Hi Dean,
> I only recently realised that to_hex() converts its input to unsigned
> before converting it to hex (something that's not mentioned in the
> docs):
Technically the documentation is accurate [1]:
"""
Converts the number to its equivalent hexadecimal representation.
"""
But I agree that adding an example with negative numbers will not
hurt. Would you like to submit a patch?
> I also think it might be useful for it to gain a couple of boolean options:
Adding extra arguments for something the user can implement
(him/her)self doesn't seem to be a great idea. With this approach we
may end up with hundreds of arguments one day.
> 1). An option to output a signed value (defaulting to false, to
> preserve the current two's complement output).
This in particular can be done like this:
```
=# select case when sign(x) > 0 then '' else '-' end || to_hex(abs(x))
from ( values (123), (-123) ) as s(x);
?column?
----------
7b
-7b
(2 rows)
```
> 2). An option to output the base prefix "0x" (which comes after the
> sign, making it inconvenient for the user to add themselves).
Ditto:
```
=# select '0x' || to_hex(x) from ( values (123), (-123) ) as s(x);
?column?
------------
0x7b
0xffffff85
```
[1]: https://www.postgresql.org/docs/current/functions-string.html
--
Best regards,
Aleksander Alekseev
