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To: "Dean Gibson (DB Administrator)" <postgresql4@ultimeth.com>
Cc: pgsql-sql <pgsql-sql@postgresql.org>
Subject: Re: Blank-padding (was: Oracle buys Innobase) 
In-reply-to: <435979B0.60107@ultimeth.com> 
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Comments: In-reply-to "Dean Gibson (DB Administrator)"
	<postgresql4@ultimeth.com>
	message dated "Fri, 21 Oct 2005 16:28:48 -0700"
Date: Fri, 21 Oct 2005 23:23:48 -0400
Message-ID: <27840.1129951428@sss.pgh.pa.us>
From: Tom Lane <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us>
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"Dean Gibson (DB Administrator)" <postgresql4@ultimeth.com> writes:
> I remember that discussion, and I was for the change.  However, upon 
> doing some testing after reading the above, I wonder if the 
> blank-stripping isn't too aggressive.  I have a CHAR(6) field (say, 
> named Z) that has "abc   " in it.  Suppose I want to append "x" to Z, 
> with any leading spaces in Z PRESERVED.

(You meant trailing spaces, I assume.)  Why exactly would you want to do
that?  You decided by your choice of datatype that the trailing spaces
weren't significant.  This gripe seems to me exactly comparable to
complaining if a numeric datatype doesn't remember how many trailing
zeroes you typed after the decimal point.  Those zeroes aren't
semantically significant, so you have no case.

			regards, tom lane