Re: COPY to table with array columns (Longish)

No problem!

SYS 'ZKCOST' size = 21

01 2750

This is a simple record in the SYS file. Primary Key is "ZKCOST" and the
Data would be 1 element with a value of 2750.

SYS 'ZPRECMPL' size = 2069
O

01 928898

02 928899

03 928900

04 928901

05 928902

06 928903

07 928904

08 928907

09 928908

10 928909

11 928910

12 928915

13 928916

14 928917

15 928918

16 928919

17 928920

18 928921

19 928925

20 928926

21 928927

<snip>

Another SYS record - this is a list of invoices that are waiting to be
confirmed and therefore obviously constantly change with additions and
deletions. So in the SQL this would need to have a Primary Key of "ZPRECMPL"
and 21 elements in the array, each with an invoice number. (well, there's
actually 293 in there at the moment, but I don't think I need to fill up the
e-mail with all of them!)

The whole sys file is variable length records like this - they range from 1
to over 17,000 fields per record.

Hope this helps,

Thanks,

-p

-----Original Message-----
From: aaron(dot)bono(at)gmail(dot)com [mailto:aaron(dot)bono(at)gmail(dot)com] On Behalf Of Aaron
Bono
Sent: Tuesday, 13 June 2006 12:36 AM
To: phillips(at)weatherbeeta(dot)com(dot)au
Cc: pgsql-sql(at)postgresql(dot)org
Subject: Re: [SQL] COPY to table with array columns (Longish)

Can you provide an example?

Thanks,
Aaron

On 6/11/06, Phillip Smith <phillips(at)weatherbeeta(dot)com(dot)au
<mailto:phillips(at)weatherbeeta(dot)com(dot)au> > wrote:

Hi All,

Hope someone can help me - our main company system runs on Raining Data
PICK/D3 (if anyone familiar with it) which stores records in it's "tables"
as variable length items. Every item has a unique Primary Key (per table)
then each item can have a variable number of fields. These fields are
delimited by Char 254, then each field can have sub-values delimited by Char
253, then sub-sub-values delimited by Char 252.

Anyway, we are trying to export everything to Postgres for reporting and
querying etc (not to actually run the system.. Yet) and hasn't been a
problem so far - everything like stock and purchase orders, sales orders etc
can pretty easily be turned in to a flat file with standard number of
columns and consistent data. We truncate every table each night then import
that latest TSV export from D3 using a COPY command.

The problem arises with tables like our SYS table which store generic system
data, so one record could have 3 fields, but the next could have 300. The
only way I can work out how to export multi-valued data like this to
Postgres is to use an array column. So the table has 2 columns - the pkey
and a data array.

How do I get this imported to the truncated table each night? At the moment
I think my best option is to modify the export for the SYS table to call
PSQL and use standard SQL INSERT statements to directly insert it instead of
exporting to a flat file, then import to Postgres.

Thanks all,

-p

For those who are interested, or if it might help, here's a rough comparison
of the database structure of D3:

Windows = PICK/D3 = Postgres

Drive = Account = Database

Directory = File = Table

File = Item = Row

Line in text file = Attribute = Field

(none) = Value = Array Element (?)

(none) = Sub Value = (none?)

Phillip Smith

IT Coordinator

Weatherbeeta P/L

8 Moncrief Rd

Nunawading, VIC, 3131

AUSTRALIA

E. phillips(at)NO-SPAM(dot)weatherbeeta(dot)com(dot)au

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