Re: WIP: to_char, support for EEEE format

2009/7/30 Robert Haas <robertmhaas(at)gmail(dot)com>:
> On Thu, Jul 30, 2009 at 10:35 AM, Brendan Jurd<direvus(at)gmail(dot)com> wrote:
>> 2009/7/30 Pavel Stehule <pavel(dot)stehule(at)gmail(dot)com>:
>>> 2009/7/29 Brendan Jurd <direvus(at)gmail(dot)com>:
>>>> I don't see any problem with extending this to allow up to 3 exponent
>>>> digits ... Pavel, any comment?
>>>
>>> I am not sure - this function should be used in reports witl fixed
>>> line's width. And I am thinking, so it's should be problem - I prefer
>>> showing some #.### chars. It's clean signal, so some is wrong, but it
>>> doesn't break generating long run reports (like exception in Oracle)
>>> and doesn't broke formating like 3 exponent digits.
>>
>> Hmm.  For what it's worth, I think Pavel makes a good point about the
>> number of exponent digits -- a large chunk of the use case for numeric
>> formatting would be fixed-width reporting.
>>
>> Limiting to two exponent digits also has the nice property that the
>> output always matches the length of the format pattern:
>>
>> 9.99EEEE
>> 1.23E+02
>>
>> I don't know whether being able to represent 3-digit exponents
>> outweighs the value of reliable fixed-width output.  Would anyone else
>> care to throw in their opinion?  However we end up handling it, we
>> will probably need to flesh out the docs regarding this.
>
> Well, what if my whole database is full of numbers with three and four
> digit exponents?  Do I have an out, or am I just hosed?
>

Maybe we should to support some modificator like Large EEEE - LEEEE or EEEEE

?? that it use 3-digit exponents

Pavel

> Apologies if this is a stupid question, I haven't read this patch.
>
> ...Robert
>