Re: FILTER for aggregates [was Re: Department of Redundancy Department: makeNode(FuncCall) division]

Greg Stark <stark(at)mit(dot)edu> wrote:
> On Mon, Jun 24, 2013 at 3:50 AM, Tom Lane <tgl(at)sss(dot)pgh(dot)pa(dot)us> wrote:
>> Or maybe they really don't give a damn about breaking
>> applications every time they invent a new reserved word?
>
> I think this is the obvious conclusion. In the standard the reserved
> words are pretty explicitly reserved and not legal column names, no?
>
> I think their model is that applications work with a certain version
> of SQL and they're not expected to work with a new version without
> extensive updating.

IMO it is insanity to write an application of any significant
complexity without a data abstraction layer sitting on a data
access layer, and it is silly to write such layers which are
intended to interface to SQL in a portable way without quoting
*all* identifiers sent to the server.  As a developer, new reserved
words never bothered me in the slightest.  At Wisconsin Courts the
most heavily used table has been called "Case" since 1989, and the
table to hold a row for each paper document printed to pay someone
is called "Check".  No need to change the names just because SQL
started using those words for new language features after we had
the tables.  And there is no reason to assume that any particular
word won't become reserved in the future.

I think the most likely explanation is not that they don't mind
breaking applications, but that they don't understand that there
are significant numbers of people who choose to write code in a
fashion which leaves them vulnerable to breakage when new reserved
words are added.

Being closer to the wide variety of users we know that there are
many such people out there, and we try to look after them as best
we can; which is entirely appropriate.

--
Kevin Grittner
EnterpriseDB: http://www.enterprisedb.com
The Enterprise PostgreSQL Company