Tom Lane wrote: >> Do I understand right that the reason why the check function is >> different from the validator function is that it would be more difficult >> to add the checks to the validator function? > >> Is that a good enough argument? From a user's perspective it is >> difficult to see why some checks are performed at function creation >> time, while others have to be explicitly checked with CHECK FUNCTION. >> I think it would be much more intuitive if CHECK FUNCTION does >> the same as function validation with check_function_bodies on. > > I think the important point here is that we need to support more than > one level of validation, and that the higher levels can't really be > applied by default in CREATE FUNCTION because they may fail on perfectly > valid code.
I understand now. There are three levels of checking: 1) Validation with check_function_bodies = off (checks nothing). 2) Validation with check_function_bodies = on (checks syntax). 3) CHECK FUNCTION (checks RAISE and objects referenced in the function). As long as 3) implies 2) (which I think it does), that makes sense. I guess I was led astray by the documentation in plhandler.sgml: Validator functions should typically honor the check_function_bodies parameter: [...] this parameter is turned off by pg_dump so that it can load procedural language functions without worrying about possible dependencies of the function bodies on other database objects. "Dependencyies on other database objects" seems more like a description of CHECK FUNCTION. But I guess that this documentation should be changed anyway to describe the check function. > A bigger issue is that once you think about more than one kind of check, > it becomes apparent that we might need some user-specifiable options to > control which checks are applied. And I see no provision for that here. My attempt at a syntax that could also cover Peter's wish for multiple checker functions: CHECK FUNCTION { func(args) | ALL [IN SCHEMA schema] [FOR ROLE user] } [ USING check_function ] OPTIONS (optname optarg [, ...]) Yours, Laurenz Albe -- Sent via pgsql-hackers mailing list (pgsql-hackers@postgresql.org) To make changes to your subscription: http://www.postgresql.org/mailpref/pgsql-hackers