Re: A creepy story about dates. How to prevent it?

We are actually considering not honoring locale for initdb encodings, so
it might make no sense to do this --- that another reason for the
question mark, but until we decide, it is an open issue.

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Lincoln Yeoh wrote:
> At 03:24 PM 6/23/2003 -0400, Bruce Momjian wrote:
>
> >Added to TODO, with question mark:
> >
> >         * Have initdb set DateStyle based on locale?
>
> Given various issues with locale (indexes, ordering etc) I'd think that
> having a DB follow the O/S locale should be special case and require
> explicit configuration.
>
> More so if certain locales are significantly slower than others which
> seemed to be the case at least in recent memory.
>
> What if a European DB backed website is hosted on a US server with English,
> French and German data?
>
> If apps/programs are talking to DBs more than people are then it may make
> more sense to store things in an application friendly format e.g. (date =
> YYYY-MM-DD, or seconds since epoch) format and having the app convert it
> based on the user's preferences. After all even in English, apps may choose
> to display Tuesday as T, Tue, Tuesday, or whatever the Boss wants.
>
> Unless postgresql has special features allowing switching from one locale
> to another on the fly (including indexes, ordering etc) within a DB
> session, I'd rather stick to say the C locale, or whatever it is that's
> fastest.
>
> Another point of consideration: if someone accidentally loads
> multibyte/other locale data into a C locale DB (or whatever is chosen as
> default DB locale), would dumping the loaded data and reloading it into a
> multibyte locale result in information/precision loss?
>
> Link.
>
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