Re: ALTER TABLE: warn when actions do not recurse to partitions - Mailing list pgsql-hackers

> On Jan 23, 2026, at 03:27, Jim Jones <jim.jones@uni-muenster.de> wrote:
>
> Hi Chao
>
> On 22/01/2026 06:45, Chao Li wrote:
>> evantest=# alter table p_test replica identity full, alter column
>> username set (n_distinct = 0.1);
>> NOTICE:  ALTER action REPLICA IDENTITY on relation "p_test" does not
>> affect present partitions
>> HINT:  partitions may be modified individually, or specify ONLY to
>> suppress this message
>> NOTICE:  ALTER action ALTER COLUMN ... SET on relation "p_test" does not
>> affect present partitions
>> HINT:  partitions may be modified individually, or specify ONLY to
>> suppress this message
>> ALTER TABLE
>
>
> One could argue that encapsulating all conditions in
> EmitPartitionNoRecurseNotice(), meaning it is called all the time, is
> slightly inefficient, but the impact is really negligible in this case -
> and it is how it is done in similar functions in tablecmds.c :) The code
> LGTM.

Hi Jim, thanks a lot for the review.

>
> One small thing:
>
> errhint is supposed to be capitalised - see Error Message Style Guide[1]

Thanks for the info, I wasn’t aware of that. When I wrote the code, I searched “errhint” over the source tree, and
didn’tfind a standard to follow. 

>
> "Detail and hint messages: Use complete sentences, and end each with a
> period. Capitalize the first word of sentences. Put two spaces after the
> period if another sentence follows (for English text; might be
> inappropriate in other languages)."
>
> ereport(NOTICE,
> errmsg("ALTER action %s on relation \"%s\" does not affect present
> partitions",
>   action_str,
>   RelationGetRelationName(rel)),
> errhint("partitions may be modified individually, or specify ONLY to
> suppress this message"));
>
> What about this?
>
> HINT: To update partitions, apply the command to each one individually,
> or specify ONLY to suppress this message.

Looks good. I will integrate your edit to the next version.

>
> I'll test the newly covered subcomands tomorrow.

Thanks again for testing. I will wait to see the test results and address all issues together in next version.

Best regards,
--
Chao Li (Evan)
HighGo Software Co., Ltd.
https://www.highgo.com/