
Invent new RawParseModes that allow the core grammar to handle pl/pgsql expressions and assignments directly, and thereby get rid of a lot of hackery in pl/pgsql's parser. This moves a good deal of knowledge about pl/pgsql into the core code: notably, we have to invent a CoercionContext that matches pl/pgsql's (rather dubious) historical behavior for assignment coercions. That's getting away from the original idea of pl/pgsql as an arm's-length extension of the core, but really we crossed that bridge a long time ago. The main advantage of doing this is that we can now use the core parser to generate FieldStore and/or SubscriptingRef nodes to handle assignments to pl/pgsql variables that are records or arrays. That fixes a number of cases that had never been implemented in pl/pgsql assignment, such as nested records and array slicing, and it allows pl/pgsql assignment to support the datatype-specific subscripting behaviors introduced in commit c7aba7c14. There are cosmetic benefits too: when a syntax error occurs in a pl/pgsql expression, the error report no longer includes the confusing "SELECT" keyword that used to get prefixed to the expression text. Also, there seem to be some small speed gains. Discussion: https://postgr.es/m/4165684.1607707277@sss.pgh.pa.us
The PostgreSQL contrib tree --------------------------- This subtree contains porting tools, analysis utilities, and plug-in features that are not part of the core PostgreSQL system, mainly because they address a limited audience or are too experimental to be part of the main source tree. This does not preclude their usefulness. User documentation for each module appears in the main SGML documentation. When building from the source distribution, these modules are not built automatically, unless you build the "world" target. You can also build and install them all by running "make all" and "make install" in this directory; or to build and install just one selected module, do the same in that module's subdirectory. Some directories supply new user-defined functions, operators, or types. To make use of one of these modules, after you have installed the code you need to register the new SQL objects in the database system by executing a CREATE EXTENSION command. In a fresh database, you can simply do CREATE EXTENSION module_name; See the PostgreSQL documentation for more information about this procedure.