Thread: "txn" in pg_stat_activity

I have just noticed that a column "txn_start" has appeared in
pg_stat_activity since 8.2.  It's a good idea, but who chose the name?
We do not use that abbreviation for "transaction" anywhere else in
Postgres, certainly not in any user-exposed places.

I'm inclined to rename it to "xact_start", which is an abbreviation
that we *do* use in the code, and in some user-visible places, eg,
pg_stat_database has "xact_commit" and "xact_rollback" columns.

Other suggestions?  If we don't change it before 8.3 beta starts,
we'll be stuck with it ...
        regards, tom lane

On Mon, 2007-09-10 at 21:04 -0400, Tom Lane wrote:
> I have just noticed that a column "txn_start" has appeared in
> pg_stat_activity since 8.2.  It's a good idea, but who chose the name?

Me.

> I'm inclined to rename it to "xact_start", which is an abbreviation
> that we *do* use in the code, and in some user-visible places, eg,
> pg_stat_database has "xact_commit" and "xact_rollback" columns.

I personally find "xact" to be a less intuitive abbreviation of
"transaction" than "txn", but for the sake of consistency, I agree it is
probably better to use "xact_start".

-Neil

Neil Conway <neilc@samurai.com> writes:
> I personally find "xact" to be a less intuitive abbreviation of
> "transaction" than "txn", but for the sake of consistency, I agree it is
> probably better to use "xact_start".

Barring other objections, I'll go make this happen.
        regards, tom lane