Re: postgresql 7.3.2 bug on date '1901-12-13' and '1901-12

Stephan Szabo <sszabo@megazone.bigpanda.com> writes:
> Hmm, I just got my machine to give a similar failure mode with
> a slightly wacky input.

Perhaps more to the point:

regression=# select timestamptz '1901/12/13 0:0:0';
     timestamptz
---------------------
 1901-12-13 00:00:00
(1 row)

regression=# select timestamptz '1901/12/14 0:0:0';
      timestamptz
------------------------
 1901-12-14 00:00:00-05
(1 row)

Note the lack of timezone in the first output.

It looks like 1901/12/14 is the oldest date for which the system will
return timezone information; IIRC, this is the oldest date representable
as a 32-bit time_t.  PG implicitly assumes that timestamps before that
are always GMT.

This still doesn't explain why Arnold sees a failure with to_date and
we don't, though.

            regards, tom lane