Disabling this option is useful to run VACUUM (with or without FULL) on
only the toast table of a relation, bypassing the main relation. This
option is enabled by default.
Running directly VACUUM on a toast table was already possible without
this feature, by using the non-deterministic name of a toast relation
(as of pg_toast.pg_toast_N, where N would be the OID of the parent
relation) in the VACUUM command, and it required a scan of pg_class to
know the name of the toast table. So this feature is basically a
shortcut to be able to run VACUUM or VACUUM FULL on a toast relation,
using only the name of the parent relation.
A new switch called --no-process-main is added to vacuumdb, to work as
an equivalent of PROCESS_MAIN.
Regression tests are added to cover VACUUM and VACUUM FULL, looking at
pg_stat_all_tables.vacuum_count to see how many vacuums have run on
each table, main or toast.
Author: Nathan Bossart
Reviewed-by: Masahiko Sawada
Discussion: https://postgr.es/m/20221230000028.GA435655@nathanxps13