Tom,
I have started working on the new protocol and have a question. Since
the startup packet now lets you set GUC parameters, what happens if you
send an invalid GUC parameter? (I don't have anything working yet so I
can't test this for myself). The reason I am asking is that the names
of GUC parameters can change between releases of the server. So in 7.5
the 'datestyle' parameter might be renamed to 'dateformat' (unlikely but
possible). At the time the startup packet is issued I don't yet know
what version of the server I am talking to, so I don't know what
parameter names to use. Therefore I think the result of passing a
unknown parameter name should not be fatal. Also it might be useful to
know what parameters got set and which did not (although once one knows
the server version, this probably can be infered from the server
version). It would probably be worth a note or two in the protocol docs
explaining how this will work across server releases so that all client
implementors are aware of this issue.
thanks,
--Barry