maria-developers team mailing list archive

[Sergey Petrunya <psergey@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Fri, Jun 10, 2011 at 12:50:34PM +0200, Sergei Golubchik wrote:
> Hi, Sergey!
> 
> On Jun 10, Sergey Petrunya wrote:
> > Hello,
> > 
> > Please find below descriptions of problems with current @@optimizer_switch
> > variable, as well as a proposal on how to fix it.
> > 
> > <contents>
> > Problems with @@optimizer_switch
> > Proposed solution
> >   Details about hooking this into parser
> > Alternate approach1: grouping
> > </contents>
> > 
> > Problems with @@optimizer_switch
> > --------------------------------
> > 
> > @@optimizer_switch variable use has outgrown its syntax. There are
> > too many settings to fit on the single line:
> > 
> > Proposed solution
> > -----------------
> > 
> > Break optimizer_switch into multiple variables, with names having the dots
> > in them. That is, current @@optimizer_switch flags will change into this set
> > of variables:
> > 
> >   optimizer.index_merge=on
> >   optimizer.index_merge.union=on
> 
> Assorted thoughts:
> 
> * I'd suggest to do any changes not in 5.3 but in 5.5, in the new
>   sys_vars code
> 
> * hierarchical structure of settings is good
> 
> * but it has to be done the drizzle way, I mean, all options converted
>   at once (you cannot switch the country from right-hand traffic to
>   left-hand, by switching only few roads or few cars first :)

I don't see how this analogy works. I understand that a switched car will
collide with non-switched car. If we switch only optimizer variables, what will 
that collide with?

> * on the other hand, we don't want to break the backward compatibility,
>   so there's a contradiction
> 
> * and we want to be compatible with MySQL, right?

Yes.

> * one possibile solution: introduce dots and hierarchy, but for the
>   purpose of name matching, compare them as underscores. have an option
>   to choouse between printing dots or underscores in show variables.
(replied in another email)

> * another solution, create hierarchies implicitly, splitting on
>   underscores. Rename variables that don't fit into the correct
>   hierarchy, keep old names as obsolete aliases, remove them later.

If there was a direct mapping from underscores to dots, there would have been
no point in the dot notation.
There is no point in changing @@time_zone to @@time.zone or
@@table_definition_cache to table.definition.cache.

>   Allow user to write SET optimizer_semijoin_*= default
>   Frankly speaking, I'd prefer a dot as a separator, not an underscore.
> 
> * you forgot saving and restoring the value of a group. Now one can save
>   @@optimizer_switch in a variable and restore it later. How to do it
>   with hierarchies?

We've rejected the SET optimizer.xxx.yyy.*=... syntax in favor of SET
optimizer.prefix=...

> * named keycaches once again will be a problem, the syntax is so out of
>   line, it never fits anywhere

I think that disallowing a few names for named key caches ('optimizer',
'aria','innodb') is not a big problem?

BR
 Sergey
-- 
Sergey Petrunia, Software Developer
Monty Program AB, http://askmonty.org
Blog: http://s.petrunia.net/blog