Re: Sequence bug

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Andreas Pflug [mailto:pgadmin@pse-consulting.de]
> Sent: 21 October 2004 14:54
> To: Dave Page
> Cc: PgAdmin Hackers
> Subject: Re: [pgadmin-hackers] Sequence bug
>
> Dave Page wrote:
>
> >
> > Hmm, it works OK (thanks), but not as you would expect.
> With setval's
> > third arg = false, you can set the sequence value to 1, which is
> > displayed as expected as the 'Current Value', but then a 'SELECT
> > nextval()' also returns 1 which is not what you would expect
> > (especially if you are not the same user, or you forgot
> what you did earlier).
>
> But this is consistent with ALTER SEQUENCE ... RESTART ...; I
> just checked.

Dunno, didn't check that, but it's certainly not what the novice user
might expect. I.e. Current val = 1, nextval = 1 !!

> > Maybe it's better not to try to allow resetting to 0 with 7,3?
>
> Why not? 0 sounds like a legal int value to me...

Hmm, it's not though is it, because (assuming a basic new sequence with
no odd values set), start = 1, min = 1, max = whatever. PostgreSQL will
error if you try to set it to zero. The closest thing to zero is to set
it to 1 and unset is_called.

I would say the least confusing behaviour would be to use

setval('foo', x, true);

If the user tries to set x >= minimum, or use:

setval('foo', minimum, false);

If x == (minimum - increment)

Regards, Dave