From: johnf <jfabiani@yolo.com>
To: pgsql-sql@postgresql.org
Subject: Re: using a list to query
Date: Sun, 3 May 2009 15:26:58 -0700
User-Agent: KMail/1.9.6 (enterprise 20070904.708012)
References: <200905020955.29386.jfabiani@yolo.com>
	<49FCF4C1.8020701@postnewspapers.com.au>
In-Reply-To: <49FCF4C1.8020701@postnewspapers.com.au>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain;
  charset="iso-8859-1"
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
Content-Disposition: inline
Message-Id: <200905031526.58125.jfabiani@yolo.com>

On Saturday 02 May 2009 06:34:57 pm Craig Ringer wrote:
> johnf wrote:
> > I have a list (or array) of primary keys stored in a field (data type
> > text). I would like to use the list to retrieve all the data from a table
> > based on the list.
> >
> > my text field contains:
> >  '123,134,343,345'
> >
> > I would to do something like the following:
> >
> > Select * from table1 where table1.pkid in (select myTextfield from
> > table2)
> >
> > So the question is there a simple way to use the list to retrieve my
> > data?
>
> http://www.postgresql.org/docs/8.3/static/functions-matching.html
>
> SELECT * FROM table1
> WHERE table1.pkid IN (
>   SELECT x FROM regexp_split_to_table(myTextfield, ',') AS x
> );
>
> ... but you should consider storing your list in an array instead, or
> using a more conventional child table with a (pkid, refid) pair list.
>
> --
> Craig Ringer

Thanks - I think this will work very well.  I considered an array but at the 
moment I don't have an easy way of retrieving data from an array.  I'm 
working on that as I type.  The other solution would be a table but that 
seems over kill for one field.  

Thanks again

-- 
John Fabiani