Re: Formatting problems with negative intervals, TO_CHAR

On Sun, Jun 06, 2004 at 06:40:56PM -0400, Tom Lane wrote:
> Jeff Boes <jboes(at)qtm(dot)net> writes:
> > This seems ... well, counter-intuitive at least:
> > (using Pg 7.4.1)
>
> > # select to_char('4 minutes'::interval -
> > '5 minutes 30 seconds'::interval, 'mi:ss');
>
> > to_char
> > ---------
> > -1:-3
> > (1 row)
>
> > Why is the trailing zero lost? Why are there two minus signs?
>
> > I would expect '-1:30'.
>
> Yeah, me too. The underlying interval value seems right:
>
> regression=# select '4 minutes'::interval - '5 minutes 30 seconds'::interval;
> ?column?
> -----------
> -00:01:30
> (1 row)
>
> so I think this is a to_char() bug. Possibly it's platform-dependent
> --- the roundoff behavior for division with a negative input varies
> across machines. However I do see the bug on HPUX 10.20 with CVS tip.

Please, read PostgreSQL docs.

http://www.postgresql.org/docs/7.4/static/functions-formatting.html

Warning: to_char(interval, text) is deprecated and should not be
used in newly-written code. It will be removed in the next version.

Karel

--
Karel Zak <zakkr(at)zf(dot)jcu(dot)cz>
http://home.zf.jcu.cz/~zakkr/