Re: BUG #18962: Type Conversion incorrect when performing UNION of queries.

Tom and David,

Thank you for the quick and clear response. I did not realize that fixed
length char and text were convertible one to the other. Conversion to fixed
length char could result in truncation, so I thought it must be forbidden.
I now realize that the SQL standard decided otherwise many decades ago.

My real issue is with SQLAlchemy - which is not able to handle tables with
bpchar in Postgres (throws an exception). I will follow up and file a bug
against SQLAlchemy. I am the lead developer for a tool to validate tables
across databases -
https://github.com/GoogleCloudPlatform/professional-services-data-validator.
Since we don't design the underlying schemas, we have to support "all" data
types rather than telling users, don't use char, use text instead.

Thanks again.

Sundar Mudupalli

On Thu, Jun 19, 2025 at 9:17 PM David G. Johnston <
david(dot)g(dot)johnston(at)gmail(dot)com> wrote:

> On Thursday, June 19, 2025, PG Bug reporting form <noreply(at)postgresql(dot)org>
> wrote:
>
>> The following bug has been logged on the website:
>>
>> Bug reference: 18962
>> Logged by: Sundar Mudupalli
>> Email address: sundar(at)mudupalli(dot)com
>> PostgreSQL version: 17.5
>> Operating system: Ubuntu I believe (using a Cloud SQL instance in GC
>> Description:
>>
>> Take the following table definitions:
>> ```
>> create table public.test_table_1 as
>> SELECT
>> 'AA'::character(2) AS text_type
>> UNION ALL
>> SELECT
>> 'BB'::character(2) AS text_type
>> UNION ALL
>> SELECT
>> 'CC'::TEXT AS text_type
>> ;
>> create table public.test_table_2 (
>> char_fixed character,
>> char_fixed_len character(5),
>> char_var character varying(5),
>> text_column text );
>> ```
>> Based on the [type conversion rules for
>> Union](https://www.postgresql.org/docs/current/typeconv-union-case.html),
>> the column `text_type` in `test_table_1` should resolve to the postgres
>> data
>> type `TEXT`.
>
>
> We typically choose to suggest just avoiding “character” instead of trying
> to document why the observed behavior is correct…
>
> In short, "character no length restriction" is actually the documented
> type "bpchar".
> "character length restricted" is effectively a domain over "bpchar" - rule
> 2
> "text" implicitly converts to "bpchar" - rule 5 vice-versa exception
> Thus the final result is "bpchar".
>
> David J.
>
>