Re: function error - Mailing list pgsql-sql

My sincerest apologies.  I had mistakenly posted a hacked up "let's try
this" version of a function I had created that wasn't working.
The truth is, everything you mentioned below IS in the book and written
very well.  I removed the FOR statement, the RETURN statement and
the language definition being SQL instead of PLPGSQL was also my fault.
Additionally, my variable types are wrong (my fault too).  So what am I
trying to say...it's all my fault.  PostgreSQL Developer's Handbook is
really a great book!  It's just dangerous in the hands of idiots like me!
Pause for time to open mouth and insert foot.

Oh the humanity!

Shamefully,

Travis

-----Original Message-----
From: Jeff Eckermann [mailto:jeff_eckermann@yahoo.com]
Sent: Thursday, March 28, 2002 10:35 AM
To: Travis Hoyt; pgsql-sql@postgresql.org
Subject: Re: [SQL] function error


If this is genuinely a copy of something in the
"PostgreSQL Developer's Handbook", then that book
could use some work.
1. You need "ALIAS FOR" in the DECLARE section
2. You need an explicit RETURN; i.e. write "RETURN
result;" before "END;"
3. Language is plpgsql, not sql (which doesn't allow
the constructions you are using).

If columns "systemid" and "time" are not of text type,
you will need to do some type casting for your
comparisons to work.  I believe "time" is a reserved
word anyway, so if that is the real name of the
column, you will need to double-quote it, which in the
function definition will need to be escaped:
'"time"', or \"time\".

--- Travis Hoyt <thoyt@npc.net> wrote:
> CREATE FUNCTION biwklyavg(text, text, text) RETURNS
> numeric AS '
>         DECLARE
>                 system          ALIAS $1;
>                 startdate       ALIAS $2;
>                 enddate         ALIAS $3;
>                 result          numeric;
>
>         BEGIN
>                 result := (select (avg(usr) +
> avg(sys)) from sardata where
> systemid = system
>                         and time between startdate
> and enddate;
>         END;
> ' LANGUAGE 'sql';
>
> Hello,
>
> The fuction listed above gives the following error:
>
> ERROR:  parser: parse error at or near "alias"
>
> I'm running v7.2.  Any ideas?  I pulled this
> directly from the examples in
> the PostgreSQL Developer's Handbook.
>
> Thanks,
>
> Travis
>

> ATTACHMENT part 2 application/x-pkcs7-signature
name=smime.p7s



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