Hi pgsql hackers, I was testing the new psql command \getenv introduced on commit 33d3eeadb2 and from a user perspective, I think that would be nice if the PSQLVAR parameter were optional, therefore when it is only necessary to view the value of the environment variable, the user just run \getenv, for example:
\getenv PATH
/usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/bin
And when it is necessary to assign the environment variable in a variable, the user could execute like this:
\getenv PATH myvar
\echo :myvar
/usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/bin
For this flexibility the order of parameters would need to be reversed, instead of \getenv PSQLVAR ENVVAR would be \getenv ENVVAR PSQLVAR.
What do you guys think? I'm not a C expert but if this proposal is interesting I can write a patch.
it is not consistent with other \g* commands. Maybe a new statement \senv ? But what is the use case? You can just press ^z and inside shell write echo $xxx, and then fg
I think that the basic use case would be just for debugging, instead call \getenv and them \echo, we could just use \getenv. I don't see any other advantages, It would just be to
write fewer commands. I think that ^z and then fg is a good alternative, since this behavior would be inconsistent.
Regards
Pavel
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