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From: jboes@nexcerpt.com (Jeff Boes)
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Subject: to_char() and order-by
Date: 27 Jun 2002 12:27:11 -0700
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Perhaps this was covered in the 7.2.x release notes, but it's mystifying us:

select to_char(time_link,'999.99') from stat_fetch
where time_link is not null
order by 1 desc limit 10;

(time_link is a double-precision column.)  Under 7.1.3, this returns results like:

 to_char 
---------
    9.99
    9.99
    9.99
    9.99
    9.99
    9.99
    9.99
    9.99
    9.99
    9.99
(10 rows)

while under 7.2.1, you get the top 10 rows in *numerical* order:

 to_char 
---------
  278.78
  261.07
  240.25
  180.24
  173.26
  160.35
  159.02
  144.57
  134.21
  131.66
(10 rows)