> At 18:36 +0200 on 9/10/98, Bruce Momjian wrote:
> 
> 
> > I am always looking for suggestions on how to display nulls.  It is on
> > the TODO list.
> 
> Here is my suggestion, admittedly a bit cheeky:
> 
> Implement an NVL function - one that dictates a NULL in a field and
> converts it to whatever value is required.
> 
> Then, anybody who wants psql to display a null function can decide what is
> to be displayed on a per-query basis:
> 
> SELECT a, nvl(b,'I am null!'), c
> FROM tab
> WHERE...
> 
> Will give something like:
> 
> a   |  ?column?  | c
> ====|============|=====
> 10  | Moses      | 100
> 20  | Solomon    | 200
> 30  | I am null! | 300
> 40  | David      | 400
> 50  | I am null! | 500
> 
> And so on... So, if someone wants \N, he'll put '\\N' in the NVL function,
> and if they want NULL, they'll put 'NULL', etc.
> 
> NVL will be usefull for lots of stuff... Not only for this...

Yes, this is a nice feature.  Ingres has it as isnull(val, 'string'), as
you demonstrated.

I will add it to the TODO list.

-- 
  Bruce Momjian                        |  http://www.op.net/~candle
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