Thread: Appendix A. PostgreSQL Error Codes
The following documentation comment has been logged on the website: Page: https://www.postgresql.org/docs/10/static/errcodes-appendix.html Description: Hi Would it be possible to present the codes in ascending sequence? This applies to all releases. Thanks
On Fri, Apr 27, 2018 at 10:08:12AM +0000, PG Doc comments form wrote: > The following documentation comment has been logged on the website: > > Page: https://www.postgresql.org/docs/10/static/errcodes-appendix.html > Description: > > Hi > Would it be possible to present the codes in ascending sequence? > This applies to all releases. Uh, I am guessing this is the order listed in the SQL standard. How would you order them differently? Have the letters only at the end? -- Bruce Momjian <bruce@momjian.us> http://momjian.us EnterpriseDB http://enterprisedb.com + As you are, so once was I. As I am, so you will be. + + Ancient Roman grave inscription +
Bruce Momjian <bruce@momjian.us> writes:
> On Fri, Apr 27, 2018 at 10:08:12AM +0000, PG Doc comments form wrote:
>> Would it be possible to present the codes in ascending sequence?
> Uh, I am guessing this is the order listed in the SQL standard. How
> would you order them differently? Have the letters only at the end?
There was some discussion of this a couple months ago, which I'm too lazy
to search the archives for right now, but it trailed off without any
agreement on what to do.
There are at least three different ordering principles that might be
applied here: numeric by code (well, perhaps more like "ASCII sort
order"); alphabetical by exception name (but probably still keeping the
000 category codes at the top); or semantic grouping (ie try to keep
related errors together). It looks to me like all three of these have
been applied in different places ;-).
One idea that might help is to present two tables with different sort
orders, say strict numeric and strict alphabetical. (If we did that,
I'd be inclined to leave errcodes.txt alone and put the sorting
responsibility on the script that converts it to SGML.)
One question that has to be asked is what we think the use-case for this
table is at all. Different use-cases result in different ideas about the
best ordering.
regards, tom lane
Hi
The use case is pretty simple; my system has thrown an SQL error code, I
want to know what it means.
Having the list in 'order by sqlstate' sequence would save me from having to
hunt up and down the list. And I can easily determine if the error code is
missing; I can then raise another bug report.
Regards
Andy Dossett
-----Original Message-----
From: Tom Lane <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us>
Sent: 27 April 2018 16:16
To: Bruce Momjian <bruce@momjian.us>
Cc: dossett@btinternet.com; pgsql-docs@lists.postgresql.org
Subject: Re: Appendix A. PostgreSQL Error Codes
Bruce Momjian <bruce@momjian.us> writes:
> On Fri, Apr 27, 2018 at 10:08:12AM +0000, PG Doc comments form wrote:
>> Would it be possible to present the codes in ascending sequence?
> Uh, I am guessing this is the order listed in the SQL standard. How
> would you order them differently? Have the letters only at the end?
There was some discussion of this a couple months ago, which I'm too lazy to
search the archives for right now, but it trailed off without any agreement
on what to do.
There are at least three different ordering principles that might be applied
here: numeric by code (well, perhaps more like "ASCII sort order");
alphabetical by exception name (but probably still keeping the
000 category codes at the top); or semantic grouping (ie try to keep related
errors together). It looks to me like all three of these have been applied
in different places ;-).
One idea that might help is to present two tables with different sort
orders, say strict numeric and strict alphabetical. (If we did that, I'd be
inclined to leave errcodes.txt alone and put the sorting responsibility on
the script that converts it to SGML.)
One question that has to be asked is what we think the use-case for this
table is at all. Different use-cases result in different ideas about the
best ordering.
regards, tom lane
The SQL standard sorts the SQLSTATE table in a first step according to the textual representation of class (first two byte) and in a second step to the textual representation of subclass (next 3 byte) - keeping the text '(no subclass)' for subclass '000' on top. Obviously for some people this 'textual' sort order is relevant.
For my personal use I strongly prefer a pure 'numeric' sort order of SQLSTATE. Therefore I created a Perl program, which generates the SGML file out of errcode.txt and published it in https://www.postgresql.org/message-id/d69ce4f1-dd4e-61c1-070e-25f662e9c622%40purtz.de . This was a follow-up action after a discussion about illegal SQLSTATE values in PG, see: https://www.postgresql.org/message-id/11558.1513819695%40sss.pgh.pa.us.
PG documentation uses a numeric sort order for class and a semantic sort order for subclass.
Which one of the three is best? Here is my judgement: For technical oriented people the first approach is horrible because it sorts not only the subclass-text but also the class-text. This scrambles important and less important values to arbitrary positions. For me, sorting of the numeric value of class in a first step is essential. The third approach may be good for persons which work on the improvement of the PG source code. But they can refer to errcodes.txt. The primary readers of our documentation are users which work in roles as DBA or application developer. I doubt that they are interested in the semantic order of subclass. But I do not know whether they prefer numeric to text or text to numeric translation.
Jürgen Purtz
On 27.04.2018 17:16, Tom Lane wrote:
Bruce Momjian <bruce@momjian.us> writes:On Fri, Apr 27, 2018 at 10:08:12AM +0000, PG Doc comments form wrote:Would it be possible to present the codes in ascending sequence?Uh, I am guessing this is the order listed in the SQL standard. How would you order them differently? Have the letters only at the end?There was some discussion of this a couple months ago, which I'm too lazy to search the archives for right now, but it trailed off without any agreement on what to do. There are at least three different ordering principles that might be applied here: numeric by code (well, perhaps more like "ASCII sort order"); alphabetical by exception name (but probably still keeping the 000 category codes at the top); or semantic grouping (ie try to keep related errors together). It looks to me like all three of these have been applied in different places ;-). One idea that might help is to present two tables with different sort orders, say strict numeric and strict alphabetical. (If we did that, I'd be inclined to leave errcodes.txt alone and put the sorting responsibility on the script that converts it to SGML.) One question that has to be asked is what we think the use-case for this table is at all. Different use-cases result in different ideas about the best ordering. regards, tom lane
"Andy Dossett" <dossett@btinternet.com> writes:
> The use case is pretty simple; my system has thrown an SQL error code, I
> want to know what it means.
> Having the list in 'order by sqlstate' sequence would save me from having to
> hunt up and down the list. And I can easily determine if the error code is
> missing; I can then raise another bug report.
Hm ... I'm not finding that to be a very compelling argument. Reading the
message text is usually *far* more illuminating, because the error codes
are (in many cases) rather broad categories rather than exact conditions.
For the use case of "why did I get this error", I'd say that looking in
Appendix A is quite unhelpful, and sorting it differently wouldn't make
it any more helpful.
regards, tom lane
> On Apr 28, 2018, at 5:11 PM, Tom Lane <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us> wrote: > > "Andy Dossett" <dossett@btinternet.com> writes: >> The use case is pretty simple; my system has thrown an SQL error code, I >> want to know what it means. >> Having the list in 'order by sqlstate' sequence would save me from having to >> hunt up and down the list. And I can easily determine if the error code is >> missing; I can then raise another bug report. > > Hm ... I'm not finding that to be a very compelling argument. Reading the > message text is usually *far* more illuminating, because the error codes > are (in many cases) rather broad categories rather than exact conditions. > For the use case of "why did I get this error", I'd say that looking in > Appendix A is quite unhelpful, and sorting it differently wouldn't make > it any more helpful. Is this information we might want to add to the main part of the website? We could provide the list of error codes in Appendix A as is right now, reference to “see more info on "/support/sql-error-codes/“ or some URL. The table on such a page could contain features such as: - sortable by number vs. alphabetical - “searchable” if needed (eliminate results) - more information about what causes such errors, perhaps with an example of the detailed message. I don’t know if this would be helpful or not. Personally I’ve only looked at the error codes section a handful of times, mostly out of curiosity or experimenting with ORM/adapter type code. Jonathan