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  1. DOCS - CREATE PUBLICATION ... EXCEPT missing details on ONLY

    Peter Smith <smithpb2250@gmail.com> — 2026-04-16T23:55:44Z

    Hi,

Currently, the EXCEPT (TABLE ...) part mentions how 'ONLY' and '*'
work for inheritance tables, but how they have no effect for
partitioned tables [1].

It seems we accidentally missed saying that these also have no effect
for *regular* tables.

PSA: a patch to clarify this.

======
[1] https://www.postgresql.org/docs/devel/sql-createpublication.html#SQL-CREATEPUBLICATION-PARAMS-FOR-EXCEPT-TABLE

Kind Regards,
Peter Smith.
Fujitsu Australia

  2. Re: DOCS - CREATE PUBLICATION ... EXCEPT missing details on ONLY

    Amit Kapila <amit.kapila16@gmail.com> — 2026-04-17T10:44:25Z

    On Fri, Apr 17, 2026 at 5:26 AM Peter Smith <smithpb2250@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Currently, the EXCEPT (TABLE ...) part mentions how 'ONLY' and '*'
> work for inheritance tables, but how they have no effect for
> partitioned tables [1].
>
> It seems we accidentally missed saying that these also have no effect
> for *regular* tables.
>

The sentence you quoted speaks about partitioned tables specifically,
so not mentioning regular tables there seems reasonable to me.

-- 
With Regards,
Amit Kapila.

  3. Re: DOCS - CREATE PUBLICATION ... EXCEPT missing details on ONLY

    Peter Smith <smithpb2250@gmail.com> — 2026-04-20T00:14:17Z

    On Fri, Apr 17, 2026 at 8:44 PM Amit Kapila <amit.kapila16@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On Fri, Apr 17, 2026 at 5:26 AM Peter Smith <smithpb2250@gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > Currently, the EXCEPT (TABLE ...) part mentions how 'ONLY' and '*'
> > work for inheritance tables, but how they have no effect for
> > partitioned tables [1].
> >
> > It seems we accidentally missed saying that these also have no effect
> > for *regular* tables.
> >
>
> The sentence you quoted speaks about partitioned tables specifically,
> so not mentioning regular tables there seems reasonable to me.
>

I think you missed my point.

The EXCEPT clause syntax allows any of the following:

... EXCEPT (TABLE ONLY parent_table);
... EXCEPT (TABLE parent_table *);

... EXCEPT (TABLE ONLY partitioned_root_table);
... EXCEPT (TABLE partitioned_root_table *);

... EXCEPT (TABLE ONLY regular_table);
... EXCEPT (TABLE regular_table *);

~~

Where:

1. Using ONLY/* for parent_table has a meaning.
2. Using ONLY/* for partitioned_root_table has no meaning but it is
allowed/ignored.
3. Using ONLY/* for regular_table has no meaning but it is allowed/ignored.

The EXCEPT clause documentation already described cases 1 and 2, but
it said nothing about case 3.

I could have left the original 'partitioned tables' paragraph alone,
and then written separately about the regular tables. e.g:
------
For partitioned tables, only the root partitioned table may be
specified in EXCEPT. Doing so excludes the root table and all of its
partitions from replication. The optional ONLY and * has no effect for
partitioned tables.

The optional ONLY and * have no effect for regular tables.
------

But it seemed unnecessarily repetitive, so the patch seperates that
common behaviour to say:
------
For partitioned tables, only the root partitioned table may be
specified in EXCEPT. Doing so excludes the root table and all of its
partitions from replication.

The optional ONLY and * have no effect for regular or partitioned tables.
------

======
Kind Regards,
Peter Smith.
Fujitsu Australia.

  4. Re: DOCS - CREATE PUBLICATION ... EXCEPT missing details on ONLY

    Amit Kapila <amit.kapila16@gmail.com> — 2026-04-20T05:45:02Z

    On Mon, Apr 20, 2026 at 5:44 AM Peter Smith <smithpb2250@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On Fri, Apr 17, 2026 at 8:44 PM Amit Kapila <amit.kapila16@gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > On Fri, Apr 17, 2026 at 5:26 AM Peter Smith <smithpb2250@gmail.com> wrote:
> > >
> > > Currently, the EXCEPT (TABLE ...) part mentions how 'ONLY' and '*'
> > > work for inheritance tables, but how they have no effect for
> > > partitioned tables [1].
> > >
> > > It seems we accidentally missed saying that these also have no effect
> > > for *regular* tables.
> > >
> >
> > The sentence you quoted speaks about partitioned tables specifically,
> > so not mentioning regular tables there seems reasonable to me.
> >
>
> I think you missed my point.
>

No, I understood the point but didn't find it useful to add this to
regular tables because they won't have children in any form.

-- 
With Regards,
Amit Kapila.

  5. Re: DOCS - CREATE PUBLICATION ... EXCEPT missing details on ONLY

    Peter Smith <smithpb2250@gmail.com> — 2026-04-20T07:14:25Z

    On Mon, Apr 20, 2026 at 3:45 PM Amit Kapila <amit.kapila16@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On Mon, Apr 20, 2026 at 5:44 AM Peter Smith <smithpb2250@gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > On Fri, Apr 17, 2026 at 8:44 PM Amit Kapila <amit.kapila16@gmail.com> wrote:
> > >
> > > On Fri, Apr 17, 2026 at 5:26 AM Peter Smith <smithpb2250@gmail.com> wrote:
> > > >
> > > > Currently, the EXCEPT (TABLE ...) part mentions how 'ONLY' and '*'
> > > > work for inheritance tables, but how they have no effect for
> > > > partitioned tables [1].
> > > >
> > > > It seems we accidentally missed saying that these also have no effect
> > > > for *regular* tables.
> > > >
> > >
> > > The sentence you quoted speaks about partitioned tables specifically,
> > > so not mentioning regular tables there seems reasonable to me.
> > >
> >
> > I think you missed my point.
> >
>
> No, I understood the point but didn't find it useful to add this to
> regular tables because they won't have children in any form.
>

Because regular tables won't have children in any form, a user could
reasonably worry that saying ONLY or `*` might give a runtime error or
a warning. There is no documentation to say otherwise. The patch
addresses that gap.

======
Kind Regards,
Peter Smith.
Fujitsu Australia