On Thu, Jan 26, 2017 at 12:13 PM, Andres Freund <andres@anarazel.de> wrote:
On 2017-01-26 14:05:43 -0500, Robert Haas wrote: > I completely understand that position. I have always been doubtful of > the value of renaming pg_xlog to pg_wal, and I'm not any more > dedicated to the idea now than I was when I committed that patch. But > there was overwhelming support for it, consensus on a level rarely > seen here.
I think that consistency was based on the change being a narrow proposition, not a license to run around and change a lot of stuff including the names of binary.
Whether the voters recognized that fact at the time I would have to concur that if we are going to change from xlog to wal we should be all-in. If you want to vote to reject putting the whole camel in the tent I would say its a vote for reverting the change that put the camel's nose in there in the first place.
I'm tempted to quote Emerson ;). I don't think the naming of pg_xlog vs. pg_wal doesn't actually have that large an impact, to change the dynamics of the wal vs xlog dichotomy. Sure it's nothing you'd do in a new program, but neither is it very bad.
Once I learned what "write ahead log" was it wasn't that big a deal to understand that this particular historical implementation detail means I have to associate xlog with it. Causing wide-spread pain to lower the comprehension bar doesn't seems like a simple win here. I have no real feel for how wide-spread that would be, though. I personally wouldn't mind it being consistent but I am not representative of the larger user base.