BUG #18194: Missing install instructions

PG Bug reporting form <noreply@postgresql.org> writes:

The file
https://github.com/postgres/postgres/blob/master/README
says you will find instructions to build PostgreSQL in the file INSTALL, but
this files does not exists.

I guess you read but didn't absorb what it says in README.git?

In a release or snapshot tarball of PostgreSQL, a documentation file named
INSTALL will appear in this directory. However, this file is not stored in
git and so will not be present if you are using a git checkout.

So please change the file README.

It's correct as it stands for our current distribution processes.
(Things probably will change in v17 because we plan to change what
is in our distributed tarballs, but we won't change that in
released branches.)

2. Also please provide a list of required packages.

We would need a different list for every operating system out there,
even different distros of Linux. And it'd vary depending on what
build options you select. So nope, that's not likely to happen.
If you don't want to deal with figuring that out based on the list
of requirements in the manual, I'd suggest using a prepackaged build
from your OS distributor instead of building from source.

regards, tom lane

On Mon, Nov 13, 2023 at 2:05 PM Tom Lane <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us> wrote:

2. Also please provide a list of required packages.

We would need a different list for every operating system out there,
even different distros of Linux. And it'd vary depending on what
build options you select. So nope, that's not likely to happen.
If you don't want to deal with figuring that out based on the list
of requirements in the manual, I'd suggest using a prepackaged build
from your OS distributor instead of building from source.

Community sourcing this on the Wiki is doable if people are willing to
contribute. I agree that it is unnecessary to incorporate into the
documentation.

David J.

OK, I missed this sentence

However, this file is not stored in git and so will not be present if

you are using a git checkout.

Since the content of the file README is wrong when using GitHub (it
refers to a file INSTALL which is not available in GitHub) you should
consider removing this file from GitHub, as you already did with the
file INSTALL. Especially because this wrong file README is shown for
everyone when viewing your repository:
https://github.com/postgres/postgres

Actually I was unhappy because your list of requirements did not
mentioned these required packages:
libicu, perl-FindBin, perl-File-Compare
Even your configure script was not aware of them. I only "saw" the
required packages based on the compiler errors.

I understand that you can't provide a list of exact package names for
each distribution, but please add the missing packages as stated above.
Thanks.

Am 13.11.2023 um 22:05 schrieb Tom Lane: