Re: How to cast a char[] to varchar?

Stephan Szabo wrote:

> On Mon, 7 Jan 2002, Jon Lapham wrote:
>
>
>>I have a column defined as "char(3)[]" which I would like to copy into a
>>different column defined as "varchar(255)".
>>
>>I've tried to cast the char(3)[] field using "CAST( ... as varchar)" but
>>I get an error message, "Cannot cast type '_bpchar' to 'varchar'".
>>
>>Any suggestions?
>>
>
> What are you trying to get out? You've got a char(3) array, what do you
> want the varchar to have in the end?
>
>

Assuming "category" is the char(3)[] column, and "cat2" is the desired
varchar(255) column, I would like the following:

main_v0_8=# select peopleid, category, cat2 from people where
peopleid=100010;
peopleid | category | cat2
----------+---------------+---------
100010 | {"col","dep"} | col dep
(1 row)

However, in the real database the char(3) array "category" may contain
anywhere from 0 to 10 items.

PS: It would be fine if the things in "cat2" contained the braces and
quotes, it does not need to be cleaned-up.

--

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Jon Lapham
Extracta Moléculas Naturais, Rio de Janeiro, Brasil
email: lapham(at)extracta(dot)com(dot)br web: http://www.extracta.com.br/
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