[PostgreSQL 8.1.0 on i686-pc-linux-gnu]
I would like to suggest that there be a less-than (or greater-than)
operator for the 'tid' type.
I used to use oid's for finding and distinguishing duplicate data.
Now that oid's are not included by default (and I do not quarrel with
that change), I thought I could use ctid's instead.
Suppose I have a table steps:
create table steps(x text, y text, z text)
but I want there to be a primary key(x,y). If I try to do:
create table temp_steps(x text, y text, z text, primary key(x,y))
insert into temp_steps select * from steps;
drop table steps; alter table temp_steps rename to steps;
I get an error that "duplicate key violates unique constraint". Some of the
rows in steps differ only in value of z. OK, I'll just fix the data...
I thought I could force values of x to be distinct with:
(I've done this several times in the past with oid's)
update steps set x=x||'X' from steps s where steps.key1=s.key1 and
steps.key2=s.key2 and step.ctid<s.ctid;
But this fails because there is no less-than operator (or function) on type
"tid". I tried casting the ctid to string but that fails too. Using "not
s.ctid=step.ctid" doesn't get me what I need(BTW, there's no != operator for
tid either).
I don't actually care which row of a pair gets changed. I just need a way to
choose *one* in the update. [sometimes I do a delete with similar where clause]
If there was some asymmetrical comparison defined on ctids, as there had been
on oids, this would all work fine. A cast to some type that has less-than
would also work fine. Any suggestions?
-- George
--
"Are the gods not just?" "Oh no, child.
What would become of us if they were?" (CSL)
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