Re: Skipping schema changes in publication

David G. Johnston <david.g.johnston@gmail.com>

From: "David G. Johnston" <david.g.johnston@gmail.com>
To: Amit Kapila <amit.kapila16@gmail.com>
Cc: Peter Smith <smithpb2250@gmail.com>, shveta malik <shveta.malik@gmail.com>, Shlok Kyal <shlok.kyal.oss@gmail.com>, vignesh C <vignesh21@gmail.com>, Dilip Kumar <dilipbalaut@gmail.com>, "Zhijie Hou (Fujitsu)" <houzj.fnst@fujitsu.com>, YeXiu <1518981153@qq.com>, Ian Lawrence Barwick <barwick@gmail.com>, Bharath Rupireddy <bharath.rupireddyforpostgres@gmail.com>, PostgreSQL Hackers <pgsql-hackers@lists.postgresql.org>
Date: 2026-02-09T06:22:55Z
Lists: pgsql-hackers
On Sunday, February 8, 2026, Amit Kapila <amit.kapila16@gmail.com> wrote:

> On Mon, Feb 9, 2026 at 6:41 AM Peter Smith <smithpb2250@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > Hi Amit.
> >
> > I understand there can be some tricky scenarios where partitions are
> > involved, but I was not sure why "pub1: FOR ALL Tables EXCEPT (tab1)
> > and pub2: FOR TABLE tab1" is an example of contradictory behaviour.
> >
> > Consider if the publisher has 3 tables tab1,tab2,tab3:
> > Here, "pub1: FOR ALL Tables EXCEPT (tab1)" is like a shorthand for
> > saying "pub1: FOR TABLE tab2,tab3"
> > So what's wrong for the subscriber to combine pub1 and pub2 in this case?
> >
>
> It is because one of the publications (pub2) indicates to include a
> particular table tab1 and the other one (pub1) to exclude the same
> table. And things become much more complex when the Except list
> contains partitions as shown in Shveta's example. So, I think it makes
> sense to keep things simple at least for the first version, we can
> consider to uplift this restriction if we see some use cases from the
> field.
>
>
>
I’m with Peter here - I do not think it is wise to expose the exception
listing outside the publication.  Publication combinations should be purely
additive in much the same way grants are in the system.  Except lists are
internal shorthand for describing the positive list of tables a publication
makes available - all tables except.

David J.

Commits

Same data as JSON: GET /api/v1/messages/:b64id/commits the thread's linked commits as JSON, with link sources. API reference →
  1. Fix miscellaneous issues in EXCEPT publication clause.

  2. Change syntax of EXCEPT TABLE clause in publication commands.

  3. Add support for EXCEPT TABLE in ALTER PUBLICATION.

  4. Allow table exclusions in publications via EXCEPT TABLE.

  5. Add wait_for_subscription_sync for TAP tests.