Re: Catalogs design question

Steve Howe writes:

> > The group array is a hack but the pg_proc array would be hard to replace
> > becauseit acts as part of the unique key used for cache lookups.
> This design itself bothers me.
> We have no other option left  ? Like arrays being referenced in relations ?
> That's far from perfect, but at least would solve those issues and others
> which might appear in other catalogs...

In general, the system catalogs are far from a perfect example (or even an
example at all) for pure, normalized relational database design.  A more
important concern in processing efficiency.  For instance, currently the
execution of a procedure takes one catalog lookup versus (1 + nargs) in a
more normalized design.  (This is an oversimplification, but you get the
idea.)

-- 
Peter Eisentraut   peter_e@gmx.net   http://funkturm.homeip.net/~peter