Thread: unknown libpq service entries ignored

When using the "service" parameter in a libpq connection (e.g., psql
service=foo), and the service name is not defined in pg_service.conf,
then the setting is silently ignored and the connection proceeds with
whatever other settings and defaults apply.  That does not look very
robust.  Shouldn't there be an error when a specified service name does
not exist?

Peter Eisentraut wrote:
> When using the "service" parameter in a libpq connection (e.g., psql
> service=foo), and the service name is not defined in pg_service.conf,
> then the setting is silently ignored and the connection proceeds with
> whatever other settings and defaults apply.  That does not look very
> robust.  Shouldn't there be an error when a specified service name does
> not exist?

I agree. It leads to strange error messages at least (I didn't want
to connect to port 5432 on localhost?!?), and you could end up
connecting to a different database than you wanted without
noticing it.

Yours,
Laurenz Albe

On tor, 2009-11-26 at 10:57 +0200, Peter Eisentraut wrote:
> When using the "service" parameter in a libpq connection (e.g., psql
> service=foo), and the service name is not defined in pg_service.conf,
> then the setting is silently ignored and the connection proceeds with
> whatever other settings and defaults apply.  That does not look very
> robust.  Shouldn't there be an error when a specified service name does
> not exist?

Possible patch for this issue.

Peter Eisentraut <peter_e@gmx.net> writes:
> +        printfPQExpBuffer(errorMessage,
> +                          libpq_gettext("ERROR: service \"%s\" not found\n"), service);

Please make the message consistent with the rest of libpq.  AFAICS none
of the other messages in that file use an ERROR: prefix.
        regards, tom lane

On fre, 2009-11-27 at 10:22 -0500, Tom Lane wrote:
> Peter Eisentraut <peter_e@gmx.net> writes:
> > +        printfPQExpBuffer(errorMessage,
> > +                          libpq_gettext("ERROR: service \"%s\" not found\n"), service);
> 
> Please make the message consistent with the rest of libpq.  AFAICS none
> of the other messages in that file use an ERROR: prefix.

Well, that style is used four times in that same function, but no where
else in the file.  So the existing uses should probably also be cleaned
up.