Dear friends,

As usual, I am working in pgAdmin2, Dave Page's excellent GUI 
(http://pgadmin.postgresql.org).

Sometimes I create objects in the GUI, sometimes I run SQL queries directly. 
In this case, pgAdmin2 is not aware when the schema changes. Then, I have to 
refresh display manually. But what if I am working in development teams? How 
can pgAdmin2 be aware that some schema objects were modified by another user?

Why not create a "pg_dump --schema-only database_name" md5sum footprint each 
time an object is modified. Maybe this can be done automatically or by a 
server-side function like :

md5_schemafootprint_save;

This md5 footprint could be stored in the database and accessed by a server 
side function, like :

md5_schemafootprint_load;

Maybe this boils down to a more general question of dependency information of 
linked objects. Such a feature may also be needed in replication (to be aware 
of schema object changes). In this case, we might need a special table 
carrying md5 footprints of each schema object. This will allow to reload only 
the needed objects (provided that we have proper efficient CREATE OR REPLACE 
solutions).

But by now, as for pgAdmin2, a simple footprint of the entire schema would 
suffice. Is this worth adding such a feature to the 7.3 to-do-list ?

Just my $0.002.

Cheers,
Jean-Michel POURE



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Thu, 21 Feb 2002 13:36:13 +0100
Jean-Michel POURE <jm.poure@freesurf.fr>
[pgadmin-hackers] Feature request: md5sum footprint of schema objects