Message-ID: <447DEED7.70306@dunslane.net>
Date: Wed, 31 May 2006 15:30:31 -0400
From: Andrew Dunstan <andrew@dunslane.net>
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To: David Fetter <david@fetter.org>
CC: Andreas Pflug <pgadmin@pse-consulting.de>,
 Chris Browne <cbbrowne@acm.org>,
	pgsql-hackers@postgresql.org
Subject: Re: Possible TODO item: copy to/from pipe
References: 
 <E7F85A1B5FF8D44C8A1AF6885BC9A0E4013885E9@ratbert.vale-housing.co.uk>
	<447DC5B4.4080407@pse-consulting.de>
	<60ac8yt74e.fsf@dba2.int.libertyrms.com>
	<447DDCC3.7040304@pse-consulting.de>
	<447DE485.6040402@dunslane.net> <20060531191348.GK27220@fetter.org>
In-Reply-To: <20060531191348.GK27220@fetter.org>
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David Fetter wrote:
> On Wed, May 31, 2006 at 02:46:29PM -0400, Andrew Dunstan wrote:
>
>   
>> I wish somebody would explain to me the compelling use case for
>> this.
>>     
>
> As with "in-place upgrades,"[1] the compelling use case is being short
> on disk space.  For somebody with a multi-TB (or whatever figure
> sounds big this week) PostgreSQL database, it may be impossible to get
> space for twice or more that.  Giving people the option to stream
> COPYs through a pipe would alleviate a lot of pain.
>
> Cheers,
> D
>
> [1]  A feature people seem to think we don't need, although convincing
> cases have been made for it.
>   

But why is that hugely better than piping psql output to gzip?

The Unix philosophy is to use small chains of tools rather than put 
everything into one big tool.

Thus, this is quite unlike inplace upgrade, which I agree would be great 
(and where I would far rather see people spend their efforts), because 
unlike for this "feature" there is no viable alternative.

cheers

andrew