"Stephen R. van den Berg" <srb@cuci.nl> writes:
> It's just that matching table and file, and subsequently figuring out
> some missing columns which may have been added/removed later,
> can be rather timeconsuming and could be made a lot easier (not necessarily
> perfect) if that information would have been present in the first page of
> a file.
So you've already moved the goalposts from what was claimed in your
prior message. If the data is not maintained (with 100% reliability)
during ALTER TABLE, how are you going to do something like "figure out
missing columns"?
I can see the potential usefulness of a self-documenting table storage
format, but this proposal isn't that; it's just an unreliable kluge.
regards, tom lane