[QGIS-Developer] Time for db manager to become an "opt-in" plugin?

[Nyall Dawson]

On Wed, 22 Jun 2022 at 15:46, Paolo Cavallini via QGIS-Developer
<qgis-developer at lists.osgeo.org> wrote:
>
> +1 from me. the current state is really confusing.
> there are a number of functions that are still missing from core, but
> what is really used can be added later, in the meantime the external
> plugin can do the job.

Right -- for completeness, here's my understanding of the
functionality available through db manager which ISN'T yet available
via the browser:

- Saving/re-running previously saved SQL queries
- Switching to the simplified "SQL builder" dialog for creating a SQL query
- Truncating a table (this is available through a Processing
algorithm, just not via browser)
- Attribute index creation (this is available through a Processing
algorithm, just not via browser)
- !! Support for editing an existing column (changing name/type). This
is the biggest functionality gap -- changing existing column types is
not available elsewhere in QGIS
- Listing database triggers

Nyall



> thanks Nyall for raising this.
> cheers.
>
> Il 22/06/22 02:43, Nyall Dawson via QGIS-Developer ha scritto:
> > Hi list,
> >
> > I wanted to raise the discussion around potentially demoting the DB
> > Manager plugin to become an opt-in, not installed by default plugin
> > available from the QGIS plugin repository only.
> >
> > It's likely no surprise to anyone on this list, but there's been a
> > multi-year effort (mostly thanks to Alessandro!) to move all the
> > important functionality of db manager over to the QGIS browser. This was
> > driven by a number of factors:
> >
> > - It was confusing and messy to expose database management tools through
> > two completely separate parts of the QGIS interface
> > - The DB Manager tools are written in provider-specific ways, and don't
> > use generic QGIS database/provider API calls. As a result there's a lot
> > of duplicate code there, and db manager doesn't gain the benefits of new
> > data provider features. (E.g. only a subset of the databases supported
> > by QGIS and the browser management tools are available for management in
> > db manager)
> > - The DB Manager functionality wasn't available for other parts of
> > QGIS/plugins/scripts/etc to reuse, whereas the browser functionality is
> > all nicely exposed to PyQGIS and is used by other parts of QGIS, eg.
> > processing tools.
> > - The Python code implementing db manager is fragile, and is subject to
> > semi-frequent regressions/breakage (through no fault of the authors --
> > it's just the nature of complex python applications which aren't soaked
> > in unit tests)
> >
> > I'd say we've reached a stage where the browser now offers all the
> > common functionality also available in db manager, and we can start to
> > seriously discuss the future of the plugin.
> >
> > My personal view is that we should demote the plugin to a
> > community-maintained, non-officially supported plugin available only
> > through the QGIS plugin repositories, and remove it from the default
> > QGIS install.
> >
> > Thoughts/discussion welcome :)
> >
> > Nyall
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > QGIS-Developer mailing list
> > QGIS-Developer at lists.osgeo.org
> > List info: https://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/qgis-developer
> > Unsubscribe: https://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/qgis-developer
>
> --
> Paolo Cavallini
> www.faunalia.eu - QGIS.org
> training, support, development on QGIS, PostGIS and more
> _______________________________________________
> QGIS-Developer mailing list
> QGIS-Developer at lists.osgeo.org
> List info: https://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/qgis-developer
> Unsubscribe: https://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/qgis-developer