On 17.05.20 08:51, Alvaro Herrera wrote:
On 15.05.20 02:00, Alvaro Herrera wrote:
Thanks everybody. I have compiled together all the suggestions and the
result is in the attached patch. Some of it is of my own devising.
* I changed "instance", and made "cluster" be mostly a synonym of that.
In my understanding, "instance" and "cluster" should be different things,
not only synonyms. "instance" can be the term for permanently fluctuating
objects (processes and RAM) and "cluster" can denote the more static objects
(directories and files). What do you think? If you agree, I would create a
patch.
I don't think that's the general understanding of those terms. For all
I know, they *are* synonyms, and there's no specific term for "the
fluctuating objects" as you call them. The instance is either running
(in which case there are processes and RAM) or it isn't.
We have the basic tools "initdb — create a new PostgreSQL database cluster" which affects nothing but files, and we have "pg_ctl — initialize, start, stop, or control a PostgreSQL server" which - directly - affects nothing but processes and RAM. (Here the term "server" collides with new definitions in the glossary. But that's another story.)
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Jürgen Purtz