Question

Working SQL

The following code works as expected, returning two columns of data (a row number and a valid value):

sql_amounts := '
  SELECT
    row_number() OVER (ORDER BY taken)::integer,
    avg( amount )::double precision
  FROM
    x_function( '|| id || ', 25 ) ca,
    x_table m
  WHERE
    m.category_id = 1 AND
    m.location_id = ca.id AND
    extract( month from m.taken ) = 1 AND
    extract( day from m.taken ) = 1
  GROUP BY
    m.taken
  ORDER BY
    m.taken';

FOR r, amount IN EXECUTE sql_amounts LOOP
  SELECT array_append( v_row, r::integer ) INTO v_row;
  SELECT array_append( v_amount, amount::double precision ) INTO v_amount;
END LOOP;

Non-Working SQL

The following code does not work as expected; the first column is a row number, the second column is NULL.

FOR r, amount IN
  SELECT
    row_number() OVER (ORDER BY taken)::integer,
    avg( amount )::double precision
  FROM
    x_function( id, 25 ) ca,
    x_table m
  WHERE
    m.category_id = 1 AND
    m.location_id = ca.id AND
    extract( month from m.taken ) = 1 AND
    extract( day from m.taken ) = 1
  GROUP BY
    m.taken
  ORDER BY
    m.taken
LOOP
  SELECT array_append( v_row, r::integer ) INTO v_row;
  SELECT array_append( v_amount, amount::double precision ) INTO v_amount;
END LOOP;

Question

Why does the non-working code return a NULL value for the second column when the query itself returns two valid columns? (This question is mostly academic; if there is a way to express the query without resorting to wrapping it in a text string, that would be great to know.)

Full Code

http://pastebin.com/hgV8f8gL

Software

PostgreSQL 8.4

Thank you.

Answer 1

From Tom Lane:

I think the problem is that you’re assuming “amount” will refer to a table column of the query, when actually it’s a local variable of the plpgsql function. The second interpretation will take precedence unless you qualify the column reference with the table’s name/alias.

Note: PG 9.0 will throw an error by default when there is an ambiguity of this type.