Marginal improvements in the wording of the autovacuum documentation:

be consistent about whether it's called a daemon or a subprocess, and
don't describe the autovacuum setting in exactly the same way as the
stats_start_collector setting, because that leaves people thinking (if
they aren't paying close attention) that autovacuum can't be changed
on the fly.

diff --git a/doc/src/sgml/config.sgml b/doc/src/sgml/config.sgml
index 6621105511abdfa00db0013dbf177f4e4eefdce2..53f102cab6b5a4610334d341cebff8b0cbc79bb5 100644 (file)
--- a/doc/src/sgml/config.sgml
+++ b/doc/src/sgml/config.sgml
@@ -1,5 +1,5 @@
 
 
   Server Configuration
@@ -867,10 +867,10 @@ SET ENABLE_SEQSCAN TO OFF;
         Sets the maximum number of disk pages for which free space will
         be tracked in the shared free-space map.  Six bytes of shared memory
         are consumed for each page slot.  This setting must be more than
-        16 * max_fsm_relations.  The default is 20000,
-       but initdb will try to set it as close as possible 
-       to 200000, depending on the amount of available memory.
-       This option can only be set at server start.
+        16 * max_fsm_relations.  The default is chosen
+        by initdb depending on the amount of available memory,
+        and can range from 20000 to 200000.
+        This option can only be set at server start.
        
       
      
@@ -2825,8 +2825,11 @@ SELECT * FROM parent WHERE key = 2400;
         Controls whether the server should start the
         statistics-collection subprocess.  This is on by default, but
         may be turned off if you know you have no interest in
-        collecting statistics.  This option can only be set at server
-        start.
+        collecting statistics or running autovacuum.
+        This option can only be set at server start, because the collection
+        subprocess cannot be started or stopped on-the-fly.  (However, the
+        extent to which statistics are actually gathered can be changed while
+        the server is running, so long as the subprocess exists.)
        
       
      
@@ -2909,12 +2912,12 @@ SELECT * FROM parent WHERE key = 2400;
 
     
      autovacuum
-     global configuration parameters
+     configuration parameters
     
 
      
-      These settings control the default behavior for the autovacuum
-      daemon. Please refer to  for
+      These settings control the behavior of the autovacuum
+      feature. Please refer to  for
       more information.
      
 
@@ -2927,10 +2930,10 @@ SELECT * FROM parent WHERE key = 2400;
       
       
        
-        Controls whether the server should start the
-        autovacuum subprocess.  This is off by default.
+        Controls whether the server should run the
+        autovacuum daemon.  This is off by default.
         stats_start_collector and stats_row_level
-        must also be on for this to start.
+        must also be turned on for autovacuum to work.
         This option can only be set at server start or in the
         postgresql.conf file.
        
@@ -2945,7 +2948,7 @@ SELECT * FROM parent WHERE key = 2400;
       
        
         Specifies the delay between activity rounds for the autovacuum
-        subprocess.  In each round the subprocess examines one database
+        daemon.  In each round the daemon examines one database
         and issues VACUUM and ANALYZE commands
         as needed for tables in that database.  The delay is measured
         in seconds, and the default is 60.