Date variables in psql

[Francisco Reyes]

Trying the following simple sql file:
\set proc_date 6/30/2004
\echo Date is :proc_date
select * from feeds where date = :proc_date limit 20;

If I start psql with the "-a" option I see the output:
\set proc_date 6/30/2004
\echo Date is :proc_date
Date is 6/30/2004
select * from feeds where date = :proc_date limit 20;

and get no records
If I type the exact same query manually it workds
select * from feeds where date = '6/30/2004' limit 20;

Any ideas of the variable may not be recognized on the select statement?

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[Tom Lane]

Francisco Reyes <li***@natserv. com> writes:

Trying the following simple sql file:
\set proc_date 6/30/2004
\echo Date is :proc_date
select * from feeds where date = :proc_date limit 20;

That's going to expand to

select * from feeds where date = 6/30/2004 limit 20;

whereas what you need is

select * from feeds where date = '6/30/2004' limit 20;

It's fairly painful to get single quotes into a psql variable;
AFAIK you have to do it like this:

\set proc_date '\'6/30/2004\''

regards, tom lane

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[Francisco Reyes]

On Thu, 7 Oct 2004, Tom Lane wrote:

It's fairly painful to get single quotes into a psql variable;
AFAIK you have to do it like this:
\set proc_date '\'6/30/2004\''

Thanks that worked.
I figure I needed to escape the single quotes, but I had tried
\'6/30/2004\', which did not work.

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