Re: Fixed length data types issue

Tom Lane <tgl(at)sss(dot)pgh(dot)pa(dot)us> writes:

> Martijn van Oosterhout <kleptog(at)svana(dot)org> writes:
>> On Thu, Sep 07, 2006 at 11:57:26AM +0100, Gregory Stark wrote:
>>> Just brain storming here. But what happens if we make Datum 2*sizeof(pointer)
>>> and stored the typmod and/or attlen in it?
>
>> The fundamental property of a Datum is that you can pass it by value to
>> a C function. This generally means it has to fit in a register. On the
>> whole, the CPU register size is the same as the pointer size, so
>> 2*sizeof(pointer) is unlikely to fit...
>
> Not to mention the problem that such a change would break every single
> datatype-manipulation function in both the core backend and every
> user-written datatype. I don't think we're going there.

Sure, I'm just brain storming. Sometimes thinking about outlandish ideas can
result in quiet reasonable ideas appearing down the line.

--
Gregory Stark
EnterpriseDB http://www.enterprisedb.com