We removed the indexing method "rtree" in version 8.3 and replaced it with "gist". Until today there are some "rtree" heritages:
- "CREATE INDEX ... USING rtree ..." is valid syntax and leads to the message "NOTICE: substituting access method gist for obsolete method rtree"
- The documentation refers to the method in ref/comments.sgml and ref/create_index.sgml.
- The documentation uses the term "R-Tree" in gist.sgml, seg.sgml, and xindex.sgml. That's ok because in this cases it refers to the abstract concept of R-trees and not to the eliminated implementation.
Isn't it time to disallow this syntax and remove all references and messages? The situation concerning index types, access methods, operator classes, and index related extensions is complicate enough and hard to explain to newcomers. Every simplification should be welcomed.
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Jürgen Purtz