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Message-ID: <dcc563d10708211842k365e15ccy631e4c43b98da996@mail.gmail.com>
Date: Tue, 21 Aug 2007 20:42:23 -0500
From: "Scott Marlowe" <scott.marlowe@gmail.com>
To: "Gregory Stark" <stark@enterprisedb.com>
Subject: Re: SELECT syntax synopsis: column_definition?
Cc: "Michael Glaesemann" <grzm@seespotcode.net>,
	"Richard Broersma Jr" <rabroersma@yahoo.com>,
	"SQL Postgresql List" <pgsql-sql@postgresql.org>
In-Reply-To: <87zm0kigwe.fsf@oxford.xeocode.com>
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References: <830878.14424.qm@web31803.mail.mud.yahoo.com>
	<50700110-2B0D-4935-B033-084ED908BEC5@seespotcode.net>
	<87zm0kigwe.fsf@oxford.xeocode.com>

On 8/21/07, Gregory Stark <stark@enterprisedb.com> wrote:
> "Michael Glaesemann" <grzm@seespotcode.net> writes:
>
> > ERROR:  a column definition list is only allowed for functions  returning
> > "record"
> >
> > So the *form* is right, but I don't know of an example that works.
>
> postgres=# create function testf() returns record as 'select 1' language sql;
> CREATE FUNCTION
> postgres=# select * from testf() as (i integer);
>  i
> ---
>  1
> (1 row)
>
>
> I haven't quite figured out how this is useful though. It probably makes more
> sense if you use plpgsql but I still don't quite see what the use case is.

I use them with the crosstab function in the tablefunc contrib module.