Ability to force *not* loading native client

node-postres supports setting NODE_PG_FORCE_NATIVE to force the loading of the native client, but there’s no way to force it to not load the native client:

if (typeof process.env.NODE_PG_FORCE_NATIVE !== 'undefined') {
  module.exports = new PG(require('./native'))
} else {
  module.exports = new PG(Client)

  // lazy require native module...the native module may not have installed
  module.exports.__defineGetter__('native', function () {
    delete module.exports.native
    var native = null
    try {
      native = new PG(require('./native'))
    } catch (err) {
      if (err.code !== 'MODULE_NOT_FOUND') {
        throw err
      }
      /* eslint-disable no-console */
      console.error(err.message)
      /* eslint-enable no-console */
    }
    module.exports.native = native
    return native
  })
}

This can cause spurious warnings about pg-native module not found. See https://github.com/sequelize/sequelize/issues/3781 for an example caused by cloning node-postgres objects.

Potential solution: support a NODE_PG_NO_LOAD_NATIVE environment variable. Setting this would cause the native getter to not be defined. Setting both NODE_PG_NO_LOAD_NATIVE and NODE_PG_FORCE_NATIVE could throw an error.

I’m happy to throw together a PR if there’s support for something like this.

[charmander]

As of pg 8.0, native isn’t enumerable. (Cloning modules still sounds like a bug in sequelize or in the use of sequelize, though.)

[gabegorelick]

Why is this seemingly magical getter necessary? Couldn’t it be simply a .getNative() instead?

That would be a much bigger breaking change. I think simply making native non-enumerable, as proposed in #1992, solves all of the issues that I am aware of without breaking all but the most contrived usages.