Re: BUG #2240: length() with geometric types

From: Andreas Erber <post(at)andreas-erber(dot)net>
To: James William Pye <pgsql(at)jwp(dot)name>
Cc: pgsql-bugs(at)postgresql(dot)org
Subject: Re: BUG #2240: length() with geometric types
Date: 2006-02-07 14:02:23
Message-ID: 43E8A86F.8050506@andreas-erber.net
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Hi,

sorry to bug you with that. I figured that out, too, in the meantime. I
wonder why the default behaviour of the path-constructor to end up in a
closed path. I would intentionally expect an open path - since I
understand a path as a connection of points that go from a start to a
destination and not necessarily back. If I would like to have a closed
path I would probably use the polygon datatype.

What was the intenion behind some of the geometric datatypes anyway. I
would have liked to work with them (esp. path) but they turned out not
to be very useful. (I cannot append or prepend a point to a path, I
cannot index-access it, I didn't even find a way to cast it to a string).

Is there any further development planned or will you keep this status? I
would prefer to see these datatypes handier in the future so they
probably get more useful.

Thx
CU
ae

James William Pye schrieb:
> On Mon, Feb 06, 2006 at 02:41:39PM +0000, Andreas Erber wrote:
>> Hi,
>>
>> I discovered some strange behaviour:
>> The length() function returns different results depending on the geometric
>> data type used as argument.
>>
>> length(lseg) produces the correct result, i.e. length(lseg('(0,0),(2,0)')) =
>> 2
>>
>> length(path) always produces the double result (independently from the
>> length of the path), i.e.
>> length(path('(0,0),(2,0)')) = 4
>> length(path('(0,0),(2,0),(4,0),(6,0),(8,0)')) = 16
>>
>> Is it supposed to be that way? If yes, why?
>
> Yes.
>
> You specified your path as a closed path. With its "loopback", it's twice as
> long.
>
> To specify it as an open path, do path('[(0,0),(2,0)]').
>
> SELECT length(path('[(1,0),(0,0)]')) = '1';
> SELECT length(path('(1,0),(0,0)')) = '2';

- --
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Information is a weapon of mass destruction
[Faithless]
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Andreas Erber
Berlin
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e-mail post(at)andreas-erber(dot)net
home http://www.andreas-erber.net
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