Re: strange behavior, hoping for an explanation

Chris Travers wrote:
> I have found recently that tables in certain contexts seem to have a
> name pseudocolumn. I was wondering if there is any documentation as
> to what this is and what it signifies.
>
> postgres=# CREATE table TEST2 (a text, b text);
> CREATE TABLE
> postgres=# INSERT INTO test2 values ('aaaa', 'bbbb');
> INSERT 0 1
> postgres=# select t.name FROM test2 t;
> name
> -------------
> (aaaa,bbbb)
> (1 row)
>
> However:
>
>
> postgres=# select name FROM test2 t;
> ERROR: column "name" does not exist
> LINE 1: select name FROM test2 t;
>
> This isn't making any sense to me. Are there certain circumstances
> where a tuple is cast to something like varchar(63)? Does this pose
> pitfals for any columns named 'name' in other contexts?

I tried to your sample in 9.1.1 and 9.2devel, and both gave me
ERROR: column t.name does not exist
as expected.

Yours,
Laurenz Albe