TODO.html 108 KB
Newer Older
1 2 3 4
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN"
"http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">
<html>
<head>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
5
<title>PostgreSQL TODO List</title>
6 7 8
<meta name="generator" content="HTML::TextToHTML v2.25"/>
</head>
<body bgcolor="#FFFFFF" text="#000000" link="#FF0000" vlink="#A00000" alink="#0000FF">
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
9 10
<h1><a name="section_1">PostgreSQL TODO List</a></h1>
<p>Current maintainer:     Bruce Momjian (<a href="mailto:bruce@momjian.us">bruce@momjian.us</a>)<br/>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
11
Last updated:           Wed Apr 23 22:24:23 EDT 2008
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
12
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
13 14
<p>The most recent version of this document can be viewed at<br/>
<a href="http://www.postgresql.org/docs/faqs.TODO.html">http://www.postgresql.org/docs/faqs.TODO.html</a>.
15
</p>
16
<p><strong>A hyphen, "-", marks changes that will appear in the upcoming 8.3 release.</strong><br/>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
17
<strong>A percent sign, "%", marks items that are easier to implement.</strong>
18 19 20
</p>
<p>This list contains all known PostgreSQL bugs and feature requests. If<br/>
you would like to work on an item, please read the Developer's FAQ<br/>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
21 22
first.  There is also a developer's wiki at<br/>
<a href="http://developer.postgresql.org">http://developer.postgresql.org</a>.
23
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
24
<h1><a name="section_2">Administration</a></h1>
25 26

<ul>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
27
  <li>-<em>Allow administrators to safely terminate individual sessions either</em>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
28
  via an SQL function or SIGTERM
29 30 31
  </li><li>Check for unreferenced table files created by transactions that were
  in-progress when the server terminated abruptly
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2006-06/msg00096.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2006-06/msg00096.php</a>
32
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
33
  </li><li>Set proper permissions on non-system schemas during db creation
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
34 35 36 37
<p>  Currently all schemas are owned by the super-user because they are copied
  from the template1 database.  However, since all objects are inherited
  from the template database, it is not clear that setting schemas to the db
  owner is correct.
38
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
39
  </li><li>Add function to report the time of the most recent server reload
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
40 41 42
  </li><li>Allow statistics collector information to be pulled from the collector
  process directly, rather than requiring the collector to write a
  filesystem file twice a second?
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
43 44 45
  </li><li>Reduce file system activity overhead of statistics file pgstat.stat
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2007-12/msg00106.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2007-12/msg00106.php</a>
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
46 47
  </li><li>Allow statistics last vacuum/analyze execution times to be displayed
  without requiring stats_row_level to be enabled
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
48 49
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-docs/2007-04/msg00028.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-docs/2007-04/msg00028.php</a>
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
50 51 52
  </li><li>Allow log_min_messages to be specified on a per-module basis
<p>  This would allow administrators to see more detailed information from
  specific sections of the backend, e.g. checkpoints, autovacuum, etc.
53 54
  Another idea is to allow separate configuration files for each module,
  or allow arbitrary SET commands to be passed to them.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
55
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
56 57
  </li><li>Simplify ability to create partitioned tables
<p>  This would allow creation of partitioned tables without requiring
58 59
  creation of triggers or rules for INSERT/UPDATE/DELETE, and constraints
  for rapid partition selection.  Options could include range and hash
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
60
  partition selection.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
61 62
</p>
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-03/msg00375.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-03/msg00375.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
63
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-04/msg00151.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-04/msg00151.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
64
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-01/msg00028.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-01/msg00028.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
65
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-01/msg00248.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-01/msg00248.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
66
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-01/msg00387.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-01/msg00387.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
67
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-01/msg00413.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-01/msg00413.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
68 69
</p>
  </li><li>Allow auto-selection of partitioned tables for min/max() operations
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
70
  </li><li>Allow more complex user/database default GUC settings
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
71
<p>  Currently ALTER USER and ALTER DATABASE support per-user and
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
72
  per-database defaults.  Consider adding per-user-and-database
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
73
  defaults so things like search_path can be defaulted for a
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
74
  specific user connecting to a specific database.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
75 76 77
</p>
  </li><li>Allow custom variable classes that can restrict who can set the values
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-11/msg00911.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-11/msg00911.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
78
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
79 80 81
  </li><li>Implement the SQL standard mechanism whereby REVOKE ROLE revokes only
  the privilege granted by the invoking role, and not those granted
  by other roles
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
82
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-bugs/2007-05/msg00010.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-bugs/2007-05/msg00010.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
83 84 85
</p>
  </li><li>Allow SSL authentication/encryption over unix domain sockets
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-12/msg00924.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-12/msg00924.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
86 87 88 89
</p>
  </li><li>Allow SSL key file permission checks to be optionally disabled when
  sharing SSL keys with other applications
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-bugs/2007-12/msg00069.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-bugs/2007-12/msg00069.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
90 91 92 93 94 95
</p>
  </li><li>Allow client certificate names to be checked against the client
  hostname
<p>  This is already implemented in
  libpq/fe-secure.c::verify_peer_name_matches_certificate() but the code
  is commented out.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
96
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
97 98
  </li><li>Configuration files
  <ul>
99
    <li>Allow pg_hba.conf to specify host names along with IP addresses
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
100 101 102 103 104 105
<p>          Host name lookup could occur when the postmaster reads the
          pg_hba.conf file, or when the backend starts.  Another
          solution would be to reverse lookup the connection IP and
          check that hostname against the host names in pg_hba.conf.
          We could also then check that the host name maps to the IP
          address.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
106
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
107
    </li><li>%Allow postgresql.conf file values to be changed via an SQL
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
108
          API, perhaps using SET GLOBAL
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
109
    </li><li>Allow the server to be stopped/restarted via an SQL API
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
110
    </li><li>Issue a warning if a change-on-restart-only postgresql.conf value
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
111
          is modified  and the server config files are reloaded
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
112 113 114
    </li><li>Consider normalizing fractions in postgresql.conf, perhaps
          using '%'
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-06/msg00550.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-06/msg00550.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
115 116 117 118
</p>
    </li><li>Allow Kerberos to disable stripping of realms so we can
          check the username@realm against multiple realms
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-11/msg00009.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-11/msg00009.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
119
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
120 121 122 123 124 125
  </li></ul>
  </li><li>Tablespaces
  <ul>
    <li>Allow a database in tablespace t1 with tables created in
          tablespace t2 to be used as a template for a new database created
          with default tablespace t2
126 127 128 129 130 131 132 133 134
<p>          Currently all objects in the default database tablespace must
          have default tablespace specifications. This is because new
          databases are created by copying directories. If you mix default
          tablespace tables and tablespace-specified tables in the same
          directory, creating a new database from such a mixed directory
          would create a new database with tables that had incorrect
          explicit tablespaces.  To fix this would require modifying
          pg_class in the newly copied database, which we don't currently
          do.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
135 136 137 138 139 140 141 142
</p>
    </li><li>Allow reporting of which objects are in which tablespaces
<p>          This item is difficult because a tablespace can contain objects
          from multiple databases. There is a server-side function that
          returns the databases which use a specific tablespace, so this
          requires a tool that will call that function and connect to each
          database to find the objects in each database for that tablespace.
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
143
    </li><li>Allow WAL replay of CREATE TABLESPACE to work when the directory
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
144
          structure on the recovery computer is different from the original
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
145
    </li><li>Allow per-tablespace quotas
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
146
  </li></ul>
147
  </li><li>Point-In-Time Recovery (PITR)
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
148
  <ul>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Done:  
Bruce Momjian committed
149
    <li>Allow a warm standby system to also allow read-only statements
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
150
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-03/msg00050.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-03/msg00050.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
151
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Done:  
Bruce Momjian committed
152
    </li><li>%Create dump tool for write-ahead logs for use in determining
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
153 154
          transaction id for point-in-time recovery
<p>          This is useful for checking PITR recovery.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
155
</p>
156
    </li><li>Allow recovery.conf to support the same syntax as
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
157 158
          postgresql.conf, including quoting
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-12/msg00497.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-12/msg00497.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
159 160 161 162
</p>
    </li><li>Fix server restart problem when the server was shutdown during
          a PITR backup
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-11/msg00800.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-11/msg00800.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
163 164 165 166
</p>
    </li><li>Recreate pg_xlog/archive_status/ if it doesn't exist after
          restoring from a PITR backup
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-12/msg00487.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-12/msg00487.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
167
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
168 169
  </li></ul>
</li></ul>
170
<h1><a name="section_3">Data Types</a></h1>
171 172

<ul>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
173
  <li>Change NUMERIC to enforce the maximum precision
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
174 175
  </li><li>Reduce storage space for small NUMERICs
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-02/msg01331.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-02/msg01331.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
176
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-02/msg00505.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-02/msg00505.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
177
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-06/msg00715.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-06/msg00715.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
178
</p>
179
  </li><li>Fix data types where equality comparison isn't intuitive, e.g. box
Bruce Momjian's avatar
>  
Bruce Momjian committed
180 181
  </li><li>Add support for public SYNONYMs
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-03/msg00519.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-03/msg00519.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
182 183 184
</p>
  </li><li>Fix CREATE CAST on DOMAINs
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-05/msg00072.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-05/msg00072.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
185
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-09/msg01681.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-09/msg01681.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
186 187 188 189
</p>
  </li><li>Allow domains to be cast
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2003-06/msg01206.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2003-06/msg01206.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-08/msg00289.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-08/msg00289.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
190
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
191 192
  </li><li>Add support for SQL-standard GENERATED/IDENTITY columns
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-07/msg00543.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-07/msg00543.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
193
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-08/msg00038.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-08/msg00038.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
194 195
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-05/msg00344.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-05/msg00344.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-05/msg00076.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-05/msg00076.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
196
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-02/msg00604.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-02/msg00604.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
197
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
198 199
  </li><li>Improve XML support
<p>  <a href="http://developer.postgresql.org/index.php/XML_Support">http://developer.postgresql.org/index.php/XML_Support</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
200
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
201 202
  </li><li>Consider placing all sequences in a single table, or create a system
  view
203
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-03/msg00008.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-03/msg00008.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
204 205 206
</p>
  </li><li>Allow the UUID type to accept non-standard formats
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-02/msg01214.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-02/msg01214.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
207 208 209
</p>
  </li><li>Allow text search dictionary to filter out only stop words
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-11/msg00081.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-11/msg00081.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
210
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
211
  </li><li>Consider a function-based API for '@@' full text searches
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
212
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-11/msg00511.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-11/msg00511.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
213 214 215
</p>
  </li><li>Improve text search error messages
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-10/msg00966.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-10/msg00966.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
216
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-11/msg01146.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-11/msg01146.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
217 218 219
</p>
  </li><li>Consider a special data type for regular expressions
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-08/msg01067.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-08/msg01067.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
220 221 222
</p>
  </li><li>Reduce BIT data type overhead using short varlena headers
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2007-12/msg00273.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2007-12/msg00273.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
223 224 225 226 227
</p>
  </li><li>Allow xml arrays to be cast to other data types
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-09/msg00981.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-09/msg00981.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-10/msg00231.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-10/msg00231.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-11/msg00471.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-11/msg00471.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
228
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
229
  </li><li>Simplify integer cross-data-type operators
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
230
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-bugs/2008-01/msg00189.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-bugs/2008-01/msg00189.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
231 232 233
</p>
  </li><li>Allow XML to accept more liberal DOCTYPE specifications
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2008-02/msg00347.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2008-02/msg00347.php</a>
234
</p>
235
  </li><li>Dates and Times
236
  <ul>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
237
    <li>Allow infinite dates and intervals just like infinite timestamps
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
238
    </li><li>Merge hardwired timezone names with the TZ database; allow either
239 240
          kind everywhere a TZ name is currently taken
    </li><li>Allow TIMESTAMP WITH TIME ZONE to store the original timezone
241
          information, either zone name or offset from UTC
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
242
<p>          If the TIMESTAMP value is stored with a time zone name, interval
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
243
          computations should adjust based on the time zone rules.
244
          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2004-10/msg00705.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2004-10/msg00705.php</a>
245
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
246
    </li><li>Fix SELECT '0.01 years'::interval, '0.01 months'::interval
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
247
    </li><li>Add a GUC variable to allow output of interval values in ISO8601
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
248
          format
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
249 250 251
    </li><li>Have timestamp subtraction not call justify_hours()?
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-sql/2006-10/msg00059.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-sql/2006-10/msg00059.php</a>
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
252
    </li><li>Improve timestamptz subtraction to be DST-aware
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
253
<p>          Currently subtracting one date from another that crosses a
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
254 255 256 257 258 259 260
          daylight savings time adjustment can return '1 day 1 hour', but
          adding that back to the first date returns a time one hour in
          the future.  This is caused by the adjustment of '25 hours' to
          '1 day 1 hour', and '1 day' is the same time the next day, even
          if daylight savings adjustments are involved.
</p>
    </li><li>Fix interval display to support values exceeding 2^31 hours
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
261
    </li><li>Add overflow checking to timestamp and interval arithmetic
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
262 263 264
    </li><li>Extend timezone code to allow 64-bit values so we can
          represent years beyond 2038
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-09/msg01363.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-09/msg01363.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
265 266 267 268
</p>
    </li><li>Use LC_TIME for localized weekday/month names, rather than
          LC_MESSAGES
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-11/msg00390.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-11/msg00390.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
269
</p>
270
    </li><li>Add ISO INTERVAL handling
271 272
  </li></ul>
</li></ul>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
273 274
<p>                  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-01/msg00250.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-01/msg00250.php</a><br/>
                  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-bugs/2006-04/msg00248.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-bugs/2006-04/msg00248.php</a>
275 276
</p>
<ul>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
277
  <li>Support ISO INTERVAL syntax if units cannot be determined from
278
                  the string, and are supplied after the string
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
279 280 281 282 283
<p>                  The SQL standard states that the units after the string
                  specify the units of the string, e.g. INTERVAL '2' MINUTE
                  should return '00:02:00'. The current behavior has the units
                  restrict the interval value to the specified unit or unit
                  range, INTERVAL '70' SECOND returns '00:00:10'.
284 285 286
</p>
<p>                  For syntax that isn't uniquely ISO or PG syntax, like '1' or
                  '1:30', treat as ISO if there is a range specification clause,
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
287 288 289 290 291 292 293 294 295 296
                  and as PG if there no clause is present, e.g. interpret '1:30'
                  MINUTE TO SECOND as '1 minute 30 seconds', and interpret
                  '1:30' as '1 hour, 30 minutes'.
</p>
<p>                  This makes common cases like SELECT INTERVAL '1' MONTH
                  SQL-standard results. The SQL standard supports a limited
                  number of unit combinations and doesn't support unit names in
                  the string. The PostgreSQL syntax is more flexible in the
                  range of units supported, e.g. PostgreSQL supports '1 year 1
                  hour', while the SQL standard does not.
297
</p>
298 299 300 301
  </li><li>Add support for year-month syntax, INTERVAL '50-6' YEAR
                  TO MONTH
  </li><li>Interpret INTERVAL '1 year' MONTH as CAST (INTERVAL '1
                  year' AS INTERVAL MONTH), and this should return '12 months'
302
  </li><li>Round or truncate values to the requested precision, e.g.
303
                  INTERVAL '11 months' AS YEAR should return one or zero
304
  </li><li>Support precision, CREATE TABLE foo (a INTERVAL MONTH(3))
305
  <ul>
306 307
    <li>Arrays
    <ul>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
308
      <li>Delay resolution of array expression's data type so assignment
309
          coercion can be performed on empty array expressions
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
310
      </li><li>Add support for arrays of domains
311 312
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-05/msg00114.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-05/msg00114.php</a>
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
313
      </li><li>Allow single-byte header storage for array elements
314 315 316
    </li></ul>
    </li><li>Binary Data
    <ul>
317
      <li>Improve vacuum of large objects, like contrib/vacuumlo?
318 319
      </li><li>Add security checking for large objects
      </li><li>Auto-delete large objects when referencing row is deleted
320
<p>          contrib/lo offers this functionality.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
321
</p>
322
      </li><li>Allow read/write into TOAST values like large objects
323
<p>          This requires the TOAST column to be stored EXTERNAL.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
324
</p>
325
      </li><li>Add API for 64-bit large object access
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
326
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2005-09/msg00781.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2005-09/msg00781.php</a>
327
</p>
328
    </li></ul>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
329 330
    </li><li>MONEY data type
    <ul>
331
      <li>Add locale-aware MONEY type, and support multiple currencies
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
332 333 334
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2005-08/msg01432.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2005-08/msg01432.php</a>
          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-03/msg01181.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-03/msg01181.php</a>
</p>
335
      </li><li>MONEY dumps in a locale-specific format making it difficult to
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
336
          restore to a system with a different locale
337
      </li><li>Allow MONEY to be easily cast to/from other numeric data types
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
338
    </li></ul>
339 340
  </li></ul>
</li></ul>
341
<h1><a name="section_4">Functions</a></h1>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
342 343

<ul>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
344
  <li>Allow INET subnet tests using non-constants to be indexed
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
345
  </li><li>Allow to_date() and to_timestamp() accept localized month names
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
346 347 348
  </li><li>Fix to_date()-related functions to consistently issue errors
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-02/msg00915.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-02/msg00915.php</a>
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
349
  </li><li>Add missing parameter handling in to_char()
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
350
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2005-12/msg00948.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2005-12/msg00948.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
351
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
352 353 354 355
  </li><li>Allow substring/replace() to get/set bit values
  </li><li>Allow to_char() on interval values to accumulate the highest unit
  requested
<p>  Some special format flag would be required to request such
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
356
  accumulation.  Such functionality could also be added to EXTRACT.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
357 358 359 360 361
  Prevent accumulation that crosses the month/day boundary because of
  the uneven number of days in a month.
</p>
  <ul>
    <li>to_char(INTERVAL '1 hour 5 minutes', 'MI') =&gt; 65
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
362
    </li><li>to_char(INTERVAL '43 hours 20 minutes', 'MI' ) =&gt; 2600
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
363 364 365
    </li><li>to_char(INTERVAL '43 hours 20 minutes', 'WK:DD:HR:MI') =&gt; 0:1:19:20
    </li><li>to_char(INTERVAL '3 years 5 months','MM') =&gt; 41
  </li></ul>
366
  </li><li>Implement inlining of set-returning functions defined in SQL
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
367
  </li><li>Allow SQL-language functions to return results from RETURNING queries
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
368
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-10/msg00665.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-10/msg00665.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
369 370
</p>
  </li><li>Allow SQL-language functions to reference parameters by parameter name
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
371 372
<p>  Currently SQL-language functions can only refer to dollar parameters,
  e.g. $1
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
373
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
374
  </li><li>Add SPI_gettypmod() to return the typemod for a TupleDesc
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
375 376 377
  </li><li>Enforce typmod for function inputs, function results and parameters for
  spi_prepare'd statements called from PLs
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-01/msg01403.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-01/msg01403.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
378
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
379
  </li><li>Allow holdable cursors in SPI
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
380
  </li><li>Tighten function permission checks
381
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-12/msg00568.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-12/msg00568.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
382 383 384 385
</p>
  </li><li>Fix IS OF so it matches the ISO specification, and add documentation
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2003-08/msg00060.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2003-08/msg00060.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-02/msg00060.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-02/msg00060.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
386 387 388 389
</p>
  </li><li>Add missing operators for geometric data types
<p>  Some geometric types do not have the full suite of geometric operators,
  e.g. box @&gt; point
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
390 391 392
</p>
  </li><li>Implement Boyer-Moore searching in strpos()
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-08/msg00012.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-08/msg00012.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
393 394 395 396 397 398
</p>
  </li><li>Prevent malicious functions from being executed with the permissions
  of unsuspecting users
<p>  Index functions are safe, so VACUUM and ANALYZE are safe too. 
  Triggers, CHECK and DEFAULT expressions, and rules are still vulnerable.
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-01/msg00268.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-01/msg00268.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
399 400 401
</p>
  </li><li>Reduce memory usage of aggregates in set returning functions
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-performance/2008-01/msg00031.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-performance/2008-01/msg00031.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
402 403 404
</p>
  </li><li>Add temporal versions of generate_series()
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-04/msg01180.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-04/msg01180.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
405 406
</p>
  </li><li>Add array_accum() and array_to_set() functions for arrays
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
407 408
<p>  The standards specify array_agg() and UNNEST.
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-08/msg00464.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-08/msg00464.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
409 410 411
</p>
  </li><li>Fix /contrib/ltree operator
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-bugs/2007-11/msg00044.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-bugs/2007-11/msg00044.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
412 413 414
</p>
  </li><li>Fix inconsistent precedence of =, &gt;, and &lt; compared to &lt;&gt;, &gt;=, and &lt;=
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-bugs/2007-12/msg00145.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-bugs/2007-12/msg00145.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
415 416 417
</p>
  </li><li>Fix regular expression bug when using complex back-references
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-bugs/2007-10/msg00000.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-bugs/2007-10/msg00000.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
418 419 420
</p>
  </li><li>Have /contrib/dblink reuse unnamed connections
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-10/msg00895.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-10/msg00895.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
421 422 423
</p>
  </li><li>Add SQL-standard array_agg() and unnest() array functions
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-01/msg01017.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-01/msg01017.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
424
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
425 426
  </li><li>Allow calling of a procedure outside a SELECT that can control the
  transaction state
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
427
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-10/msg01375.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-10/msg01375.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
428
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
429
</li></ul>
430
<h1><a name="section_5">Multi-Language Support</a></h1>
431 432 433 434

<ul>
  <li>Add NCHAR (as distinguished from ordinary varchar),
  </li><li>Allow locale to be set at database creation
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
435 436 437 438
<p>  Currently locale can only be set during initdb.  No global tables have
  locale-aware columns.  However, the database template used during
  database creation might have locale-aware indexes.  The indexes would
  need to be reindexed to match the new locale.
439
</p>
440 441 442
  </li><li>Allow encoding on a per-column basis optionally using the ICU library;
  Add CREATE COLLATE
<p>  Right now only one encoding is allowed per database.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
443 444
</p>
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2005-03/msg00932.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2005-03/msg00932.php</a>
445
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2005-08/msg00039.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2005-08/msg00039.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
446
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2005-08/msg00309.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2005-08/msg00309.php</a>
447 448 449 450
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2005-09/msg00110.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2005-09/msg00110.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2005-09/msg00020.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2005-09/msg00020.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2005-12/msg01121.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2005-12/msg01121.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-01/msg00767.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-01/msg00767.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
451
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2006-03/msg00233.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2006-03/msg00233.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
452
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-09/msg00662.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-09/msg00662.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
453 454
  <a href="http://wiki.postgresql.org/wiki/Todo:Collate">http://wiki.postgresql.org/wiki/Todo:Collate</a> 
  <a href="http://wiki.postgresql.org/wiki/Todo:ICU">http://wiki.postgresql.org/wiki/Todo:ICU</a>
455 456
</p>
  </li><li>Support multiple simultaneous character sets, per SQL92
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
457
  </li><li>Improve UTF8 combined character handling?
458 459
  </li><li>Add octet_length_server() and octet_length_client()
  </li><li>Make octet_length_client() the same as octet_length()?
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
460
  </li><li>Fix problems with wrong runtime encoding conversion for NLS message files
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
461 462
  </li><li>Add URL to more complete multi-byte regression tests
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2005-07/msg00272.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2005-07/msg00272.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
463 464 465 466
</p>
  </li><li>Fix ILIKE and regular expressions to handle case insensitivity
  properly in multibyte encodings
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-bugs/2005-10/msg00001.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-bugs/2005-10/msg00001.php</a>
467
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2005-11/msg00173.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2005-11/msg00173.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
468 469 470 471
</p>
  </li><li>Set client encoding based on the client operating system encoding
<p>  Currently client_encoding is set in postgresql.conf, which
  defaults to the server encoding.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
472
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-08/msg01696.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-08/msg01696.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
473 474 475 476
</p>
  </li><li>Change memory allocation for multi-byte functions so memory is
  allocated inside conversion functions
<p>  Currently we preallocate memory based on worst-case usage.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
477
</p>
478
</li></ul>
479
<h1><a name="section_6">Views / Rules</a></h1>
480 481

<ul>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Done:  
Bruce Momjian committed
482
  <li>Automatically create rules on views so they are updateable, per SQL99
483
<p>  We can only auto-create rules for simple views.  For more complex
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Done:  
Bruce Momjian committed
484
  cases users will still have to write rules manually.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
485 486
</p>
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-03/msg00586.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-03/msg00586.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
487
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2006-08/msg00255.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2006-08/msg00255.php</a>
488 489
</p>
  </li><li>Add the functionality for WITH CHECK OPTION clause of CREATE VIEW
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
490
  </li><li>Allow VIEW/RULE recompilation when the underlying tables change
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
491 492 493
<p>  Another issue is whether underlying table changes should be reflected
  in the view, e.g. should SELECT * show additional columns if they
  are added after the view is created.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
494 495 496 497
</p>
  </li><li>Make it possible to use RETURNING together with conditional DO INSTEAD
  rules, such as for partitioning setups
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-09/msg00577.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-09/msg00577.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
498 499 500 501 502 503 504
</p>
  </li><li>Add the ability to automatically create materialized views
<p>  Right now materialized views require the user to create triggers on the
  main table to keep the summary table current.  SQL syntax should be able
  to manager the triggers and summary table automatically.  A more
  sophisticated implementation would automatically retrieve from the
  summary table when the main table is referenced, if possible.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
505
</p>
506
</li></ul>
507
<h1><a name="section_7">SQL Commands</a></h1>
508 509

<ul>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
510
  <li>Add CORRESPONDING BY to UNION/INTERSECT/EXCEPT
511
  </li><li>Add ROLLUP, CUBE, GROUPING SETS options to GROUP BY
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
512 513
  </li><li>%Allow SET CONSTRAINTS to be qualified by schema/table name
  </li><li>%Add a separate TRUNCATE permission
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
514 515 516
<p>  Currently only the owner can TRUNCATE a table because triggers are not
  called, and the table is locked in exclusive mode.
</p>
517 518
  </li><li>Allow PREPARE of cursors
  </li><li>Allow finer control over the caching of prepared query plans
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
519
<p>  Currently queries prepared via the libpq API are planned on first
520 521 522 523 524
  execute using the supplied parameters --- allow SQL PREPARE to do the
  same.  Also, allow control over replanning prepared queries either
  manually or automatically when statistics for execute parameters
  differ dramatically from those used during planning.
</p>
525
  </li><li>Improve logging of prepared transactions recovered during startup
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
526
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-11/msg00092.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-11/msg00092.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
527
</p>
528
  </li><li>Add a GUC variable to warn about non-standard SQL usage in queries
529 530 531 532 533 534 535 536 537
  </li><li>Add SQL-standard MERGE/REPLACE/UPSERT command
<p>  MERGE is typically used to merge two tables.  REPLACE or UPSERT
  command does UPDATE, or on failure, INSERT. This is similar to UPDATE,
  then for unmatched rows, INSERT.  Whether concurrent access allows
  modifications which could cause row loss is implementation independent.
  To implement this cleanly requires that the table have a unique index
  so duplicate checking can be easily performed.  It is possible to do it
  without a unique index if we require the user to LOCK the table before
  the MERGE.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
538 539
</p>
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2005-11/msg00501.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2005-11/msg00501.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
540
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2005-11/msg00536.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2005-11/msg00536.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
541
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-04/msg01475.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-04/msg01475.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
542
</p>
543 544
  </li><li>Add NOVICE output level for helpful messages like automatic sequence/index
  creation
545
  </li><li>Add GUC to issue notice about statements that use unjoined tables
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
546
  </li><li>Allow EXPLAIN to identify tables that were skipped because of
547
  constraint_exclusion
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
548
  </li><li>Allow EXPLAIN output to be more easily processed by scripts, perhaps XML
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
549
  </li><li>Enable standard_conforming_strings
550
  </li><li>Make standard_conforming_strings the default in 8.5?
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
551 552 553 554 555 556
<p>  When this is done, backslash-quote should be prohibited in non-E''
  strings because of possible confusion over how such strings treat
  backslashes.  Basically, '' is always safe for a literal single
  quote, while \' might or might not be based on the backslash
  handling rules.
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
557
  </li><li>Simplify dropping roles that have objects in several databases
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
558
  </li><li>Allow COMMENT ON to accept an expression rather than just a string
559
  </li><li>Allow the count returned by SELECT, etc to be represented as an int64
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
560
  to allow a higher range of values
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
561
  </li><li>Add SQL99 WITH clause to SELECT
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
562
  </li><li>Add SQL:2003 WITH RECURSIVE (hierarchical) queries to SELECT
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
563 564
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-01/msg01375.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-01/msg01375.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-02/msg00642.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-02/msg00642.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
565
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-03/msg00139.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-03/msg00139.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
566
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-11/msg01334.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-11/msg01334.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
567 568
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2008-01/msg00105.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2008-01/msg00105.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2008-03/msg00327.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2008-03/msg00327.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
569
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
570 571 572 573
  </li><li>Add DEFAULT .. AS OWNER so permission checks are done as the table
  owner
<p>  This would be useful for SERIAL nextval() calls and CHECK constraints.
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
574
  </li><li>Allow DISTINCT to work in multiple-argument aggregate calls
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
575 576
  </li><li>Add column to pg_stat_activity that shows the progress of long-running
  commands like CREATE INDEX and VACUUM
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
577
  </li><li>Implement SQL:2003 window functions
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
578 579
  </li><li>Improve failure message when DROP DATABASE is used on a database that
  has prepared transactions
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
580 581 582
  </li><li>Allow INSERT/UPDATE ... RETURNING inside a SELECT 'FROM' clause
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2006-09/msg00803.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2006-09/msg00803.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-10/msg00693.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-10/msg00693.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
583 584 585 586
</p>
  </li><li>Increase locking when DROPing objects so dependent objects cannot
  get dropped while the DROP operation is happening
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-01/msg00937.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-01/msg00937.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
587
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
588
  </li><li>-<em>Allow AS in "SELECT col AS label" to be optional in certain cases</em>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
589 590 591
  </li><li>Allow INSERT ... DELETE ... RETURNING, namely allow the DELETE ...
  RETURNING to supply values to the INSERT
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-02/thrd2.php#00979">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-02/thrd2.php#00979</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
592 593 594 595
  </li><li>Add comments on system tables/columns using the information in
  catalogs.sgml
<p>  Ideally the information would be pulled from the SGML file
  automatically.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
596 597 598 599
</p>
  </li><li>Improve reporting of UNION type mismatches
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-04/msg00944.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-04/msg00944.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-03/msg00597.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-03/msg00597.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
600
</p>
601 602 603 604
  </li><li>CREATE
  <ul>
    <li>Allow CREATE TABLE AS to determine column lengths for complex
          expressions like SELECT col1 || col2
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
605
    </li><li>Have WITH CONSTRAINTS also create constraint indexes
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
606
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-04/msg00149.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-04/msg00149.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
607
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
608
    </li><li>Have CONSTRAINT cname NOT NULL record the contraint name
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
609 610
<p>          Right now pg_attribute.attnotnull records the NOT NULL status
          of the column, but does not record the contraint name
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
611 612 613 614
</p>
    </li><li>Prevent concurrent CREATE TABLE table1 from sometimes returning
          a cryptic error message
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-bugs/2007-10/msg00169.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-bugs/2007-10/msg00169.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
615
</p>
616 617 618
  </li></ul>
  </li><li>UPDATE
  <ul>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
619
    <li>Allow UPDATE tab SET ROW (col, ...) = (SELECT...)
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
620
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-07/msg01306.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-07/msg01306.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
621
          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-03/msg00865.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-03/msg00865.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
622 623
          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-04/msg00315.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-04/msg00315.php</a>
          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2008-03/msg00237.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2008-03/msg00237.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
624 625 626 627
</p>
    </li><li>Research self-referential UPDATEs that see inconsistent row versions
          in read-committed mode
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-05/msg00507.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-05/msg00507.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
628
          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-06/msg00016.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-06/msg00016.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
629 630 631 632
</p>
    </li><li>Allow GLOBAL temporary tables to exist as empty by default in
          all sessions
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-07/msg00006.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-07/msg00006.php</a>
633
</p>
634
  </li></ul>
635 636
  </li><li>ALTER
  <ul>
637 638 639
    <li>Have ALTER TABLE RENAME rename SERIAL sequence names
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-03/msg00008.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-03/msg00008.php</a>
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
640 641 642 643
    </li><li>Have ALTER SEQUENCE RENAME rename the sequence name stored
          in the sequence table
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-bugs/2007-09/msg00092.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-bugs/2007-09/msg00092.php</a>
          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-bugs/2007-10/msg00007.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-bugs/2007-10/msg00007.php</a>
644
          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-03/msg00008.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-03/msg00008.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
645
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
646
    </li><li>Add ALTER DOMAIN to modify the underlying data type
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
647
    </li><li>%Allow ALTER TABLE ... ALTER CONSTRAINT ... RENAME
648
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2006-02/msg00168.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2006-02/msg00168.php</a>
649
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
650
    </li><li>%Allow ALTER TABLE to change constraint deferrability and actions
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
651
    </li><li>Add missing object types for ALTER ... SET SCHEMA
652
    </li><li>Allow ALTER TABLESPACE to move to different directories
653
    </li><li>Allow databases to be moved to different tablespaces
654 655
    </li><li>Allow moving system tables to other tablespaces, where possible
<p>          Currently non-global system tables must be in the default database
656
          tablespace. Global system tables can never be moved.
657
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
658
    </li><li>Prevent parent tables from altering or dropping constraints
659 660 661 662
          like CHECK that are inherited by child tables unless CASCADE
          is used
    </li><li>%Prevent child tables from altering or dropping constraints
          like CHECK that were inherited from the parent table
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
663
    </li><li>Have ALTER INDEX update the name of a constraint using that index
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
664
    </li><li>Add ALTER TABLE RENAME CONSTRAINT, update index name also
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
665 666 667 668
    </li><li>Allow column display reordering by recording a display,
          storage, and permanent id for every column?
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-12/msg00782.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-12/msg00782.php</a>
</p>
669 670 671
  </li></ul>
  </li><li>CLUSTER
  <ul>
672
    <li>Automatically maintain clustering on a table
673 674
<p>          This might require some background daemon to maintain clustering
          during periods of low usage. It might also require tables to be only
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
675
          partially filled for easier reorganization.  Another idea would
676 677 678 679
          be to create a merged heap/index data file so an index lookup would
          automatically access the heap data too.  A third idea would be to
          store heap rows in hashed groups, perhaps using a user-supplied
          hash function.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
680
          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-performance/2004-08/msg00349.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-performance/2004-08/msg00349.php</a>
681
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
682
    </li><li>%Add default clustering to system tables
683 684 685
<p>          To do this, determine the ideal cluster index for each system
          table and set the cluster setting during initdb.
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
686 687
    </li><li>%Add VERBOSE option to report tables as they are processed,
          like VACUUM VERBOSE
688 689 690 691 692 693
  </li></ul>
  </li><li>COPY
  <ul>
    <li>Allow COPY to report error lines and continue
<p>          This requires the use of a savepoint before each COPY line is
          processed, with ROLLBACK on COPY failure.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
694
          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-12/msg00572.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-12/msg00572.php</a>
695
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
696 697
    </li><li>Allow COPY on a newly-created table to skip WAL logging
<p>          On crash recovery, the table involved in the COPY would
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
698
          be removed or have its heap and index files truncated.  One
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
699 700
          issue is that no other backend should be able to add to
          the table at the same time, which is something that is
701 702 703
          currently allowed.  This currently is done if the table is
          created inside the same transaction block as the COPY because
          no other backends can see the table.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
704 705 706 707
</p>
    </li><li>Consider using a ring buffer for COPY FROM
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2008-02/msg00140.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2008-02/msg00140.php</a>
          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-02/msg01080.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-02/msg01080.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
708 709 710
</p>
    </li><li>Allow COPY FROM to create index entries in bulk
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-02/msg00811.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-02/msg00811.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
711
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
712 713 714 715 716
    </li><li>Allow COPY in CSV mode to control whether a quoted zero-length
          string is treated as NULL
<p>          Currently this is always treated as a zero-length string,
          which generates an error when loading into an integer column
          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-07/msg00905.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-07/msg00905.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
717
</p>
718
  </li></ul>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
719 720 721
  </li><li>GRANT/REVOKE
  <ul>
    <li>Allow column-level privileges
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
722
    </li><li>%Allow GRANT/REVOKE permissions to be applied to all schema objects
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Done:  
Bruce Momjian committed
723
          with one command
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
724 725 726 727
<p>          The proposed syntax is:
</p><p>                GRANT SELECT ON ALL TABLES IN public TO phpuser;
                GRANT SELECT ON NEW TABLES IN public TO phpuser;
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
728
    </li><li>Allow GRANT/REVOKE permissions to be inherited by objects based on
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
729
          schema permissions
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
730
    </li><li>Allow SERIAL sequences to inherit permissions from the base table?
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
731
  </li></ul>
732 733
  </li><li>CURSOR
  <ul>
734
    <li>Prevent DROP TABLE from dropping a row referenced by its own open
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
735
          cursor?
736 737 738 739
  </li></ul>
  </li><li>INSERT
  <ul>
    <li>Allow INSERT/UPDATE of the system-generated oid value for a row
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Done:  
Bruce Momjian committed
740
    </li><li>In rules, allow VALUES() to contain a mixture of 'old' and 'new'
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
741
          references
742
  </li></ul>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Done:  
Bruce Momjian committed
743
  </li><li>SHOW/SET
744
  <ul>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
745
    <li>Add SET PERFORMANCE_TIPS option to suggest INDEX, VACUUM, VACUUM
746 747
          ANALYZE, and CLUSTER
  </li></ul>
748 749 750 751 752 753 754 755 756 757 758 759 760 761 762
  </li><li>LISTEN/NOTIFY
  <ul>
    <li>Allow LISTEN/NOTIFY to store info in memory rather than tables?
<p>          Currently LISTEN/NOTIFY information is stored in pg_listener. 
          Storing such information in memory would improve performance.
</p>
    </li><li>Add optional textual message to NOTIFY
<p>          This would allow an informational message to be added to the notify
          message, perhaps indicating the row modified or other custom
          information.
</p>
    </li><li>Allow multiple identical NOTIFY events to always be communicated
          to the client, rather than sent as a single notification to the
          listener
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2008-01/msg00057.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2008-01/msg00057.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
763 764 765 766
</p>
    </li><li>Allow NOTIFY in rules involving conditionals
    </li><li>Improve LISTEN concurrency
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-02/msg01106.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-02/msg01106.php</a>
767 768
</p>
  </li></ul>
769 770 771 772 773 774 775 776 777 778 779 780 781 782 783 784 785 786 787
</li></ul>
<h1><a name="section_8">Referential Integrity</a></h1>

<ul>
  <li>Add MATCH PARTIAL referential integrity
  </li><li>Change foreign key constraint for array -&gt; element to mean element
  in array?
  </li><li>Fix problem when cascading referential triggers make changes on
  cascaded tables, seeing the tables in an intermediate state
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2005-09/msg00174.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2005-09/msg00174.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2005-09/msg00174.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2005-09/msg00174.php</a>
</p>
  </li><li>Allow DEFERRABLE and end-of-statement UNIQUE constraints?
<p>  This would allow UPDATE tab SET col = col + 1 to work if col has
  a unique index.  Currently, uniqueness checks are done while the
  command is being executed, rather than at the end of the statement
  or transaction.
  <a href="http://people.planetpostgresql.org/greg/index.php?/archives/2006/06/10.html">http://people.planetpostgresql.org/greg/index.php?/archives/2006/06/10.html</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-09/msg01458.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-09/msg01458.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
788
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
789
  </li><li>Optimize referential integrity checks
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
790
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-performance/2005-10/msg00458.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-performance/2005-10/msg00458.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
791
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-04/msg00744.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-04/msg00744.php</a>
792 793 794 795 796 797
</p>
</li></ul>
<h1><a name="section_9">Server-Side Languages</a></h1>

<ul>
  <li>PL/pgSQL
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
798
  <ul>
799 800 801 802 803 804 805
    <li>Fix RENAME to work on variables other than OLD/NEW
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2002-03/msg00591.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2002-03/msg00591.php</a>
          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-01/msg01615.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-01/msg01615.php</a>
          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-01/msg01587.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-01/msg01587.php</a>
</p>
    </li><li>Allow function parameters to be passed by name,
          get_employee_salary(12345 AS emp_id, 2001 AS tax_year)
806
    </li><li>Allow handling of %TYPE arrays, e.g. tab.col%TYPE[]
807 808 809 810 811 812 813 814 815 816 817 818 819 820 821
    </li><li>Allow listing of record column names, and access to
          record columns via variables, e.g. columns := r.(*),
          tval2 := r.(colname)
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2005-07/msg00458.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2005-07/msg00458.php</a>
          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2006-05/msg00302.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2006-05/msg00302.php</a>
          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2006-06/msg00031.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2006-06/msg00031.php</a>
</p>
    </li><li>Add support for SCROLL cursors
    </li><li>Add support for WITH HOLD cursors
    </li><li>Allow row and record variables to be set to NULL constants,
          and allow NULL tests on such variables
<p>          Because a row is not scalar, do not allow assignment
          from NULL-valued scalars.
</p>
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-10/msg00070.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-10/msg00070.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
822 823 824
</p>
    </li><li>Review handling of MOVE and FETCH
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-04/msg00527.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-04/msg00527.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
825 826 827 828
</p>
    </li><li>Improve logic of determining if an identifier is a a
          variable or column name
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-07/msg00436.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-07/msg00436.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
829
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
830
    </li><li>Consider keeping seperate cached copies when search_path changes
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
831
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-01/msg01009.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-01/msg01009.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
832 833 834
</p>
    </li><li>Add CASE capability to language (already in SQL)
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-01/msg00696.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-01/msg00696.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
835
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
836
  </li></ul>
837
  </li><li>Other
838
  <ul>
839 840 841 842 843 844 845 846 847 848 849 850
    <li>Add table function support to pltcl, plpythonu
    </li><li>Add support for polymorphic arguments and return types to
          languages other than PL/PgSQL
    </li><li>Add capability to create and call PROCEDURES
    </li><li>Add support for OUT and INOUT parameters to languages other
          than PL/PgSQL
    </li><li>Add PL/PythonU tracebacks
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2006-02/msg00288.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2006-02/msg00288.php</a>
</p>
    </li><li>Allow data to be passed in native language formats, rather
          than only text
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-05/msg00289.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-05/msg00289.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
851 852 853
</p>
    </li><li>Add ability to obfuscate function bodies
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2008-01/msg00125.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2008-01/msg00125.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
854
</p>
855 856
  </li></ul>
</li></ul>
857
<h1><a name="section_10">Clients</a></h1>
858 859

<ul>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
860
  <li>Have pg_ctl look at PGHOST in case it is a socket directory?
861 862 863 864 865 866
  </li><li>Allow pg_ctl to work properly with configuration files located outside
  the PGDATA directory
<p>  pg_ctl can not read the pid file because it isn't located in the
  config directory but in the PGDATA directory.  The solution is to
  allow pg_ctl to read and understand postgresql.conf to find the
  data_directory value.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
867 868 869 870
</p>
  </li><li>Add a function like pg_get_indexdef() that report more detailed index
  information
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-bugs/2007-12/msg00166.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-bugs/2007-12/msg00166.php</a>
871
</p>
872 873 874 875
  </li><li>psql
  <ul>
    <li>Have psql show current values for a sequence
    </li><li>Move psql backslash database information into the backend, use
876
          mnemonic commands?
877 878
<p>          This would allow non-psql clients to pull the same information out
          of the database as psql.
879
          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2004-01/msg00191.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2004-01/msg00191.php</a>
880
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
881
    </li><li>Make psql's \d commands more consistent
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
882
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2004-11/msg00014.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2004-11/msg00014.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
883
          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2004-11/msg00014.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2004-11/msg00014.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
884
</p>
885
    </li><li>Consistently display privilege information for all objects in psql
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
886
    </li><li>Add auto-expanded mode so expanded output is used if the row
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
887
          length is wider than the screen width.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
888
<p>          Consider using auto-expanded mode for backslash commands like \df+.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
889 890 891 892
</p>
    </li><li>Prevent tab completion of SET TRANSACTION from querying the
          database and therefore preventing the transaction isolation
          level from being set.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
893
<p>          Currently SET &lt;tab&gt; causes a database lookup to check all
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
894 895 896
          supported session variables.  This query causes problems
          because setting the transaction isolation level must be the
          first statement of a transaction.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
897
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
898 899 900 901
    </li><li>Add a \set variable to control whether \s displays line numbers
<p>          Another option is to add \# which lists line numbers, and
          allows command execution.
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
902
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-12/msg00255.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-12/msg00255.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
903 904 905 906
</p>
    </li><li>Prevent escape string warnings when object names have
          backslashes
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-01/msg00227.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-01/msg00227.php</a>
907
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
908 909 910 911
    </li><li>Have \d show foreign keys that reference a table's primary key
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-04/msg00424.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-04/msg00424.php</a>
</p>
    </li><li>Have \d show child tables that inherit from the specified parent
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
912 913
    </li><li>Have \l+ show database size, if permissions allow
<p>          Ideally it will not generate an error for invalid permissions
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
914 915 916
</p>
    </li><li>Include the symbolic SQLSTATE name in verbose error reports
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2007-09/msg00438.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2007-09/msg00438.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
917 918 919
</p>
    </li><li>Improve display if enums
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-01/msg00826.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-01/msg00826.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
920
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
921
    </li><li>Add prompt escape to display the client and server versions
922
  </li></ul>
923
  </li><li>pg_dump / pg_restore
924
  <ul>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
925
    <li>%Add dumping of comments on index columns and composite type columns
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
926
    </li><li>%Add full object name to the tag field.  eg. for operators we need
927
          '=(integer, integer)', instead of just '='.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
928
    </li><li>Add pg_dumpall custom format dumps?
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
929 930
    </li><li>Allow selection of individual object(s) of all types, not just
          tables
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
931
    </li><li>In a selective dump, allow dumping of an object and all its
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
932
          dependencies
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
933
    </li><li>Add options like pg_restore -l and -L to pg_dump
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
934
    </li><li>Stop dumping CASCADE on DROP TYPE commands in clean mode
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
935 936
    </li><li>Allow pg_dump --clean to drop roles that own objects or have
          privileges
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
937 938 939 940
    </li><li>Change pg_dump so that a comment on the dumped database is
          applied to the loaded database, even if the database has a
          different name.  This will require new backend syntax, perhaps
          COMMENT ON CURRENT DATABASE.
941 942
    </li><li>Remove unnecessary function pointer abstractions in pg_dump source
          code
943 944 945
    </li><li>Allow pg_dump to utilize multiple CPUs and I/O channels by dumping
          multiple objects simultaneously
<p>          The difficulty with this is getting multiple dump processes to
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
946 947
          produce a single dump output file.  It also would require
          several sessions to share the same snapshot.
948 949 950 951 952 953 954
          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-02/msg00205.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-02/msg00205.php</a>
</p>
    </li><li>Allow pg_restore to utilize multiple CPUs and I/O channels by
          restoring multiple objects simultaneously
<p>          This might require a pg_restore flag to indicate how many
          simultaneous operations should be performed.  Only pg_dump's
          -Fc format has the necessary dependency information.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
955
          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-02/msg00963.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-02/msg00963.php</a>
956 957 958 959 960 961 962 963 964 965 966
</p>
    </li><li>To better utilize resources, allow pg_restore to check foreign
          keys simultaneously, where possible
    </li><li>Allow pg_restore to create all indexes of a table
          concurrently, via a single heap scan
<p>          This requires a pg_dump -Fc file because that format contains
          the required dependency information.
          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2007-05/msg01274.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2007-05/msg01274.php</a>
</p>
    </li><li>Allow pg_restore to load different parts of the COPY data
          simultaneously
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
967 968 969 970
    </li><li>Prevent pg_dump/pg_restore from being affected by
          statement_timeout
<p>          Using psql to restore a pg_dump dump is also affected.
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
971
    </li><li>Remove pre-7.3 pg_dump code that assumes pg_depend does not exit
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
972 973
    </li><li>Allow pre/data/post files when schema and data are dumped
          separately, for performance reasons
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
974 975
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-02/msg00205.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-02/msg00205.php</a>
</p>
976
  </li></ul>
977
  </li><li>ecpg
978 979 980 981 982
  <ul>
    <li>Docs
<p>          Document differences between ecpg and the SQL standard and
          information about the Informix-compatibility module.
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
983
    </li><li>Solve cardinality &gt; 1 for input descriptors / variables?
984 985
    </li><li>Add a semantic check level, e.g. check if a table really exists
    </li><li>fix handling of DB attributes that are arrays
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
986
    </li><li>Use backend PREPARE/EXECUTE facility for ecpg where possible
987 988
    </li><li>Implement SQLDA
    </li><li>Fix nested C comments
989
    </li><li>%sqlwarn[6] should be 'W' if the PRECISION or SCALE value specified
990 991
    </li><li>Make SET CONNECTION thread-aware, non-standard?
    </li><li>Allow multidimensional arrays
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
992
    </li><li>Add internationalized message strings
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
993
    </li><li>Implement COPY FROM STDIN
994
  </li></ul>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
995 996
  </li><li>libpq
  <ul>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
997
    <li>Add PQescapeIdentifierConn()
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
998
    </li><li>Prevent PQfnumber() from lowercasing unquoted the column name
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
999
<p>          PQfnumber() should never have been doing lowercasing, but
1000 1001
          historically it has so we need a way to prevent it
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1002
    </li><li>Allow statement results to be automatically batched to the client
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1003
<p>          Currently all statement results are transferred to the libpq
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1004
          client before libpq makes the results available to the
1005
          application.  This feature would allow the application to make
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1006
          use of the first result rows while the rest are transferred, or
1007
          held on the server waiting for them to be requested by libpq.
1008
          One complexity is that a statement like SELECT 1/col could error
1009
          out mid-way through the result set.
1010
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1011 1012
    </li><li>Consider disallowing multiple queries in PQexec() as an
          additional barrier to SQL injection attacks
1013
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-01/msg00184.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-01/msg00184.php</a>
1014 1015 1016
</p>
    </li><li>Add PQexecf() that allows complex parameter substitution
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-03/msg01803.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-03/msg01803.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1017 1018 1019
</p>
    </li><li>Add SQLSTATE severity to PGconn return status
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-interfaces/2007-11/msg00015.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-interfaces/2007-11/msg00015.php</a>
1020
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1021
  </li></ul>
1022
</li></ul>
1023
<h1><a name="section_11">Triggers</a></h1>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1024

1025
<ul>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1026
  <li>Add deferred trigger queue file
1027 1028 1029
<p>  Right now all deferred trigger information is stored in backend
  memory.  This could exhaust memory for very large trigger queues.
  This item involves dumping large queues into files.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1030
</p>
1031 1032 1033 1034
  </li><li>Allow triggers to be disabled in only the current session.
<p>  This is currently possible by starting a multi-statement transaction,
  modifying the system tables, performing the desired SQL, restoring the
  system tables, and committing the transaction.  ALTER TABLE ...
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1035
  TRIGGER requires a table lock so it is not ideal for this usage.
1036 1037 1038 1039 1040 1041
</p>
  </li><li>With disabled triggers, allow pg_dump to use ALTER TABLE ADD FOREIGN KEY
<p>  If the dump is known to be valid, allow foreign keys to be added
  without revalidating the data.
</p>
  </li><li>Allow statement-level triggers to access modified rows
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1042
  </li><li>Support triggers on columns
1043
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2005-07/msg00107.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2005-07/msg00107.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1044
</p>
1045 1046 1047 1048 1049
  </li><li>Allow AFTER triggers on system tables
<p>  System tables are modified in many places in the backend without going
  through the executor and therefore not causing triggers to fire. To
  complete this item, the functions that modify system tables will have
  to fire triggers.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1050 1051 1052
</p>
  </li><li>Tighten trigger permission checks
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-12/msg00564.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-12/msg00564.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1053 1054 1055
</p>
  </li><li>Allow BEFORE INSERT triggers on views
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2007-02/msg01466.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2007-02/msg01466.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1056
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Done:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1057
  </li><li>-<em>Add ability to trigger on TRUNCATE</em>
1058
</li></ul>
1059
<h1><a name="section_12">Indexes</a></h1>
1060

Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1061
<ul>
1062
  <li>Add UNIQUE capability to non-btree indexes
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1063 1064 1065 1066 1067 1068 1069 1070 1071
  </li><li>Prevent index uniqueness checks when UPDATE does not modify the column
<p>  Uniqueness (index) checks are done when updating a column even if the
  column is not modified by the UPDATE.
</p>
  </li><li>Allow the creation of on-disk bitmap indexes which can be quickly
  combined with other bitmap indexes
<p>  Such indexes could be more compact if there are only a few distinct values.
  Such indexes can also be compressed.  Keeping such indexes updated can be
  costly.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1072 1073 1074
</p>
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2005-07/msg00512.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2005-07/msg00512.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-12/msg01107.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-12/msg01107.php</a>
1075 1076 1077 1078
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-03/msg00265.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-03/msg00265.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-03/msg01214.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-03/msg01214.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-05/msg00013.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-05/msg00013.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-07/msg00741.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-07/msg00741.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1079 1080 1081
</p>
  </li><li>Allow accurate statistics to be collected on indexes with more than
  one column or expression indexes, perhaps using per-index statistics
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1082
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-performance/2006-10/msg00222.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-performance/2006-10/msg00222.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1083
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-03/msg01131.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-03/msg01131.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1084 1085 1086 1087 1088
</p>
  </li><li>Consider increasing the number of default statistics target, and
  reduce statistics target overhead
<p>  Also consider having a larger statistics target for indexed columns
  and expression indexes
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1089
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2007-05/msg01228.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2007-05/msg01228.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1090
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2007-06/msg00542.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2007-06/msg00542.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1091
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-01/msg01066.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-01/msg01066.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1092
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1093
  </li><li>Consider compressing indexes by storing key values duplicated in
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1094
  several rows as a single index entry
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1095 1096 1097
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-12/msg00341.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-12/msg00341.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-02/msg01264.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-02/msg01264.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-03/msg00465.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-03/msg00465.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1098
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-03/msg00163.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-03/msg00163.php</a>
1099 1100
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-08/msg00014.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-08/msg00014.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-08/msg00487.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-08/msg00487.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1101
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-04/msg01589.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-04/msg01589.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1102
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1103 1104 1105 1106 1107
  </li><li>Add REINDEX CONCURRENTLY, like CREATE INDEX CONCURRENTLY
<p>  This is difficult because you must upgrade to an exclusive table lock
  to replace the existing index file.  CREATE INDEX CONCURRENTLY does not
  have this complication.  This would allow index compaction without
  downtime.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1108
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-performance/2007-08/msg00289.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-performance/2007-08/msg00289.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1109 1110
</p>
  </li><li>Allow multiple indexes to be created concurrently, ideally via a
1111
  single heap scan, and have pg_restore use it
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1112 1113
  </li><li>Consider sorting entries before inserting into btree index
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2008-01/msg01010.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2008-01/msg01010.php</a>
1114 1115 1116
</p>
  </li><li>Allow index scans to return matching index keys
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-03/msg01079.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-03/msg01079.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1117
</p>
1118 1119 1120 1121 1122 1123 1124 1125 1126 1127 1128
  </li><li>Inheritance
  <ul>
    <li>Allow inherited tables to inherit indexes, UNIQUE constraints,
          and primary/foreign keys
    </li><li>Honor UNIQUE INDEX on base column in INSERTs/UPDATEs
          on inherited table, e.g.  INSERT INTO inherit_table
          (unique_index_col) VALUES (dup) should fail
<p>          The main difficulty with this item is the problem of
          creating an index that can span multiple tables.
</p>
    </li><li>Allow SELECT ... FOR UPDATE on inherited tables
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1129
    </li><li>Require all CHECK constraints to be inherited
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1130
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-bugs/2007-04/msg00026.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-bugs/2007-04/msg00026.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1131 1132 1133
</p>
    </li><li>Add checks to prevent a CREATE RULE views on inherited tables
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2008-02/msg01420.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2008-02/msg01420.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1134
          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2008-03/msg00077.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2008-03/msg00077.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1135
</p>
1136
  </li></ul>
1137 1138 1139 1140 1141 1142
  </li><li>GIST
  <ul>
    <li>Add more GIST index support for geometric data types
    </li><li>Allow GIST indexes to create certain complex index types, like
          digital trees (see Aoki)
  </li></ul>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1143
  </li><li>Hash
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1144 1145 1146 1147 1148
</li></ul>
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-09/msg00051.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-09/msg00051.php</a>
</p>
<ul>
  <li>Pack hash index buckets onto disk pages more efficiently
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1149
<p>          Currently only one hash bucket can be stored on a page. Ideally
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1150 1151
          several hash buckets could be stored on a single page and greater
          granularity used for the hash algorithm.
1152 1153
</p>
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2004-06/msg00168.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2004-06/msg00168.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1154
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1155
  </li><li>Consider sorting hash buckets so entries can be found using a
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1156
          binary search, rather than a linear scan
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1157
  </li><li>In hash indexes, consider storing the hash value with or instead
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1158
          of the key itself
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1159 1160
  </li><li>Add WAL logging for crash recovery
  </li><li>Allow multi-column hash indexes
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Done:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1161
  </li><li>-<em>During index creation, pre-sort the tuples to improve build speed</em>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1162
</li></ul>
1163
<h1><a name="section_13">Fsync</a></h1>
1164 1165

<ul>
1166
  <li>Determine optimal fdatasync/fsync, O_SYNC/O_DSYNC options
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1167
<p>  Ideally this requires a separate test program that can be run
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1168 1169
  at initdb time or optionally later.  Consider O_SYNC when
  O_DIRECT exists.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1170
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1171
  </li><li>Add program to test if fsync has a delay compared to non-fsync
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1172 1173 1174
  </li><li>Consider sorting writes during checkpoint
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-06/msg00541.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-06/msg00541.php</a>
</p>
1175
</li></ul>
1176
<h1><a name="section_14">Cache Usage</a></h1>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1177

1178
<ul>
1179
  <li>Speed up COUNT(*)
1180 1181 1182 1183 1184 1185
<p>  We could use a fixed row count and a +/- count to follow MVCC
  visibility rules, or a single cached value could be used and
  invalidated if anyone modifies the table.  Another idea is to
  get a count directly from a unique index, but for this to be
  faster than a sequential scan it must avoid access to the heap
  to obtain tuple visibility information.
1186 1187 1188 1189 1190 1191
</p>
  </li><li>Provide a way to calculate an "estimated COUNT(*)"
<p>  Perhaps by using the optimizer's cardinality estimates or random
  sampling.
</p>
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2005-11/msg00943.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2005-11/msg00943.php</a>
1192 1193
</p>
  </li><li>Allow data to be pulled directly from indexes
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1194 1195 1196 1197 1198 1199
<p>  Currently indexes do not have enough tuple visibility information
  to allow data to be pulled from the index without also accessing
  the heap.  One way to allow this is to set a bit on index tuples
  to indicate if a tuple is currently visible to all transactions
  when the first valid heap lookup happens.  This bit would have to
  be cleared when a heap tuple is expired.
1200 1201
</p>
<p>  Another idea is to maintain a bitmap of heap pages where all rows
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1202
  are visible to all backends, and allow index lookups to reference
1203 1204 1205 1206
  that bitmap to avoid heap lookups, perhaps the same bitmap we might
  add someday to determine which heap pages need vacuuming.  Frequently
  accessed bitmaps would have to be stored in shared memory.  One 8k
  page of bitmaps could track 512MB of heap pages.
1207 1208 1209 1210 1211 1212 1213
</p>
<p>  A third idea would be for a heap scan to check if all rows are visible
  and if so set a per-table flag which can be checked by index scans. 
  Any change to the table would have to clear the flag.  To detect
  changes during the heap scan a counter could be set at the start and
  checked at the end --- if it is the same, the table has not been
  modified --- any table change would increment the counter.
1214 1215 1216
</p>
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-10/msg00166.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-10/msg00166.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2008-01/msg00049.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2008-01/msg00049.php</a>
1217
</p>
1218
  </li><li>Consider automatic caching of statements at various levels:
1219 1220 1221 1222
  <ul>
    <li>Parsed query tree
    </li><li>Query execute plan
    </li><li>Query results
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1223
        <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-04/msg00823.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-04/msg00823.php</a>
1224
  </li></ul>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1225 1226
  </li><li>Consider increasing internal areas when shared buffers is increased
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2005-10/msg01419.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2005-10/msg01419.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1227 1228 1229 1230
</p>
  </li><li>Consider decreasing the amount of memory used by PrivateRefCount
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-11/msg00797.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-11/msg00797.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-01/msg00752.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-01/msg00752.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1231 1232 1233 1234
</p>
  </li><li>Consider allowing higher priority queries to have referenced buffer
  cache pages stay in memory longer
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-11/msg00562.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-11/msg00562.php</a>
1235
</p>
1236
</li></ul>
1237
<h1><a name="section_15">Vacuum</a></h1>
1238 1239 1240

<ul>
  <li>Improve speed with indexes
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1241 1242 1243
<p>  For large table adjustments during VACUUM FULL, it is faster to cluster
  or reindex rather than update the index.  Also, index updates can bloat
  the index.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1244 1245
</p>
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-03/msg00024.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-03/msg00024.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1246
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-performance/2007-05/msg00296.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-performance/2007-05/msg00296.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1247
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-08/msg00307.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-08/msg00307.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1248
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1249 1250
  </li><li>Auto-fill the free space map by scanning the buffer cache or by
  checking pages written by the background writer
1251
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-02/msg01125.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-02/msg01125.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1252
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-03/msg00011.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-03/msg00011.php</a>
1253
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1254 1255 1256 1257 1258
  </li><li>Create a bitmap of pages that need vacuuming
<p>  Instead of sequentially scanning the entire table, have the background
  writer or some other process record pages that have expired rows, then
  VACUUM can look at just those pages rather than the entire table.  In
  the event of a system crash, the bitmap would probably be invalidated.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1259 1260 1261 1262
  One complexity is that index entries still have to be vacuumed, and
  doing this without an index scan (by using the heap values to find the
  index entry) might be slow and unreliable, especially for user-defined
  index functions.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1263 1264 1265
</p>
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-12/msg01188.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-12/msg01188.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-01/msg00121.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-01/msg00121.php</a>
1266 1267 1268 1269 1270
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-03/msg00508.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-03/msg00508.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-04/msg00347.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-04/msg00347.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-11/msg00156.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-11/msg00156.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-03/msg00546.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-03/msg00546.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-04/msg00416.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-04/msg00416.php</a>
1271
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1272 1273
  </li><li>Allow FSM to return free space toward the beginning of the heap file,
  in hopes that empty pages at the end can be truncated by VACUUM
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1274 1275
  </li><li>Allow FSM page return free space based on table clustering, to assist
  in maintaining clustering?
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1276
  </li><li>Improve dead row detection during multi-statement transactions usage
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1277
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-03/msg00358.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-03/msg00358.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1278 1279 1280
</p>
  </li><li>Consider a more compact data representation for dead tuples
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-05/msg00143.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-05/msg00143.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1281
</p>
1282
  </li><li>Auto-vacuum
1283
  <ul>
1284
    <li>%Issue log message to suggest VACUUM FULL if a table is nearly
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1285
          empty?
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1286 1287
    </li><li>Improve control of auto-vacuum
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-12/msg00876.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-12/msg00876.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1288 1289 1290
</p>
    </li><li>Prevent long-lived temporary tables from causing frozen-xid
          advancement starvation
1291 1292 1293
<p>          The problem is that autovacuum cannot vacuum them to set frozen xids;
          only the session that created them can do that.
          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2007-06/msg01645.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2007-06/msg01645.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1294 1295 1296 1297
</p>
    </li><li>Store per-table autovacuum settings in pg_class.reloptions.
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-02/msg01440.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-02/msg01440.php</a>
          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-01/msg00724.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-01/msg00724.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1298 1299 1300 1301
</p>
    </li><li>Prevent autovacuum from running if an old transaction is still
          running from the last vacuum
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-11/msg00899.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-11/msg00899.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1302
</p>
1303 1304
  </li></ul>
</li></ul>
1305
<h1><a name="section_16">Locking</a></h1>
1306 1307

<ul>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1308
  <li>Fix priority ordering of read and write light-weight locks (Neil)
1309 1310
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2004-11/msg00893.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2004-11/msg00893.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2004-11/msg00905.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2004-11/msg00905.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1311 1312 1313 1314 1315
</p>
  </li><li>Fix problem when multiple subtransactions of the same outer transaction
  hold different types of locks, and one subtransaction aborts
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-11/msg01011.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-11/msg01011.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-12/msg00001.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-12/msg00001.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1316
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-02/msg00435.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-02/msg00435.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1317
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-05/msg00773.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-05/msg00773.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1318 1319 1320 1321
</p>
  </li><li>Allow UPDATEs on only non-referential integrity columns not to conflict
  with referential integrity locks
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-02/msg00073.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-02/msg00073.php</a>
1322
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1323
  </li><li>Add idle_in_transaction_timeout GUC so locks are not held for long
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1324
  periods of time
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1325 1326
  </li><li>Improve deadlock detection when a page cleaning lock conflicts
  with a shared buffer that is pinned
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1327 1328 1329
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-bugs/2008-01/msg00138.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-bugs/2008-01/msg00138.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-01/msg00873.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-01/msg00873.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-committers/2008-01/msg00365.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-committers/2008-01/msg00365.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1330 1331 1332
</p>
  </li><li>Detect deadlocks involving LockBufferForCleanup()
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-01/msg00873.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-01/msg00873.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1333
</p>
1334
</li></ul>
1335
<h1><a name="section_17">Startup Time Improvements</a></h1>
1336 1337

<ul>
1338
  <li>Experiment with multi-threaded backend for backend creation
1339 1340
<p>  This would prevent the overhead associated with process creation. Most
  operating systems have trivial process creation time compared to
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1341
  database startup overhead, but a few operating systems (Win32,
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1342
  Solaris) might benefit from threading.  Also explore the idea of
1343
  a single session using multiple threads to execute a statement faster.
1344 1345
</p>
</li></ul>
1346
<h1><a name="section_18">Write-Ahead Log</a></h1>
1347 1348

<ul>
1349
  <li>Eliminate need to write full pages to WAL before page modification
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1350
<p>  Currently, to protect against partial disk page writes, we write
1351 1352 1353
  full page images to WAL before they are modified so we can correct any
  partial page writes during recovery.  These pages can also be
  eliminated from point-in-time archive files.
1354
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2002-06/msg00655.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2002-06/msg00655.php</a>
1355
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1356
  <ul>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1357
    <li>When off, write CRC to WAL and check file system blocks
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1358
           on recovery
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1359 1360 1361
<p>           If CRC check fails during recovery, remember the page in case
           a later CRC for that page properly matches.
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1362 1363 1364
    </li><li>Write full pages during file system write and not when
           the page is modified in the buffer cache
<p>           This allows most full page writes to happen in the background
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1365 1366 1367
           writer.  It might cause problems for applying WAL on recovery
           into a partially-written page, but later the full page will be
           replaced from WAL.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1368 1369
</p>
  </li></ul>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1370
  </li><li>Allow WAL traffic to be streamed to another server for stand-by
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1371
  replication
1372
  </li><li>Reduce WAL traffic so only modified values are written rather than
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1373 1374 1375
  entire rows
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-03/msg01589.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-03/msg01589.php</a>
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1376
  </li><li>Allow WAL information to recover corrupted pg_controldata
1377
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2006-06/msg00025.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2006-06/msg00025.php</a>
1378
</p>
1379 1380 1381 1382 1383
  </li><li>Find a way to reduce rotational delay when repeatedly writing
  last WAL page
<p>  Currently fsync of WAL requires the disk platter to perform a full
  rotation to fsync again. One idea is to write the WAL to different
  offsets that might reduce the rotational delay.
1384
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2002-11/msg00483.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2002-11/msg00483.php</a>
1385
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1386
  </li><li>Allow WAL logging to be turned off for a table, but the table
1387
  might be dropped or truncated during crash recovery
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1388
<p>  Allow tables to bypass WAL writes and just fsync() dirty pages on
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1389
  commit.  This should be implemented using ALTER TABLE, e.g. ALTER
1390
  TABLE PERSISTENCE [ DROP | TRUNCATE | DEFAULT ].  Tables using
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1391
  non-default logging should not use referential integrity with
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1392 1393
  default-logging tables.  A table without dirty buffers during a
  crash could perhaps avoid the drop/truncate.
1394
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2005-12/msg01016.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2005-12/msg01016.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1395 1396
</p>
  </li><li>Allow WAL logging to be turned off for a table, but the table would
1397
  avoid being truncated/dropped
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1398
<p>  To do this, only a single writer can modify the table, and writes
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1399
  must happen only on new pages so the new pages can be removed during
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1400 1401
  crash recovery.  Readers can continue accessing the table.  Such
  tables probably cannot have indexes.  One complexity is the handling
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1402
  of indexes on TOAST tables.
1403
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2005-12/msg01016.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2005-12/msg01016.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1404 1405
</p>
  </li><li>Speed WAL recovery by allowing more than one page to be prefetched
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1406 1407 1408
<p>  This should be done utilizing the same infrastructure used for
  prefetching in general to avoid introducing complex error-prone code
  in WAL replay.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1409 1410
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2007-12/msg00683.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2007-12/msg00683.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-12/msg00497.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-12/msg00497.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1411
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-02/msg01279.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-02/msg01279.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1412 1413 1414
</p>
  </li><li>Improve WAL concurrency by increasing lock granularity
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-02/msg00556.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-02/msg00556.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1415 1416 1417
</p>
  </li><li>Be more aggressive about creating WAL files
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-10/msg01325.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-10/msg01325.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1418 1419
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2004-07/msg01075.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2004-07/msg01075.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2005-04/msg00556.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2005-04/msg00556.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1420 1421 1422
</p>
  </li><li>Have resource managers report the duration of their status changes
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-10/msg01468.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-10/msg01468.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1423 1424 1425 1426
</p>
  </li><li>Move pgfoundry's xlogdump to /contrib and have it rely more closely
  on the WAL backend code
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-11/msg00035.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-11/msg00035.php</a>
1427 1428
</p>
</li></ul>
1429
<h1><a name="section_19">Optimizer / Executor</a></h1>
1430 1431

<ul>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1432
  <li>Improve selectivity functions for geometric operators
1433 1434 1435
  </li><li>Precompile SQL functions to avoid overhead
  </li><li>Create utility to compute accurate random_page_cost value
  </li><li>Improve ability to display optimizer analysis using OPTIMIZER_DEBUG
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1436 1437
  </li><li>Have EXPLAIN ANALYZE issue NOTICE messages when the estimated and
  actual row counts differ by a specified percentage
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1438 1439 1440
  </li><li>Improve how ANALYZE computes in-doubt tuples
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-11/msg00771.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-11/msg00771.php</a>
</p>
1441
  </li><li>Consider using hash buckets to do DISTINCT, rather than sorting
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1442 1443
<p>  This would be beneficial when there are few distinct values.  This is
  already used by GROUP BY.
1444
</p>
1445
  </li><li>Log statements where the optimizer row estimates were dramatically
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1446
  different from the number of rows actually found?
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1447 1448
  </li><li>Consider compressed annealing to search for query plans
<p>  This might replace GEQO, <a href="http://sixdemonbag.org/Djinni">http://sixdemonbag.org/Djinni</a>.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1449
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1450
  </li><li>Improve merge join performance by allowing mark/restore of
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1451 1452
  tuple sources
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-01/msg00096.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-01/msg00096.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1453 1454 1455
</p>
  </li><li>Consider using a hash for joining to a large IN (VALUES ...) list
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-05/msg00450.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-05/msg00450.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1456
</p>
1457
</li></ul>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1458 1459 1460 1461 1462 1463 1464 1465 1466 1467 1468 1469 1470 1471 1472 1473 1474 1475 1476 1477 1478 1479 1480 1481 1482
<h1><a name="section_20">Background Writer</a></h1>

<ul>
  <li>Consider having the background writer update the transaction status
  hint bits before writing out the page
<p>  Implementing this requires the background writer to have access to system
  catalogs and the transaction status log.
</p>
  </li><li>Consider adding buffers the background writer finds reusable to the
  free list 
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-04/msg00781.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-04/msg00781.php</a>
</p>
  </li><li>Automatically tune bgwriter_delay based on activity rather then using a
  fixed interval
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-04/msg00781.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-04/msg00781.php</a>
</p>
  </li><li>Consider wither increasing BM_MAX_USAGE_COUNT improves performance
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-06/msg01007.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-06/msg01007.php</a>
</p>
  </li><li>Test to see if calling PreallocXlogFiles() from the background writer
  will help with WAL segment creation latency
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-06/msg00340.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-06/msg00340.php</a>
</p>
</li></ul>
<h1><a name="section_21">Miscellaneous Performance</a></h1>
1483 1484 1485 1486 1487

<ul>
  <li>Do async I/O for faster random read-ahead of data
<p>  Async I/O allows multiple I/O requests to be sent to the disk with
  results coming back asynchronously.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1488 1489
</p>
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-10/msg00820.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-10/msg00820.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1490
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-performance/2007-09/msg00255.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-performance/2007-09/msg00255.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1491
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-12/msg00027.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-12/msg00027.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1492
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2008-01/msg00170.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2008-01/msg00170.php</a>
1493
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1494
  </li><li>Use mmap() rather than SYSV shared memory or to write WAL files?
1495 1496 1497 1498 1499 1500 1501 1502 1503
<p>  This would remove the requirement for SYSV SHM but would introduce
  portability issues. Anonymous mmap (or mmap to /dev/zero) is required
  to prevent I/O overhead.
</p>
  </li><li>Consider mmap()'ing files into a backend?
<p>  Doing I/O to large tables would consume a lot of address space or
  require frequent mapping/unmapping.  Extending the file also causes
  mapping problems that might require mapping only individual pages,
  leading to thousands of mappings.  Another problem is that there is no
1504
  way to <u>prevent</u> I/O to disk from the dirty shared buffers so changes
1505 1506 1507
  could hit disk before WAL is written.
</p>
  </li><li>Add a script to ask system configuration questions and tune postgresql.conf
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1508 1509
  </li><li>Consider ways of storing rows more compactly on disk
  <ul>
1510
    <li>Reduce the row header size?
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1511
    </li><li>Consider reducing on-disk varlena length from four bytes to
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1512
          two because a heap row cannot be more than 64k in length
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1513
  </li></ul>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1514
  </li><li>Consider increasing NUM_CLOG_BUFFERS
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1515
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-08/msg00030.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-08/msg00030.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1516
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-performance/2007-08/msg00024.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-performance/2007-08/msg00024.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1517 1518 1519 1520
</p>
  </li><li>Consider transaction start/end performance improvements
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-07/msg00948.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-07/msg00948.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-03/msg00361.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-03/msg00361.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1521
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1522
  </li><li>Allow user configuration of TOAST thresholds
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1523
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-02/msg00213.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-02/msg00213.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1524
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-08/msg00082.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-08/msg00082.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1525 1526 1527 1528
</p>
  </li><li>Allow configuration of backend priorities via the operating system
<p>  Though backend priorities make priority inversion during lock
  waits possible, research shows that this is not a huge problem.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1529 1530
</p>
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2007-02/msg00493.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2007-02/msg00493.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1531
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1532 1533 1534 1535 1536 1537 1538 1539 1540 1541
  </li><li>Experiment with multi-threaded backend better I/O utilization
<p>  This would allow a single query to make use of multiple I/O channels
  simultaneously.  One idea is to create a background reader that can
  pre-fetch sequential and index scan pages needed by other backends.
  This could be expanded to allow concurrent reads from multiple devices
  in a partitioned table.
</p>
  </li><li>Experiment with multi-threaded backend better CPU utilization
<p>  This would allow several CPUs to be used for a single query, such as
  for sorting or query execution.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1542 1543 1544
</p>
  </li><li>Consider increasing the minimum allowed number of shared buffers
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-bugs/2008-02/msg00157.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-bugs/2008-02/msg00157.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1545 1546 1547
</p>
  </li><li>Expire published xmin for read-only and idle transactions
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-09/msg00343.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-09/msg00343.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1548 1549 1550 1551
</p>
  </li><li>Consider if CommandCounterIncrement() can avoid its
  AcceptInvalidationMessages() call
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-committers/2007-11/msg00585.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-committers/2007-11/msg00585.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1552 1553 1554
</p>
  </li><li>Improve performance of shared invalidation queue for multiple CPUs
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-performance/2008-01/msg00023.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-performance/2008-01/msg00023.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1555 1556 1557 1558
</p>
  </li><li>Consider Cartesian joins when both relations are needed to form an
  indexscan qualification for a third relation
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-performance/2007-12/msg00090.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-performance/2007-12/msg00090.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1559 1560 1561 1562 1563
</p>
  </li><li>Consider not storing a NULL bitmap on disk if all the NULLs are
  trailing
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-12/msg00624.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-12/msg00624.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-12/msg00109.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-12/msg00109.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1564 1565 1566
</p>
  </li><li>Sort large UPDATE/DELETEs so it is done in heap order
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-01/msg01119.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-01/msg01119.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1567
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Done:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1568
  </li><li>-<em>Avoid tuple some tuple copying in sort routines</em>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1569 1570
  </li><li>SMP scalability improvements
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-07/msg00439.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-07/msg00439.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1571
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-09/msg00206.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-09/msg00206.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1572
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-03/msg00361.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-03/msg00361.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1573 1574 1575
</p>
  </li><li>Research reducing deTOASTing in more places
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-09/msg00895.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-09/msg00895.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1576 1577 1578 1579 1580
</p>
  </li><li>Consider being smarter about memory and external files used during
  sorts
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-11/msg01101.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-11/msg01101.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-12/msg00045.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-12/msg00045.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1581 1582 1583 1584 1585
</p>
  </li><li>Allow one transaction to see tuples using the snapshot of another
  transaction
<p>  This would assist multiple backends in working together.
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-01/msg00400.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-01/msg00400.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1586
</p>
1587
</li></ul>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1588
<h1><a name="section_22">Source Code</a></h1>
1589 1590 1591

<ul>
  <li>Add use of 'const' for variables in source tree
1592
  </li><li>Move some things from contrib into main tree
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1593
  </li><li>%Remove warnings created by -Wcast-align
1594 1595 1596 1597 1598 1599
  </li><li>Move platform-specific ps status display info from ps_status.c to ports
  </li><li>Add optional CRC checksum to heap and index pages
  </li><li>Improve documentation to build only interfaces (Marc)
  </li><li>Remove or relicense modules that are not under the BSD license, if possible
  </li><li>Acquire lock on a relation before building a relcache entry for it
  </li><li>Allow cross-compiling by generating the zic database on the target system
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Done:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1600
  </li><li>Improve NLS maintenance of libpgport messages linked onto applications
1601
  </li><li>Clean up casting in contrib/isn
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1602 1603
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-11/msg00245.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-11/msg00245.php</a>
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1604 1605
  </li><li>Use UTF8 encoding for NLS messages so all server encodings can
  read them properly
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1606
  </li><li>Update Bonjour to work with newer cross-platform SDK
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1607
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-09/msg02238.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-09/msg02238.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1608
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2006-10/msg00048.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2006-10/msg00048.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1609
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1610
  </li><li>Consider detoasting keys before sorting
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1611
  </li><li>Consider GnuTLS if OpenSSL license becomes a problem
1612
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2006-05/msg00040.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2006-05/msg00040.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1613
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-12/msg01213.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-12/msg01213.php</a>
1614
</p>
1615 1616
  </li><li>Consider changing documentation format from SGML to XML
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-docs/2006-12/msg00152.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-docs/2006-12/msg00152.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1617
</p>
1618
  </li><li>Consider making NAMEDATALEN more configurable in future releases
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1619
  </li><li>Update our code to handle 64-bit timezone files to match the zic
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1620
  source code, which now uses them
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1621 1622
  </li><li>Have configure choose integer datetimes by default
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-05/msg00046.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-05/msg00046.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1623 1624 1625
</p>
  </li><li>Support scoped IPv6 addresses
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-bugs/2007-05/msg00111.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-bugs/2007-05/msg00111.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1626
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1627 1628 1629 1630
  </li><li>Consider allowing 64-bit integers and floats to be passed by value on
  64-bit platforms
<p>  Also change 32-bit floats (float4) to be passed by value at the same
  time.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1631 1632 1633
</p>
  </li><li>Research use of signals and sleep wake ups
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-07/msg00003.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-07/msg00003.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1634 1635 1636
</p>
  </li><li>Add automated check for invalid C++ source code constructs
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-07/msg00056.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-07/msg00056.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1637 1638 1639
</p>
  </li><li>Consider simplifying how memory context resets handle child contexts
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-08/msg00067.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2007-08/msg00067.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1640 1641 1642
</p>
  </li><li>Remove use of MAKE_PTR and MAKE_OFFSET macros
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2007-08/msg01510.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2007-08/msg01510.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1643 1644 1645
</p>
  </li><li>Convert single quotes to apostrophes in the PDF documentation
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-docs/2007-12/msg00059.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-docs/2007-12/msg00059.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1646 1647 1648
</p>
  </li><li>Create three versions of libpgport to simplify client code
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-10/msg00154.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-10/msg00154.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1649 1650 1651
</p>
  </li><li>Remove old-style routines for manipulating tuples
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-10/msg00851.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-10/msg00851.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1652 1653 1654 1655
</p>
  </li><li>Improve detection of shared memory segments being used by other
  FreeBSD jails
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-01/msg00656.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-01/msg00656.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1656 1657 1658 1659 1660 1661
</p>
  </li><li>Implement the non-threaded Avahi service discovery protocol
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-02/msg00939.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-02/msg00939.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2008-02/msg00097.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2008-02/msg00097.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-03/msg01211.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-03/msg01211.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2008-04/msg00001.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2008-04/msg00001.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1662
</p>
1663 1664 1665 1666 1667 1668 1669 1670 1671 1672
  </li><li>Win32
  <ul>
    <li>Remove configure.in check for link failure when cause is found
    </li><li>Remove readdir() errno patch when runtime/mingwex/dirent.c rev
          1.4 is released
    </li><li>Remove psql newline patch when we find out why mingw outputs an
          extra newline
    </li><li>Allow psql to use readline once non-US code pages work with
          backslashes
    </li><li>Fix problem with shared memory on the Win32 Terminal Server
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1673 1674 1675 1676
    </li><li>Diagnose problem where shared memory can sometimes not be
          attached by postmaster children
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2007-08/msg01377.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-general/2007-08/msg01377.php</a>
</p>
1677 1678
    </li><li>Improve signal handling
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2005-06/msg00027.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2005-06/msg00027.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1679 1680 1681
</p>
    </li><li>Convert MSVC build system to remove most batch files
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-08/msg00961.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-08/msg00961.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1682 1683 1684 1685
</p>
    </li><li>Prevent SSL from sending network packets to avoid interference
          with Win32 signal emulation
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-12/msg00455.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-12/msg00455.php</a>
1686
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1687
    </li><li>Support pgxs when using MSVC
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1688 1689 1690
    </li><li>Fix MSVC NLS support, like for to_char()
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-02/msg00485.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-02/msg00485.php</a>
          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2008-02/msg00038.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-patches/2008-02/msg00038.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1691
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1692
    </li><li>Find a correct rint() substitute on Windows
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1693
<p>          <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-01/msg00808.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-01/msg00808.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1694
</p>
1695 1696 1697 1698 1699 1700
  </li></ul>
  </li><li>Wire Protocol Changes
  <ul>
    <li>Allow dynamic character set handling
    </li><li>Add decoded type, length, precision
    </li><li>Use compression?
1701
    </li><li>Update clients to use data types, typmod, schema.table.column names
1702
          of result sets using new statement protocol
1703 1704
  </li></ul>
</li></ul>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1705
<h1><a name="section_23">Exotic Features</a></h1>
1706 1707 1708 1709 1710 1711 1712 1713

<ul>
  <li>Add pre-parsing phase that converts non-ISO syntax to supported
  syntax
<p>  This could allow SQL written for other databases to run without
  modification.
</p>
  </li><li>Allow plug-in modules to emulate features from other databases
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1714
  </li><li>Add features of Oracle-style packages  (Pavel)
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1715 1716 1717 1718 1719
<p>  A package would be a schema with session-local variables,
  public/private functions, and initialization functions.  It
  is also possible to implement these capabilities
  in any schema and not use a separate "packages"
  syntax at all.
1720
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1721
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-08/msg00384.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-08/msg00384.php</a>
1722
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1723
  </li><li>Consider allowing control of upper/lower case folding of unquoted
1724 1725
  identifiers
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2004-04/msg00818.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2004-04/msg00818.php</a>
1726
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-10/msg01527.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-10/msg01527.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1727
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-03/msg00849.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-03/msg00849.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1728
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1729
  </li><li>Add autonomous transactions
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1730
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-01/msg00893.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2008-01/msg00893.php</a>
1731 1732
</p>
</li></ul>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1733
<h1><a name="section_24">Features We Do <u>Not</u> Want</a></h1>
1734 1735

<ul>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1736
  <li>All backends running as threads in a single process (not wanted)
1737 1738 1739 1740
<p>  This eliminates the process protection we get from the current setup.
  Thread creation is usually the same overhead as process creation on
  modern systems, so it seems unwise to use a pure threaded model.
</p>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1741
  </li><li>Optimizer hints (not wanted)
1742 1743
<p>  Optimizer hints are used to work around problems in the optimizer.  We
  would rather have the problems reported and fixed.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1744 1745
</p>
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-08/msg00506.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-08/msg00506.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1746 1747
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-10/msg00517.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-10/msg00517.php</a>
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-10/msg00663.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2006-10/msg00663.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1748 1749 1750
</p>
<p>  Because we support postfix operators, it isn't possible to make AS
  optional and continue to use bison.
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1751
  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2003-04/msg00436.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2003-04/msg00436.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Add:  
Bruce Momjian committed
1752 1753
</p>
<p>  <a href="http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-sql/2006-08/msg00164.php">http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-sql/2006-08/msg00164.php</a>
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1754 1755
</p>
  </li><li>Embedded server (not wanted)
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1756
<p>  While PostgreSQL clients runs fine in limited-resource environments, the
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1757
  server requires multiple processes and a stable pool of resources to
Bruce Momjian's avatar
Bruce Momjian committed
1758 1759
  run reliabily and efficiently.  Stripping down the PostgreSQL server
  to run in the same process address space as the client application
1760
  would add too much complexity and failure cases.</p>
1761
</li></ul>
1762

1763 1764
</body>
</html>