-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: RIPEMD160 Tom Lane opined:
> The actual argument for doing this is nothing more nor less than > "mysql does it like that". 99% of the people who will tell you this > is user-friendly think so because they used mysql before coming to > postgres. No. While the original poster may have been making a separate comparison to MySQL, I can assure you that my impetus for doing this is not being driven by the behavior of the mysql client. Having "help" do something other than throw a syntax error is a very common feature in many interactive programs, for example openssl, gdb, ftp, bash, mail, telnet, and vim. > That might be sufficient reason to do it; I'm not sure. Personally > I find it a really bad idea for psql to be usurping syntax that > doesn't start with a backslash, but I don't suppose I'm representative > of people who haven't absorbed the difference between psql and SQL. Right: this is obviously aimed at people who are new to psql. > Note that the mysql help facility covers both the mysql program and SQL > commands (ie both \? and \h in our terminology) so the proposed patch > is going to be seen as pretty lacking anyway by mysql-trained users. It gets them pointed in the right direction. > It's interesting to note that "help", "\h", and "\?" all provoke the > same response(s) in mysql. Perhaps a patch that had had more than two > seconds' design effort in it would do the same in psql; though I'm not > sure what to do to disambiguate the case with no arguments. I'm not looking to emulate MySQL, I'm looking to do something reasonable when a user enters "help". Output that is generated in response to a user's action is more likely to be read than something auto-generated at the start of the session, and they should be able to take it from there. Alvaro suggests: > To avoid the usage of unadorned "help" (which I don't think is going to > ever cause conflicts with a SQL command but perhaps it's better to be > prepared), one idea would be to respond with "please execute \help > instead", and then \help would emit the verbose output. Ugh. Why make people do two steps? - -- Greg Sabino Mullane [EMAIL PROTECTED] PGP Key: 0x14964AC8 200801201518 http://biglumber.com/x/web?pk=2529DF6AB8F79407E94445B4BC9B906714964AC8 -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- iD8DBQFHk683vJuQZxSWSsgRA1F0AJ0RVQqd6LeIGsZDeyP78Y/WngpMdACfdrPZ LJ5gmCbZ3OuXq6JK5C+BTEQ= =flsE -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- ---------------------------(end of broadcast)--------------------------- TIP 3: Have you checked our extensive FAQ? http://www.postgresql.org/docs/faq
