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Thread: SQL Reserved words

SQL Reserved words

From
"DUDLEY,DONALD (HP-Boise,ex1)"
Date:
<p><font face="Arial" size="2">I am importing a database from Informix (SE 7.25) on HP-UX 11i to postgres 7.3.2 on RH 8
Linux.</font><br/><font face="Arial" size="2">In running the "CREATE TABLE" scripts while building the new database,
pgSQLseems to be choking on several of the column names.</font><p><font face="Arial" size="2">When I looked in the
appendixB1 of the Users Manual, I see that some of the column names are reserved words, either by pgSQL or by ANSI
SQL.</font><p><fontface="Arial" size="2">Some of the column names are: 'desc' (for 'description', collides with keyword
for'DESCENDING'), and 'group' (used in 'GROUP BY' clause).</font><p><font face="Arial" size="2">I'd like not to have to
alterthe many queries used in scripts and programs to change 'desc' to descr, and group to grp, for example. 
</font><p><fontface="Arial" size="2">Is there a way to tell pgSQL that you're referencing a column name and not a
reservedword?  Informix handled them ok...</font><p><font face="Arial" size="2">Thanks,</font><br /><font face="Arial"
size="2">Don</font>

Re: SQL Reserved words

From
Stephan Szabo
Date:
On Tue, 22 Apr 2003, DUDLEY,DONALD (HP-Boise,ex1) wrote:

> I am importing a database from Informix (SE 7.25) on HP-UX 11i to postgres
> 7.3.2 on RH 8 Linux.
> In running the "CREATE TABLE" scripts while building the new database, pgSQL
> seems to be choking on several of the column names.
> When I looked in the appendix B1 of the Users Manual, I see that some of the
> column names are reserved words, either by pgSQL or by ANSI SQL.
> Some of the column names are: 'desc' (for 'description', collides with
> keyword for 'DESCENDING'), and 'group' (used in 'GROUP BY' clause).
> I'd like not to have to alter the many queries used in scripts and programs
> to change 'desc' to descr, and group to grp, for example.
> Is there a way to tell pgSQL that you're referencing a column name and not a
> reserved word?  Informix handled them ok...

You can use double quotes around the names (in all cases where you refer
to it) to use it as an identifier, but that doesn't help if you don't want
to change the queries.