Packaging questions and ideas for 7

As I begin to get a feel for the changes in PostgreSQL 7, I begin to
think about the changes I will have to make to the RedHat RPMs.  Since
the 7 code is nowhere near a packageable condition as yet,  I have
restricted my thinking to some general issues.

In the latest RPM's for RedHat for version 6.5.2, a couple of scripts
and some documentation is packaged that is not part of the main
tarball.  Of the
additions, I find that there are pieces that could be useful as part of
the main tarball.

The first and foremost piece that I would like to see included (in a
modified form) is the migration script set that Oliver Elphick wrote and
I modified.  A further modification could be made to let these scripts
work for the general case -- environment variables, et al, to direct the
migration work.

There are two scripts of interest:

1.) pg_dumpall_new:  A modified pg_dumpall that uses a different port
number and linking loader directives to allow execution of backup copies
of postmaster, postgres, libpq.so, and psql to dump an old format
database after the new version has been installed.

2.) postgresql-dump: A script that performs the work of migrating --
whether it be a dump-restore, or whatnot.  This is a quite comprehensive
script.

Work would have to be done to these two scripts for the general case --
would such work be worth the effort for those who don't run the RPM or
Debian versions??  The work to be done would  comprise: writing a script
(as part of make install?) to pull the backup executables, and modifying
the two scripts above to work with postgresql installed WHEREVER.  The
scripts could be integrated with a configure directive, maybe?

I realize that these scripts solve a problem that is not widespread
(wide relative to number of platforms, not number of users), but someone
other than a Debian or RedHat user might find them useful.

Also packaged in the RPM set is a README for the rpm set, an initscript
for the RedHat SysV-style init system, and the PostgreSQL-HOWTO.  Of
these three, for the general case, the PostgreSQL-HOWTO is by far the
most useful -- in fact, a good portion of Bruce's outline is contained
within the HOWTO. The PostgreSQL HOWTO can be found on the Linux
Documentation Project's site (metalab.unc.edu/linux).

With the popularity of the RPM version (RedHat and Mandrake ship
substantially the same RPM set, with SuSE and Caldera shipping others),
would it be prudent to include some RPM-specific (and Debian specific)
notes in the main documentation, and where??  With all the different
layouts between the various packages, is it desireable to maybe make a
'packages FAQ'??

My next substantial challenge is going to be making the RedHat-specific
RPM set function on a non-RedHat RPM-based distribution, such as the
aforementioned Caldera and SuSE.  A generic RPM set will then be the
result -- and then any RPM-based distribution can use the enhancements
and will be generally compatible.  I got e-mail last week from a SuSE
user who wanted to use the 6.5.2-1 RPM set that I put together -- and,
quite frankly, I was clueless to SuSE, which was embarassing.  The
situation with Caldera is worse -- they packaged 6.2.1 a long time ago
(COL 1.3), and the latest version of COL doesn't even have PostgreSQL.

I am open to suggestions.

In any case, have a good one...

--
Lamar Owen
WGCR Internet Radio
Pisgah Forest, North Carolina
1 Peter 4:11