Allow changing autovacuum_max_workers without restarting.

This commit introduces a new parameter named
autovacuum_worker_slots that controls how many autovacuum worker
slots to reserve during server startup.  Modifying this new
parameter's value does require a server restart, but it should
typically be set to the upper bound of what you might realistically
need to set autovacuum_max_workers.  With that new parameter in
place, autovacuum_max_workers can now be changed with a SIGHUP
(e.g., pg_ctl reload).

If autovacuum_max_workers is set higher than
autovacuum_worker_slots, a WARNING is emitted, and the server will
only start up to autovacuum_worker_slots workers at a given time.
If autovacuum_max_workers is set to a value less than the number of
currently-running autovacuum workers, the existing workers will
continue running, but no new workers will be started until the
number of running autovacuum workers drops below
autovacuum_max_workers.

Reviewed-by: Sami Imseih, Justin Pryzby, Robert Haas, Andres Freund, Yogesh Sharma
Discussion: https://postgr.es/m/20240410212344.GA1824549%40nathanxps13

1 files changed, 1 insertions, 0 deletions

diff --git a/src/include/postmaster/autovacuum.h b/src/include/postmaster/autovacuum.h
index edac746f3cf..54e01c81d68 100644
--- a/src/include/postmaster/autovacuum.h
+++ b/src/include/postmaster/autovacuum.h
@@ -28,6 +28,7 @@ typedef enum
 
 /* GUC variables */
 extern PGDLLIMPORT bool autovacuum_start_daemon;
+extern PGDLLIMPORT int autovacuum_worker_slots;
 extern PGDLLIMPORT int autovacuum_max_workers;
 extern PGDLLIMPORT int autovacuum_work_mem;
 extern PGDLLIMPORT int autovacuum_naptime;