From: Tom Lane <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us>
To: "David G. Johnston" <david.g.johnston@gmail.com>
cc: s@xss.de, Pg Docs <pgsql-docs@lists.postgresql.org>
Subject: Re: Mention RETURNING ... INTO target
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Comments: In-reply-to "David G. Johnston" <david.g.johnston@gmail.com>
	message dated "Tue, 07 Jun 2022 13:47:14 -0700"
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Date: Tue, 07 Jun 2022 17:07:30 -0400
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"David G. Johnston" <david.g.johnston@gmail.com> writes:
> On Tue, Jun 7, 2022 at 1:30 PM PG Doc comments form <noreply@postgresql.=
org>
> wrote:
>> It looks like INSERT INTO ... RETURNING allows defining a target for th=
e
>> returned values like SELECT ... INTO does.

> That isn't how it works.  RETURNING simply turns INSERT into a result se=
t
> producing SQL Command.  And SQL doesn't have a concept of "target"
> (variables) in the sense you are thinking. pg/pgsql does, allowing resul=
t
> set data to be placed into variables.

Right.  And in fact this *is* documented in the context of pl/pgsql:

https://www.postgresql.org/docs/current/plpgsql-statements.html#PLPGSQL-ST=
ATEMENTS-SQL-ONEROW

			regards, tom lane