Re: INTERVAL MINUTE TO SECOND didn't do what I thought it would do

On Wed, Jan 8, 2025 at 3:07 PM Adrian Klaver <adrian(dot)klaver(at)aklaver(dot)com>
wrote:

>
>
> On 1/8/25 11:58 AM, Ron Johnson wrote:
> > On Wed, Jan 8, 2025 at 2:43 PM Adrian Klaver <adrian(dot)klaver(at)aklaver(dot)com
> > <mailto:adrian(dot)klaver(at)aklaver(dot)com>> wrote:
> >
>
> > > I'd hoped that ::INTERVAL MINUTE TO SECOND would do the trick, but
> > > MINUTE TO SECOND seems to be ignored.
> >
> > From here:
> >
> >
> https://www.postgresql.org/docs/current/datatype-datetime.html#DATATYPE-INTERVAL-INPUT
> <
> https://www.postgresql.org/docs/current/datatype-datetime.html#DATATYPE-INTERVAL-INPUT
> >
> >
> > "Also, field values “to the right” of the least significant field
> > allowed by the fields specification are silently discarded. For
> > example,
> > writing INTERVAL '1 day 2:03:04' HOUR TO MINUTE results in dropping
> the
> > seconds field, but not the day field."
> >
> >
> > I read that, but it did not mention that the day values are retained.
>
> I suggest reading the entire section(8.5.4. Interval Input) as well as
> 8.5.5. Interval Output.
>

I did, but either missed something or did not interpret it correctly.

> >
> > >
> > > Is there cast magic that does what I want?
> >
> > The only way I can think of extract the epoch from the interval and
> > pass
> > to a function that builds what you want.
> >
> >
> > I was afraid of that. Must decide if it's worth the time.
> >
> If you don't mind decimal minutes, a quick and dirty solution is:
>
> select extract(epoch from (now() - '2025-01-07 14:15:32'::timestamptz))
> / 60;
>
> 1301.5244606333333333
>

That's what I currently do, using to_char() to add commas and display 3
decimal places.

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