MySQL-ism help patch for psql
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From: Robert Haas on 25 Jan 2010 11:41 On Mon, Jan 25, 2010 at 11:14 AM, Andrew Dunstan <andrew(a)dunslane.net> wrote: > Alastair "Bell" Turner wrote: >> >> If this option is designed to help people's transition - basically to >> get to them before they've got to most of the manual - having to turn >> it on will be pointless. It needs to be active by default. > > My problem with this whole idea is that it seems to be very MySQL-specific. > Why aren't we providing help for users migrating from Oracle, Sybase, > Informix, Ingres, DB2, SQLServer and Firebird, to name but a few? And if we > turn all those on by default, we'll have a pretty horrible banner when > starting psql. I don't really have a horse in this race, but perhaps the answer is that people are asking for MySQL help but no one is asking for help migrating from any of those other databases. At least not yet. But I think we're getting off into the weeds a little bit here. In theory, people who notice that psql gives the following message should be OK: Type "help" for help. Now when you type help, you get this: You are using psql, the command-line interface to PostgreSQL. Type: \copyright for distribution terms \h for help with SQL commands \? for help with psql commands \g or terminate with semicolon to execute query \q to quit Now, at this point, if you are a MySQL user who wants to find the equivalent of SHOW TABLES and DESCRIBE, it's very plausible that you'll now try \h, because SHOW TABLES and DESCRIBE are SQL commands. Then you might try some things like: \h SHOW \h TABLE ....hoping to find what you're looking for. If you eventually go back and try \? you will hopefully notice this line (which at least in my terminal window doesn't even show up until the second page): \d[S+] list tables, views, and sequences It's not too much to hope that you'll try \d at this point and get a list of all your tables, but it's far from clear how you'd know that "\d foo" is the way to get the column definitions for foo. Maybe instead of (or in addition to) providing MySQL-specific help, we should find a way to emphasize the "\d" and "\d table" commands, because those are (IMO) two big things that people coming from ANY other database product are likely to want to find, and it's not as easy to find them right now as perhaps it should be. ....Robert -- Sent via pgsql-hackers mailing list (pgsql-hackers(a)postgresql.org) To make changes to your subscription: http://www.postgresql.org/mailpref/pgsql-hackers
From: "Ross J. Reedstrom" on 25 Jan 2010 11:49 On Mon, Jan 25, 2010 at 06:06:53PM +0200, Alastair Bell Turner wrote: <..> > without having to add a switch to their command lines. It's not going > to have anything to say to experienced psql users anyway so it would > probably not bug anyone enough to turn it off. I would so use this feature going the other way: fire up comfortable psql and see what mysql command I need to type ... Having it in the interface (behind \help [mysql|oracle|firebird|mssql|..] seems reasonable to me, given how much info we already have in \help. I find the basic BNF help for SQL syntax still useful reminder, and know to go to the actual docs when there's not enough there. So a quick mapping of most-needed commands, and a pointer to the docs for the full ramifications and subtle differences seems to fit the existing documentation module. Ross -- Ross Reedstrom, Ph.D. reedstrm(a)rice.edu Systems Engineer & Admin, Research Scientist phone: 713-348-6166 The Connexions Project http://cnx.org fax: 713-348-3665 Rice University MS-375, Houston, TX 77005 GPG Key fingerprint = F023 82C8 9B0E 2CC6 0D8E F888 D3AE 810E 88F0 BEDE -- Sent via pgsql-hackers mailing list (pgsql-hackers(a)postgresql.org) To make changes to your subscription: http://www.postgresql.org/mailpref/pgsql-hackers
From: "Ross J. Reedstrom" on 25 Jan 2010 12:00 On Mon, Jan 25, 2010 at 10:49:55AM -0600, Ross J. Reedstrom wrote: > On Mon, Jan 25, 2010 at 06:06:53PM +0200, Alastair Bell Turner wrote: > <..> > > without having to add a switch to their command lines. It's not going > > to have anything to say to experienced psql users anyway so it would > > probably not bug anyone enough to turn it off. > > I would so use this feature going the other way: fire up comfortable > psql and see what mysql command I need to type ... Having it in the > interface (behind \help [mysql|oracle|firebird|mssql|..] seems reasonable > to me, given how much info we already have in \help. I find the basic > BNF help for SQL syntax still useful reminder, and know to go to the Well, behind \migrate or some other word as others have, since I see \help is just the SQL help I so praised. Ross -- Ross Reedstrom, Ph.D. reedstrm(a)rice.edu Systems Engineer & Admin, Research Scientist phone: 713-348-6166 The Connexions Project http://cnx.org fax: 713-348-3665 Rice University MS-375, Houston, TX 77005 GPG Key fingerprint = F023 82C8 9B0E 2CC6 0D8E F888 D3AE 810E 88F0 BEDE -- Sent via pgsql-hackers mailing list (pgsql-hackers(a)postgresql.org) To make changes to your subscription: http://www.postgresql.org/mailpref/pgsql-hackers
From: Greg Smith on 25 Jan 2010 12:08 Ross J. Reedstrom wrote: > So a quick mapping of most-needed commands, and a pointer to the docs for the full > ramifications and subtle differences seems to fit the existing > documentation module. > And that's been done at least twice already: http://blog.endpoint.com/2009/12/mysql-and-postgres-command-equivalents.html http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Converting_MySQL_to_PostgreSQL -- Greg Smith 2ndQuadrant Baltimore, MD PostgreSQL Training, Services and Support greg(a)2ndQuadrant.com www.2ndQuadrant.com -- Sent via pgsql-hackers mailing list (pgsql-hackers(a)postgresql.org) To make changes to your subscription: http://www.postgresql.org/mailpref/pgsql-hackers
From: Bruce Momjian on 25 Jan 2010 12:12
Ross J. Reedstrom wrote: > On Mon, Jan 25, 2010 at 06:06:53PM +0200, Alastair Bell Turner wrote: > <..> > > without having to add a switch to their command lines. It's not going > > to have anything to say to experienced psql users anyway so it would > > probably not bug anyone enough to turn it off. > > I would so use this feature going the other way: fire up comfortable > psql and see what mysql command I need to type ... Having it in the > interface (behind \help [mysql|oracle|firebird|mssql|..] seems reasonable > to me, given how much info we already have in \help. I find the basic > BNF help for SQL syntax still useful reminder, and know to go to the > actual docs when there's not enough there. So a quick mapping of > most-needed commands, and a pointer to the docs for the full > ramifications and subtle differences seems to fit the existing > documentation module. It would be interesting to implement \help mysql, and then have commands like SHOW TABLE trigger a message suggesting they do \help mysql. -- Bruce Momjian <bruce(a)momjian.us> http://momjian.us EnterpriseDB http://enterprisedb.com + If your life is a hard drive, Christ can be your backup. + -- Sent via pgsql-hackers mailing list (pgsql-hackers(a)postgresql.org) To make changes to your subscription: http://www.postgresql.org/mailpref/pgsql-hackers |