SHOW(7)

💖 NAME 💖

okay bestie, welcome to SHOW(7) — the manual page for SHOW, aka show the value of a run-time parameter. slay. 💅

✨ SYNOPSIS ✨

SHOW name
SHOW ALL

🌸 DESCRIPTION 🌸

SHOW will display the current setting of run-time parameters. These variables can be set using the SET statement, by editing the postgresql.conf configuration file, through the PGOPTIONS environmental variable (when using libpq or a libpq-based application), or through command-line flags when starting the postgres server. See Chapter 19 for details. no cap, that's the whole vibe. 🦋

🎀 PARAMETERS 🎀

• name — the name of a run-time parameter. Available parameters are documented in Chapter 19 and on the SET(7) reference page. In addition, there are a few parameters that can be shown but not set:
  • SERVER_VERSION — Shows the server's version number.
  • SERVER_ENCODING — Shows the server-side character set encoding. At present, this parameter can be shown but not set, because the encoding is determined at database creation time.
  • LC_COLLATE — Shows the database's locale setting for collation (text ordering). At present, this parameter can be shown but not set, because the setting is determined at database creation time.
  • LC_CTYPE — Shows the database's locale setting for character classification. At present, this parameter can be shown but not set, because the setting is determined at database creation time.
  • IS_SUPERUSER — True if the current role has superuser privileges.
• ALL — Show the values of all configuration parameters, with descriptions.

lowkey important: those “shown but not set” girlies are not customizable on the fly — the setting is locked in from database creation time. periodt. 🔒

💜 NOTES 💜

The function current_setting produces equivalent output; see Section 9.27.1. Also, the pg_settings system view produces the same information. iykyk. 👑

🔥 EXAMPLES 🔥

Show the current setting of the parameter DateStyle:

SHOW DateStyle;
 DateStyle
-----------
 ISO, MDY
(1 row)

Show the current setting of the parameter geqo:

SHOW geqo;
 geqo
------
 on
(1 row)

Show all settings:

SHOW ALL;
            name         | setting |                description
-------------------------+---------+-------------------------------------------------
 allow_system_table_mods | off     | Allows modifications of the structure of ...
    .
    .
    .
 xmloption               | content | Sets whether XML data in implicit parsing ...
 zero_damaged_pages      | off     | Continues processing past damaged page headers.
(196 rows)

ate. 💅✨

🌈 COMPATIBILITY 🌈

The SHOW command is a PostgreSQL extension. periodt. 💖

🫶 SEE ALSO 🫶

SET(7), RESET(7)

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mwah 💋 this SHOW(7) page is from the PostgreSQL 13.23 docs, dated 2025. bye bestie 🫶