Re: Bug #513: union all changes char(3) column definition

Bruce Momjian <pgman(at)candle(dot)pha(dot)pa(dot)us> writes:
> However, I don't think creating a bpchar
> with no length is a proper solution. Should we just punt to text in
> these cases?

How many special cases like that do you want to put into the allegedly
datatype-independent CREATE TABLE code?

If I thought this were the only case then I'd not object ... but it
looks like a slippery slope from here.

And --- it's not like replacing "bpchar" with "text" actually buys us
any useful new functionality. AFAICS it's just a cosmetic thing.

regards, tom lane

PS: On the other hand, we might consider attacking the problem from
the reverse direction, ie *removing* code. For example, if there
weren't redundant || operators for char and varchar, then every ||
operation would yield text, and the example we're looking at would
work the way you want for free. I've thought for awhile that we
could use a pass through pg_proc and pg_operator to remove some
entries we don't really need.