postgres/doc/TODO

====================================================
TODO list (FAQ) for PostgreSQL
====================================================
last updated:		Thu Oct  2 14:08:20 EDT 1997

current maintainer:	Bruce Momjian (maillist@candle.pha.pa.us)

The most recent version of this document can be viewed at
the postgreSQL WWW site, http://www.postgreSQL.org.

THE CHANGES FOR 6.2 APPEAR AT THE END OF THIS DOCUMENT

Developers who have claimed items are:
	Bruce is Bruce Momjian<maillist@candle.pha.pa.us>
	Bryan is Bryan Henderson<bryanh@giraffe.netgate.net>
	Dan is Dan McGuirk <mcguirk@indirect.com>
	Daniel is Daniel Kalchev <daniel@digsys.bg>
	Darren is Darren King <darrenk@insightdist.com>
	Edmund is Edmund Mergl <E.Mergl@bawue.de>
	Erich Stamberger <eberger@gewi.kfunigraz.ac.at>
	Gerhard is Gerhard Reithofer <gerhardr@tech-edv.co.at>
	Igor is Igor <igor@sba.miami.edu>
	Jun is Jun Kuwamura <juk@rccm.co.jp>
	Kurt is "Kurt J. Lidl" <lidl@va.pubnix.com>
 	Martin is Martin S. Utesch <utesch@aut.tu-freiberg.de>
	Oleg is Oleg Bartunov <oleg@sai.msu.su>
	Paul is Paul M. Aoki <aoki@CS.Berkeley.EDU>
	Patrick is Patrick van Kleef <pvk@pobox.com>
	Raymond is Raymond Toy <toy@rtp.ericsson.se>
	Soo-Ho Ok <shok@detc.dongeui-tc.ac.kr>
	Stefan Simkovics <ssimkovi@rainbow.studorg.tuwien.ac.at>
	Sven is Sven Verdoolaege <skimo@breughel.ufsia.ac.be>
	Tatsuo is Tatsuo Ishii <t-ishii@sra.co.jp>
	Thomas is Thomas Lockhart <tgl@mythos.jpl.nasa.gov>
	Vadim is "Vadim B. Mikheev" <vadim@sable.krasnoyarsk.su>
	Vivek is Vivek Khera <khera@kci.kciLink.com>

RELIABILITY
-----------
-Overhaul mdmgr/smgr to fix double unlinking and double opens, cleanup(Erich)
-Overhaul bufmgr/lockmgr/transaction manager(Vadim)
Fix CLUSTER
Remove EXTEND?
Fix all NULL features
	allow psql to print nulls meaningfully
Fix compile and security of Kerberos/GSSAPI code (Daniel Kalchev?)
COUNT on VIEW always returns zero (maybe because there is no oid for views?)
CREATE VIEW requires super-user priviledge
can lo_export()/lo_import() read/write anywhere, causing a security problem?
Tables that start with xinv confused to be large objects
Two and three dimmensional arrays display improperly, missing {}
Add GROUP BY and HAVING to INSERT INTO table SELECT * FROM table2
lo_unlink() crashes server
Allow variable casts with BETWEEN 'today'::asbtime AND 'today'::abstime
Prevent auto-table reference, like SELECT table.col WHERE col = 3 (?)
Remove un-needed malloc() calls and replace with palloc().
SELECT * FROM table WHERE int4_column = '1' fails
SELECT a[1] FROM test fails, it needs test.a[1]
SELECT COUNT(*) FROM TAB1, TAB2 fails
SELECT SUM(2+2) FROM table dumps core
UPDATE table SET table.value = 3 fails
UPDATE key_table SET keyval=max(reftab.NUM)+1 WHERE tblname='reftab' fails
INSERT INTO ... SELECT DISTINCT ... generates error on DISTINCT
INSERT INTO table SELECT id, count(*) FROM table2 GROUP BY id generate error

ENHANCEMENTS
------------
Replace table-level locking with row or page-level locking(Vadim)
PRIMARY KEY during table creation
Add SERIAL type
Preserve GRANT/REVOKE/pg_group in pg_dump
Transaction log
Add full ANSI SQL capabilities (Stefan)
	add subselects, possibility using temporary SQL functions
	Implement HAVING clause
	Implement EXISTS qualifier
	report "Not implemented" if valid syntax is supplied
	add OUTER joins, left and right (Thomas)
	make VIEWs updateable where possible
	add UNIONS, INTERSECTS, SUBTRACTS
	add temporary tables
	add sql3 recursive unions
	add the concept of dataspaces
	allow conversion type casts on SELECT target fields
	add DECIMAL, NUMERIC, DOUBLE PRECISION, BIT, BIT VARYING
	 	NCHAR (as distinguished from ordinary varchar),
Allow compression of large fields or a compressed field type
Fix the rules system(Jan?,Soo-Ho)
	robust
	making INSTEAD rules work
	add CONSTRAINT
Full set of text operations and functions
	word searches, concat,max() on text, char
Large objects
	overwriting blocks has problems
	there are other problems, too.
	Fix large object mapping scheme
	not to stuff everything as files in a single directory
Better interface for adding to pg_group
Make MONEY/DECIMAL have a defined precision
Add support for tables >2G, or test current version
Threaded version of the server or libpq
Allow libpq to cancel query requests
Add REGEX internationalization
Add other language types for built-in functions
	expand to allow tcl, perl, java,
	generalize the function manager switch to pass 
		function sources to interpreter engines.
remove time-travel feature(Vadim)
reduce system column overhead(Vadmin)
remove pg_time table(Vadim)
allow row re-use without vacuum, maybe?(Vadim)
can't vacuum large objects
can't reduce index file size with vacuum
Remove restriction that ORDER BY field must be in SELECT list(?)
Allow queries about owner of tables, like:
        SELECT u.usesysid FROM postgres.pg_user u;
Add word index for text fields, maybe with trigrams, i.e.:
    ' (cat | dog) & ! fox ' meaning text has cat or dog, but not fox
Allow readline-type or editor command editing of multi-line SQL commands
Populate backend status area and write program to dump status data
Add ALTER TABLE DROP COLUMN feature
Remove stale files upon startup(Vivek)
Add command to show privileges
Allow INSERT INTO ... SELECT to convert column types
Add syslog functionality
Add STDDEV/VARIANCE() function for standard deviation computation/variance
Add table/column/function discription table indexed by oid
add pg_type attribute to identify types that need length (bpchar, varchar)
add UNIQUE capability to non-btree indexes
make large objects have their own reltype
make number of backends a config parameter, storage/sinvaladt.h:MaxBackendId
certain indexes will not shrink, i.e. oid indexes with many inserts
make NULL's come out at the beginning or end depending on the ORDER BY direction
change the library/backend interface to use network byte order
allow unix domain sockets for local connections for performance and security
Add PAGER for psql's \dt and \d tablename

PERFORMANCE
-----------
Use indexes in ORDER BY
Allow LIKE/wildcard matches to use indexes if the wildcard character is not first
Optimizing disjunctive queries
Fix bushy-plans (Martin)
Other optimizer bugs
Is fsync use optimized?
Cache most recent query plan(s?)
Shared catalog cache, reduce lseek()'s by caching table size in shared area
Allow compression of log and meta data
Add FILLFACTOR to index creation
Allow indexes to be used with OR clauses(Vadim)
update pg_statistic table to remove operator column

DOCUMENTATION
-------------
Update usermanual source(many)
remove time-travel in documentation(Bruce)
added features used in grammer but not in docs, like :: and CAST
update libpq++ manual page

PORTABILITY
-----------
 

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

                     CHANGES IN THE 6.2 RELEASE

Bug Fixes
---------
Fix problems with pg_dump for inheritance, sequences, archive tables(Bruce)
Fix compile errors on overflow due to shifts, unsigned, and bad prototypes
	 from Solaris(Diab Jerius)
Fix bugs in geometric line arithmetic (bad intersection calculations)(Thomas)
Check for geometric intersections at endpoints to avoid rounding ugliness(Thomas)
Catch non-functional delete attempts(Vadim)
Change time function names to be more consistent(Michael Reifenberg)
Check for zero divides(Michael Reifenberg)
Fix very old bug which made tuples changed/inserted by a commnd
	visible to the command itself (so we had multiple update of 
	updated tuples, etc)(Vadim)
Fix for SELECT null, 'fail' FROM pg_am (Patrick)
SELECT NULL as EMPTY_FIELD now allowed(Patrick)
Remove un-needed signal stuff from contrib/pginterface
Fix OR (where x <> 1 or x isnull didn't return tuples with x NULL) (Vadim)
Fix time_cmp function (Vadim)
Fix handling of functions with non-attribute first argument in 
	WHERE clauses (Vadim)
Fix GROUP BY when order of entries is different from order
	in target list (Vadim)
Fix pg_dump for aggregates without sfunc1 (Vadim)

Enhancements
------------
Default genetic optimizer GEQO parameter is now 8(Bruce)
Allow use parameters in target list having aggregates in functions(Vadim)
Added JDBC driver as an interface(Adrian & Peter)
pg_password utility
Return number of tuples inserted/affected by INSERT/UPDATE/DELETE etc.(Vadim)
Triggers implemented with CREATE TRIGGER (SQL3)(Vadim)
SPI (Server Programming Interface) allows execution of queries inside 
	C-functions (Vadim)
NOT NULL implemented (SQL92)(Robson Paniago de Miranda)
Include reserved words for string handling, outer joins, and unions(Thomas)
Implement extended comments ("/* ... */") using exclusive states(Thomas)
Add "//" single-line comments(Bruce)
Remove some restrictions on characters in operator names(Thomas)
DEFAULT and CONSTRAINT for tables implemented (SQL92)(Vadim & Thomas)
Add text concatenation operator and function (SQL92)(Thomas)
Support WITH TIME ZONE syntax (SQL92)(Thomas)
Support INTERVAL <unit> TO <unit> syntax (SQL92)(Thomas)
Define types DOUBLE PRECISION, INTERVAL, CHARACTER,
	and CHARACTER VARYING (SQL92)(Thomas)
Define type FLOAT(p) and rudimentary DECIMAL(p,s), NUMERIC(p,s) (SQL92)(Thomas)
Define EXTRACT(), POSITION(), SUBSTRING(), and TRIM() (SQL92)(Thomas)
Define CURRENT_DATE, CURRENT_TIME, CURRENT_TIMESTAMP (SQL92)(Thomas)
Add syntax and warnings for UNION, HAVING, INNER and OUTER JOIN (SQL92)(Thomas)
Add more reserved words, mostly for SQL92 compliance(Thomas)
Allow hh:mm:ss time entry for timespan/reltime types(Thomas)
Add center() routines for lseg, path, polygon(Thomas)
Add distance() routines for circle-polygon, polygon-polygon(Thomas)
Check explicitly for points and polygons contained within polygons
	using an axis-crossing algorithm(Thomas)
Add routine to convert circle-box(Thomas)
Merge conflicting operators for different geometric data types(Thomas)
Replace distance operator "<===>" with "<->"(Thomas)
Replace "above" operator "!^" with ">^" and "below" operator "!|" with "<^"(Thomas)
Add routines for text trimming on both ends, substring, and string position(Thomas)
Added conversion routines circle(box) and poly(circle)(Thomas)
Allow internal sorts to be stored in memory rather than in files(Bruce & Vadim)
Allow functions and operators on internally-identical types to succeed(Bruce)
Speed up backend startup after profiling analysis(Bruce)
Inline frequently called functions for performance(Bruce)
Reduce open() calls(Bruce)
psql:  Add PAGER for \h and \?,\C fix
Fix for psql pager when no tty(Bruce)
New entab utility(Bruce)
General trigger functions for referential integrity (Vadim)
General trigger functions for time travel (Vadim)
General trigger functions for AUTOINCREMENT/IDENTITY feature (Vadim)
MOVE implementation (Vadim)

Source Tree Changes
-------------------
HPUX 10 patches (Vladimir Turin)
Added SCO support, (Daniel Harris)
mkLinux patches (Tatsuo Ishii)
Change geometric box terminology from "length" to "width"(Thomas)
Deprecate temporary unstored slope fields in geometric code(Thomas)
Remove restart instructions from INSTALL(Bruce)
Look in /usr/ucb first for install(Bruce)
Fix c++ copy example code(Thomas)
Add -o to psql manual page(Bruce)
Prevent relname unallocated string length from being copied into database(Bruce)
Cleanup for NAMEDATALEN use(Bruce)
Fix pg_proc names over 15 chars in output(Bruce)
Add strNcpy() function(Bruce)
remove some (void) casts that are unnecessary(Bruce)
new interfaces directory(Marc)
Replace fopen() calls with calls to fd.c functions(Bruce)
Make functions static where possible(Bruce)
enclose unused functions in #ifdef NOT_USED(Bruce)
Remove call to difftime() in timestamp support to fix SunOS(Bruce & Thomas)
Changes for Digital Unix
Portability fix for pg_dumpall(Bruce)
Rename pg_attribute.attnvals to attdisbursion(Bruce)
"intro/unix" manual page now "pgintro"(Bruce)
"built-in" manual page now "pgbuiltin"(Bruce)
"drop" manual page now "drop_table"(Bruce)
Add "create_trigger", "drop_trigger" manual pages(Thomas)
Add constraints regression test(Vadim & Thomas)
Add comments syntax regression test(Thomas)
Add PGINDENT and support program(Bruce)
Massive commit to run PGINDENT on all *.c and *.h files(Bruce)
Files moved to /src/tools directory(Bruce)
SPI and Trigger programming guides (Vadim & D'Arcy)