I can imagine one more
(None - I would rename this) ClientOnly - Client can use Catalog Planning or Local Planning PreferClient - Client should use local planning, but the plan api is available for this table — I can only imagine this would be useful for a scenario where most clients are heavy and have the resources to do local planning (or engine distributed planning) but you still want to support lightweight clients which can’t really do planning themselves. PreferCatalog - Client should use the plan API, but credentials have been provided to enable local planning — This is probably a transitional state as we move from clients that only support local planning to those which can use the plan api. CatalogOnly - Clients are not provided with the credentials required to read the table from the Metadata.json alone. If they do not implement the scan plan API they should fail fast, otherwise they will fail when they attempt to load a manifest_list file — This is used in circumstances where the catalog is giving either file specific credentials or is protecting the delivered files in some way such that their contents has been specially redacted or something like that. I assume most catalogs will start with “ClientOnly” or “None” Then as Catalogs being to support planning API we will see most tables move to PreferCatalog with some perhaps extremely heavy or large tables staying as PreferClient or Client Only. Then catalogs with special protections may have some tables return CatalogOnly so they can either scope credentials more tightly or manipulate the files that the client actually has access to in some way. On Sat, Dec 20, 2025 at 1:09 AM Jean-Baptiste Onofré <[email protected]> wrote: > Hi Prashant > > It makes sense to me. I guess we are using Catalog properties to > indicate what the REST server supports to the client, right ? > I will take a look at the PR, but I like the idea. > > Regards > JB > > On Sat, Dec 20, 2025 at 12:53 AM Prashant Singh <[email protected]> > wrote: > >> Hey All, >> >> I wanted to bring up the discussion of introducing a concept of rest scan >> planning mode which would help the server to instruct the client on how to >> plan the table via loadTableResponse or config at table level override. >> There are three possible values which one could think of : >> 1. *None* : i.e plan it on the client side, this may be the table is too >> small and the additional rest request would add more overhead than benefit. >> 2. *Optional* : client can choose to plan it either locally or can >> trigger server side planning. >> 3. *Required* : client MUST do server side planning, the server could >> suggest this if it has better indexed the iceberg metadata or client is >> running on low resources or the table is protected. Server MAY choose >> whatever way required to enforce the client cant bypass this for example >> let's say don't vend cred as part of loadTable and only mint it part of >> planning completion this would mean if the client doesn't call plan table . >> >> I proactively have created a pull request [1], would love to know all >> your feedback either here or in the PR directly ! >> >> Wish you all a very happy Holidays, it has been great working with you >> all. >> >> [1] https://github.com/apache/iceberg/pull/14867 >> >> Best, >> Prashant Singh >> >
