Re: Support UPDATE table SET(*)=...

On Fri, Oct 17, 2014 at 10:10 AM, Tom Lane <tgl(at)sss(dot)pgh(dot)pa(dot)us> wrote:
> Merlin Moncure <mmoncure(at)gmail(dot)com> writes:
>> On Fri, Oct 17, 2014 at 9:55 AM, Marko Tiikkaja <marko(at)joh(dot)to> wrote:
>>> I don't know about Tom, but I didn't like that:
>>> http://www.postgresql.org/message-id/5364C982.7060003@joh.to
>
>> Hm, I didn't understand your objection:
>
>> <quoting>
>> So e.g.:
>> UPDATE foo f SET f = ..;
>
>> would resolve to the table, despite there being a column called "f"?
>> That would break backwards compatibility.
>> </quoting>
>
>> That's not correct: it should work exactly as 'select' does; given a
>> conflict resolve the field name, so no backwards compatibility issue.
>
> The point is that it's fairly messy (and bug-prone) to have a syntax
> where we have to make an arbitrary choice between two reasonable
> interpretations.
>
> If you look back at the whole thread Marko's above-cited message is in,
> we'd considered a bunch of different possible syntaxes for this, and
> none of them had much support. The "(*)" idea actually is starting to
> look pretty good to me.

Hm, I'll take it then.

merlin