On Tue, Jun 2, 2015 at 07:33:19PM +0530, Abhijit Menon-Sen wrote: > At 2015-06-01 23:35:23 -0500, htf...@gmail.com wrote: > > > > No, it won't prevent the incredibly stupid from doing incredibly > > stupid things, nothing will. > > I hate to speechify, but I think we should try hard to avoid framing > such questions in terms of "incredibly stupid" people and the things > they might do. > > We have anecdotal and circumstantial evidence that the names pg_xlog and > pg_clog have given some people the impression that they can delete files > therein. Sometimes do this when their server is in imminent danger of > running out of space, sometimes not. But our documentation makes it > clear that these files are important. > > I think naming these directories to convey the right impression is a > straightforward interface design problem, and we also know that big > flashing red warnings are less effective than one might hope for. I > do not think a bigger, stripier warning is worth doing in isolation. > I do think it's worth choosing better names.
I think we also have to consider that these admins are in crisis mode when the run out of disk space, so they are not in a calm environment where decisions are considered carefully. You can say decisions should always be considered carefully, but I am not sure how realistic that is. -- Bruce Momjian <br...@momjian.us> http://momjian.us EnterpriseDB http://enterprisedb.com + Everyone has their own god. + -- Sent via pgsql-hackers mailing list (pgsql-hackers@postgresql.org) To make changes to your subscription: http://www.postgresql.org/mailpref/pgsql-hackers