Re: Make COPY format extendable: Extract COPY TO format implementations

Masahiko Sawada <sawada.mshk@gmail.com>

From: Masahiko Sawada <sawada.mshk@gmail.com>
To: Sutou Kouhei <kou@clear-code.com>
Cc: michael@paquier.xyz, zhjwpku@gmail.com, andrew@dunslane.net, nathandbossart@gmail.com, pgsql-hackers@postgresql.org
Date: 2023-12-14T20:19:43Z
Lists: pgsql-hackers
On Thu, Dec 14, 2023 at 6:44 PM Sutou Kouhei <kou@clear-code.com> wrote:
>
> Hi,
>
> In <CAD21AoCvjGserrtEU=UcA3Mfyfe6ftf9OXPHv9fiJ9DmXMJ2nQ@mail.gmail.com>
>   "Re: Make COPY format extendable: Extract COPY TO format implementations" on Mon, 11 Dec 2023 10:57:15 +0900,
>   Masahiko Sawada <sawada.mshk@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > IIUC we cannot create two same name functions with the same arguments
> > but a different return value type in the first place. It seems to me
> > to be an overkill to change such a design.
>
> Oh, sorry. I didn't notice it.
>
> > Another idea is to encapsulate copy_to/from_handler by a super class
> > like copy_handler. The handler function is called with an argument,
> > say copyto, and returns copy_handler encapsulating either
> > copy_to/from_handler depending on the argument.
>
> It's for using "${copy_format_name}" such as "json" and
> "parquet" as a function name, right?

Right.

> If we use the
> "${copy_format_name}" approach, we can't use function names
> that are already used by tablesample method handler such as
> "system" and "bernoulli" for COPY FORMAT name. Because both
> of tablesample method handler function and COPY FORMAT
> handler function use "(internal)" as arguments.
>
> I think that tablesample method names and COPY FORMAT names
> will not be conflicted but the limitation (using the same
> namespace for tablesample method and COPY FORMAT) is
> unnecessary limitation.

Presumably, such function name collisions are not limited to
tablesample and copy, but apply to all functions that have an
"internal" argument. To avoid collisions, extensions can be created in
a different schema than public. And note that built-in format copy
handler doesn't need to declare its handler function.

>
> How about using prefix ("copy_to_${copy_format_name}" or
> something) or suffix ("${copy_format_name}_copy_to" or
> something) for function names? For example,
> "copy_to_json"/"copy_from_json" for "json" COPY FORMAT.
>
> ("copy_${copy_format_name}" that returns copy_handler
> encapsulating either copy_to/from_handler depending on the
> argument may be an option.)

While there is a way to avoid collision as I mentioned above, I can
see the point that we might want to avoid using a generic function
name such as "arrow" and "parquet" as custom copy handler functions.
Adding a prefix or suffix would be one option but to give extensions
more flexibility, another option would be to support format = 'custom'
and add the "handler" option to specify a copy handler function name
to call. For example, COPY ... FROM ... WITH (FORMAT = 'custom',
HANDLER = 'arrow_copy_handler').

Regards,

-- 
Masahiko Sawada
Amazon Web Services: https://aws.amazon.com



Commits

  1. Refactor Copy{From|To}GetRoutine() to use pass-by-reference argument.

  2. Refactor COPY FROM to use format callback functions.

  3. Refactor COPY TO to use format callback functions.

  4. Another try to fix BF failure introduced in commit ddd5f4f54a.

  5. Revert "Refactor CopyReadAttributes{CSV,Text}() to use a callback in COPY FROM"

  6. Improve COPY TO performance when server and client encodings match

  7. Simplify signature of CopyAttributeOutCSV() in copyto.c

  8. Revert "Refactor CopyAttributeOut{CSV,Text}() to use a callback in COPY TO"

  9. Refactor CopyAttributeOut{CSV,Text}() to use a callback in COPY TO

  10. Refactor CopyReadAttributes{CSV,Text}() to use a callback in COPY FROM

  11. Add progress reporting of skipped tuples during COPY FROM.

  12. pgbench: Add \syncpipeline

  13. meson: Make gzip and tar optional

  14. Export the external file reader used in COPY FROM as APIs.