Redundant explicit field name/types description while select from function with return type of record

From: <Eugen(dot)Konkov(at)aldec(dot)com>
To: <pgsql-bugs(at)postgresql(dot)org>
Subject: Redundant explicit field name/types description while select from function with return type of record
Date: 2008-03-28 09:56:41
Message-ID: 034201c890ba$068adde0$1200a8c0@kharkov.localhost
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PG v8.3.1

CREATE or REPLACE FUNCTION "public"."aaa"()
RETURNS SETOF "pg_catalog"."record" AS
$BODY$
DECLARE r record;
BEGIN
select 1 as num into r; -- here PG know that first field is integer and has
name 'num'
return next r;
return;
END;
$BODY$
LANGUAGE 'plpgsql' VOLATILE;

select * from aaa()

Expected result:
num
--------
1

type of field 'num' is integer;

Actual result:
pg require explicit name and type
select * from aaa() as ( num integer )
^^^^^^^^^^^^^
//////
this is redundant character typing

Also I see that PG alway know type of field in function, because of when I
write
select * from aaa() as ( num varchar )
I get an error.
SQL State: 42804
ERROR: wrong record type supplied in RETURN NEXT
CONTEXT: PL/pgSQL function "aaa" line 4 at RETURN NEXT

So there is posible to PG do not supply type explicitly. So now I can just
write:
select * from aaa() as ( num )

Futher optimizations:
When somebody write
select 1;
PG return will:
?column?
--------
1
And I have no any errors because of I do not write return data type.
Also notice that PG generate automatically a name for my field. Do you see?

Let's me extend that example:
select 1, 'asdf';
?column? | ?column?_1
--------------------
1 | asdf
Do you see an alignment of data? Right alignment - integer, left aligment -
string
PG see types of data without any problem and errors reporting

Let's my extend this example to function:
CREATE or REPLACE FUNCTION "public"."aaa"()
RETURNS SETOF "pg_catalog"."record" AS
$BODY$
DECLARE r record;
BEGIN
select 1, 'asdf'; -- as we saw earlier PG know that first field is integer
and second one is string
return next r;
return;
END;
$BODY$
LANGUAGE 'plpgsql' VOLATILE;

Keeping in mind examples above expected results for:
select * from aaa();
must be:
?column? | ?column?_1
-----------------------
1 | asdf

Actual result is:
a column definition list is required for functions returning "record"
It seems a BUG

Are you agree with my suggestion? If so will you plan to fix this BUG?

Responses

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