Thomas Lockhart <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > Let's not let trivial english semantics divert the discussion please.
It's hardly a trivial point, seeing that transactions are such a fundamental aspect of the system. The statements that we have now that depend on being-in-a-transaction-block-or-not (eg, VACUUM) are ugly kluges IMHO. Let me give you another reason why having only local SET would be a bad idea: how are you going to issue a SET with any persistent effect when working through an interface like JDBC that wraps every command you give in a BEGIN/END block? We have also talked about modifying the backend's behavior to act like BEGIN is issued implicitly as soon as you execute any command, so that explicit COMMIT is always needed (at least some people think this is necessary for SQL spec compliance). Either one of these are going to pose severe problems for the user-friendliness of SET if it only comes in a local flavor. I can certainly think of uses for a local-effects flavor of SET. But I don't want that to be the only flavor. regards, tom lane ---------------------------(end of broadcast)--------------------------- TIP 4: Don't 'kill -9' the postmaster