Hi all!
I wanted to propose a possible "rationalization" of the PostgreSQL naming
scheme, as briefly outlined below. The following suggestion may seem like a
trivial improvement to some, but to me it is a matter of polish and
consistency.
One possible renaming / reorganization: (feedback encouraged!!!)
change default account name postgres to pgsql
change daemon name postmaster to pgsqld
change client name psql to pgsql
change data location /var/lib/pgsql/data to /var/pgsql
move .conf files from /var/lib/pgsql/data to /etc/pgsql
change all PG_xxx file names (PG_VERSION, /usr/bin/pg_xxx, etc) to pgsql_xxx
change all postgresql* file names to pgsql*
whatever else I have missed...:)
I think this would be a very worthwhile improvement, but I don't know how
others feel about this. It should make it easier for newbies to learn their
way around and generally reduce confusion.
Going a bit further in reorganization, if the config files always lived in
an /etc/pgsql directory, then pgsqld (aka postmaster) could start with zero
parameters and zero environment variables (true?), since it could get PGDATA
and PGLIB type data, plus log file location, from the config files. This
should simplify the init scripts as well, and generally make setup easier.
Eventually, other environment variables (like the one passed to CREATE
DATABASE name WITH
LOCATION = 'location' where location is an environment variable) could be
eliminated, so that all configuration information lived in /etc/pgsql conf
files.
I am a Unix/Linux novice, but this seems to make sense to me. What does
everyone think?
Rob
PS Please forgive me in advance if this is not the correct mailing list to
propose this on.