Re: Add switches for DELIMITER and NULL in pg_dump COPY - Mailing list pgsql-hackers

From Tom Lane
Subject Re: Add switches for DELIMITER and NULL in pg_dump COPY
Date
Msg-id 14919.1141833780@sss.pgh.pa.us
Whole thread Raw
In response to Add switches for DELIMITER and NULL in pg_dump COPY  (David Fetter <david@fetter.org>)
Responses Re: Add switches for DELIMITER and NULL in pg_dump COPY
List pgsql-hackers
David Fetter <david@fetter.org> writes:
> From the earlier discussion, it appears that there is a variety of
> opinions on what the COPY delimiter should be in pg_dump.  This patch
> allows people to set it and the NULL string.

Did anyone provide a convincing use case for this?  It's of zero value
from the perspective of pg_dump itself; the only possible argument is
that it makes it easier for program-foo to parse the output of pg_dump.
But I don't see any programs around to parse arbitrary SQL scripts,
especially not the pretty-PG-specific scripts that pg_dump emits.

I think it much more likely that people needing this sort of thing would
be using something like "psql -c 'copy foo to stdout'", so as to get the
data without any added overhead.

So this seems like mere creeping featurism to me.  pg_dump has too many
switches already.

            regards, tom lane

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