Re: Function for retreiving datatype

Michael Fuhr wrote:

>On Tue, Jan 11, 2005 at 08:29:33AM +1100, Brendan Jurd wrote:
>
>
>
>>My post was all about finding out whether postgres has this
>>functionality.
>>
>>
>
>Certainly PostgreSQL provides a way to discover a row's column
>types, but how to do it depends on where you're trying to do it
>from.  If you're writing a client program in C using libpq, you
>could use the functions documented under "Retrieving Query Result
>Information" in the "Command Execution Functions" section of the
>libpq chapter of the documentation.  If you're writing a client
>program using ECPG then you could use a descriptor area.  If you're
>writing a server-side C program that makes queries via SPI then you
>could use the functions defined under "Interface Support Functions"
>in the "Server Programming Interface" chapter.
>
>Is that what you're looking for?
>
>
>
Actually I'm looking for an internal function -- something within
postgres' implementation of SQL itself, which I can use in queries
independent of the front-end language.  The same way you use functions
like to_char() or now().