Re: pgsql: Avoid using ambiguous word "positive" in error message. - Mailing list pgsql-hackers

From Andrew Dunstan
Subject Re: pgsql: Avoid using ambiguous word "positive" in error message.
Date
Msg-id b3a5a0f7-d956-0c54-2c0d-4bbcec7064ef@dunslane.net
Whole thread Raw
In response to Re: pgsql: Avoid using ambiguous word "positive" in error message.  (Robert Haas <robertmhaas@gmail.com>)
List pgsql-hackers
On 8/30/21 10:19 AM, Robert Haas wrote:
> On Mon, Aug 30, 2021 at 10:16 AM Tom Lane <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us> wrote:
>> Robert Haas <robertmhaas@gmail.com> writes:
>>> The new style seems good, but I don't really agree that "positive" and
>>> "non-negative" are ambiguous. "positive" means >0 and "non-negative"
>>> means >= 0, because 0 is neither positive nor negative.
>> Well, the point is precisely that not everyone makes that distinction.
>> I agree that everyone will read "non-negative" as ">= 0"; but there's
>> a fair percentage of the population that uses "positive" the same way.
> The mathematician in me recoils.
>

Yep, me too. IIRC Ada comes with a predefined subtype named "Positive"
which has the range 1..Integer'Max. It also has "Natural" which includes
zero.


cheers


andrew

--
Andrew Dunstan
EDB: https://www.enterprisedb.com




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