel Hill, Pennsylvania 19026

Mon, 22 Oct 2001 21:55:47 -0400 (EDT)
Bruce Momjian <pgman@candle.pha.pa.us>
Re: [GENERAL] To Postgres Devs : Wouldn't changing the   selectlimit
Bruce Momjian wrote:
> 
> > > I don't think that enough votes are needed to reverse
> > > the change. You broke the discussion first rule.
> 
> Are you subscribed to general?  We had a big discussion there and there

I know the discussion and I've thought Peter's objection was
suffienctly valid to reverse your change but the discussion
has continued.

regards,
Hiroshi Inoue

Tue, 23 Oct 2001 11:03:24 +0900
Hiroshi Inoue <Inoue@tpf.co.jp>
Re: [GENERAL] To Postgres Devs : Wouldn't changing the  
Thomas Lockhart <lockhart@fourpalms.org> writes:
> I think Hiroshi's point is the same as mine: discussions of feature
> changes need to happen on -hackers before being implemented.

Well, IIRC there *was* some discussion about this some months back, and
no one particularly objected to changing it to be compatible with MySQL.
That's why Bruce felt free to execute on the TODO item despite being
so close to beta.

> Subscriptions to other mailing lists should not be required to stay up
> with mainstream development issues.

Actually, the reason we have an argument now is the other way around:
some non-hackers people complained when the change notice went by.
We do have an obligation to users who don't read -hackers.

Given the amount of noise being raised on the issue now, I think the
better part of valor is to revert to the 7.1 behavior and plan to
discuss it again for 7.3.  But it's not like Bruce did this with no
warning or discussion.

			regards, tom lane

Mon, 22 Oct 2001 22:32:57 -0400
Tom Lane <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us>
Re: [GENERAL] To Postgres Devs : Wouldn't changing the selectlimit 
> Thomas Lockhart <lockhart@fourpalms.org> writes:
> > I think Hiroshi's point is the same as mine: discussions of feature
> > changes need to happen on -hackers before being implemented.
> 
> Well, IIRC there *was* some discussion about this some months back, and
> no one particularly objected to changing it to be compatible with MySQL.
> That's why Bruce felt free to execute on the TODO item despite being
> so close to beta.
> 
> > Subscriptions to other mailing lists should not be required to stay up
> > with mainstream development issues.
> 
> Actually, the reason we have an argument now is the other way around:
> some non-hackers people complained when the change notice went by.
> We do have an obligation to users who don't read -hackers.
> 
> Given the amount of noise being raised on the issue now, I think the
> better part of valor is to revert to the 7.1 behavior and plan to
> discuss it again for 7.3.  But it's not like Bruce did this with no
> warning or discussion.

[ BCC to general ]

I agree.  Let me reverse this to 7.1 behavior, and note in the HISTORY
file that LIMIT #,# will be removed in 7.3.  That way, people know it is
coming and it gives them one release to fix their queries.  I know Tom
wanted it removed right away because it is so confusing but I think we
have enough votes to keep it around, unchanged, for another release.

As to whether we should emit a NOTICE every time LIMIT #,# is used, I
think not, but if people want it I can add it.

-- 
  Bruce Momjian                        |  http://candle.pha.pa.us
  pgman@candle.pha.pa.us               |  (610) 853-3000
  +  If your life is a hard drive,     |  830 Blythe Avenue
  +  Christ can be your backup.        |  Drexel Hill, Pennsylvania 19026

Mon, 22 Oct 2001 22:38:29 -0400 (EDT)
Bruce Momjian <pgman@candle.pha.pa.us>
Re: [HACKERS] To Postgres Devs : Wouldn't changing the selectlimit
On Monday 22 October 2001 10:32 pm, Tom Lane wrote:
> Thomas Lockhart <lockhart@fourpalms.org> writes:
> > I think Hiroshi's point is the same as mine: discussions of feature
> > changes need to happen on -hackers before being implemented.
[snip]
> > Subscriptions to other mailing lists should not be required to stay up
> > with mainstream development issues.

> Actually, the reason we have an argument now is the other way around:
> some non-hackers people complained when the change notice went by.
> We do have an obligation to users who don't read -hackers.

If they want to deal with development issues, let them subscribe to hackers.  
Sorry, I know that's more than a little rude.  But that _is_ what the hackers 
list is for, right?  'The developers live there' is the advertisement.....

As I'm subscribed to most of the postgresql lists, I sometimes miss which 
list it's on -- but I'll have to say that I agree with both Thomas and Bruce: 
the behavior needs to be fixed, AND it needs to be discussed on hackers 
before fixing.

> Given the amount of noise being raised on the issue now, I think the
> better part of valor is to revert to the 7.1 behavior and plan to
> discuss it again for 7.3.  But it's not like Bruce did this with no
> warning or discussion.

Communications breakdown either way.  The warning and discussion was on 
general -- a bcc to hackers would have been a good thing, IMHO.

But that's past.  It's mighty close to beta -- is this fix a showstopper?  
The behavior currently is rather broken according to the results of the 
discussion on general.  Do we really want a whole 'nother major version cycle 
to pass before this kludge is fixed?  Six months to a year down the road?

The longer this behavior is in the code, the harder it's going to be to 
remove it, IMNSHO.
--
Lamar Owen
WGCR Internet Radio
1 Peter 4:11

Mon, 22 Oct 2001 23:56:24 -0400
Lamar Owen <lamar.owen@wgcr.org>
Re: [GENERAL] To Postgres Devs : Wouldn't changing the selectlimit
Lamar Owen <lamar.owen@wgcr.org> writes:
> The behavior currently is rather broken according to the results of the 
> discussion on general.  Do we really want a whole 'nother major version cycle
> to pass before this kludge is fixed?  Six months to a year down the road?
> The longer this behavior is in the code, the harder it's going to be to 
> remove it, IMNSHO.

I agree completely with these points, which is why I'd rather have seen
it dealt with (one way or t'other) in 7.2.  But we appear to have a lot
of people who don't think it's been discussed adequately in
$PREFERRED_FORUM ... and the one thing I *really* don't want is to hold
up 7.2 beta anymore for this issue.  Let's stuff this worm back in the
can and get on with it.

			regards, tom lane

Tue, 23 Oct 2001 00:11:07 -0400
Tom Lane <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us>
Re: [GENERAL] To Postgres Devs : Wouldn't changing the selectlimit 
> But that's past.  It's mighty close to beta -- is this fix a showstopper?  
> The behavior currently is rather broken according to the results of the 
> discussion on general.  Do we really want a whole 'nother major version cycle 
> to pass before this kludge is fixed?  Six months to a year down the road?
> 
> The longer this behavior is in the code, the harder it's going to be to 
> remove it, IMNSHO.

We just have too many opinions here.  I have put it back and noted it
will be removed in 7.3.  If someone else wants to propose it to be
removed in 7.2 and have a vote, and do the work, and take the heat, go
ahead. I am not going to do it.

It is just like the grief I got over jdbc patches for 7.1.  At some
point it is not worth having people get upset at me over it.  Basically,
you have removed any desire I have to resolve this.


FYI, my personal opinion is that we should keep it around for one more
release because forcing people to remove it from the queries with no
warning is more disruptive, I think, than the fact we don't match
MySQL's syntax.  Also, LIMIT #,# is no longer documented.  That change
will be in 7.2.  Of course, that means that if someone tries MySQL's
syntax, they have no documentation stating that the params are
backwards.   If they read the HISTORY file, they will know not to use
LIMIT #,# anyway.

-- 
  Bruce Momjian                        |  http://candle.pha.pa.us
  pgman@candle.pha.pa.us               |  (610) 853-3000
  +  If your life is a hard drive,     |  830 Blythe Avenue
  +  Christ can be your backup.        |  Drexel Hill, Pennsylvania 19026

Tue, 23 Oct 2001 00:24:24 -0400 (EDT)
Bruce Momjian <pgman@candle.pha.pa.us>
Re: [GENERAL] To Postgres Devs : Wouldn't changing the selectlimit
Not possible to accept both forms at present and issue a notice that 
LIMIT m,n is deprecated?

If LIMIT m,n is found, internally re-write it to LIMIT m OFFSET n and 
press on.

This should appease everyone and still allow the 'proper' form to be 
implemented right now.  There isn't just the question of when it appears 
in pgsql, but when it appears in everyone else's code that depends on 
postgres.  If you delay LIMIT..OFFSET, then I too am affected in my 
code.  If I use it today and my code is in beta (which it is), then when 
it goes release, I'll have to issue a change in the future for that. 
 Granted it's not a big thing for me, but if I have 200,000 
installations, that means eventually there will have to be 200,000 
upgrades when they upgrade postgres.

We all know that everyone updates their software frequently and in a 
timely manner to keep things running smoothly, right?  *cough*

David

Tom Lane wrote:

>Given the amount of noise being raised on the issue now, I think the
>better part of valor is to revert to the 7.1 behavior and plan to
>discuss it again for 7.3.  But it's not like Bruce did this with no
>warning or discussion.
>



Tue, 23 Oct 2001 01:07:23 -0400
David Ford <david@blue-labs.org>
Re: [GENERAL] To Postgres Devs : Wouldn't changing the selectlimit
> I agree completely with these points, which is why I'd rather have seen
> it dealt with (one way or t'other) in 7.2.  But we appear to have a lot
> of people who don't think it's been discussed adequately in
> $PREFERRED_FORUM ... and the one thing I *really* don't want is to hold
> up 7.2 beta anymore for this issue.  Let's stuff this worm back in the
> can and get on with it.

Frankly, I'd be happy to consider this a bug fix either way. The timing
is compatible with 7.2, and I'm happy that Bruce is bringing this to
resolution. My point was simply that some discussion on -hackers is
appropriate, and that others on -hackers who might have a stake in this
should be in on the discussion.

fwiw, I don't have a strong opinion about *which* path is taken to fix
the problem. But the old implementation is the worst of all worlds, and
the replacement syntax which is already in the code is a better choice.

                     - Thomas

Tue, 23 Oct 2001 13:52:18 +0000
Thomas Lockhart <lockhart@fourpalms.org>
Re: [GENERAL] To Postgres Devs : Wouldn't changing the 
> Not possible to accept both forms at present and issue a notice that 
> LIMIT m,n is deprecated?

We accept both now and will for <=7.2.  In 7.3, it will be only LIMIT #
OFFSET #.

-- 
  Bruce Momjian                        |  http://candle.pha.pa.us
  pgman@candle.pha.pa.us               |  (610) 853-3000
  +  If your life is a hard drive,     |  830 Blythe Avenue
  +  Christ can be your backup.        |  Drexel Hill, Pennsylvania 19026

Tue, 23 Oct 2001 12:23:18 -0400 (EDT)
Bruce Momjian <pgman@candle.pha.pa.us>
Re: [GENERAL] To Postgres Devs : Wouldn't changing the selectlimit