Date: Thu, 8 Aug 2002 14:46:47 +0200
From: Frank Joerdens <frank@joerdens.de>
To: Karel Zak <zakkr@zf.jcu.cz>
Cc: Ludwig Lim <lud_nowhere_man@yahoo.com>,
 Frank Joerdens <frank@joerdens.de>,
	PostgreSQL Mailing List <pgsql-sql@postgresql.org>
Subject: Re: to_char and '=' weirdness
Message-ID: <20020808144646.B15630@superfly.archi-me-des.de>
References: <20020808133300.A15630@superfly.archi-me-des.de>
	<20020808114824.4497.qmail@web40018.mail.yahoo.com>
	<20020808141154.C14021@zf.jcu.cz>
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	from zakkr@zf.jcu.cz on Thu, Aug 08, 2002 at 02:11:55PM +0200

On Thu, Aug 08, 2002 at 02:11:55PM +0200, Karel Zak wrote:
> On Thu, Aug 08, 2002 at 04:48:24AM -0700, Ludwig Lim wrote:
> > 
> > > which would appear to indicate that to_char actually
> > > yields the string
> > > '04109'. Why doesn't the '=' operator work then?
> > 
> >   I tried running a test sql statement
> >  select(length(to_char(99,'00000')))
> >  It return six.
> > 
> >  I think that postgreSQL put a leading blank to
> > indicate that it is a positive number (not sure, just
> > my opinion)
> 
>  Right.
> 
> >   try using :
> >    
> >   select to_char(plz,'00000')
> >   from andresses 
> >   where trim(to_char(plz,'00000'))='04109'
> 
>  use FM instead trim(): to_char(plz,'FM00000')
> 
>  ...and please, better read  docs :-)

Well, I just looked again and couldn't find it. Mostly I use Bruce's
excellent book (pdf version from November 2000), which at least mentions
to_char. I just went to

http://www.de.postgresql.org/users-lounge/docs/7.2/postgres/

and looked under data types and type conversion, to no avail.

Where is this documented?

Regards, Frank