[Oledb-dev] [HACKERS] Re: double precision error with pg linux server, but not with windows pg server

[Andrew Dunstan]

Shachar Shemesh wrote:
>> Perhaps OLE is trying to use binary instead of text transmission of
>> data?
>>     
> Of course it does. That's what the OLE DB specs say. Said so in my
> original email.
>   


Why the heck do the OLE DB specs care about the internals of the 
client-server prototocol? It is documented fairly clearly that text is 
the only portable way to transfer data.

Perhaps we need to expand this sentence in the docs: "Keep in mind that 
binary representations for complex data types may change across server 
versions;"

The COPY docs are probably more correct: "The BINARY key word causes all 
data to be stored/read as binary format rather than as text. It is 
somewhat faster than the normal text mode, but a binary-format file is 
less portable across machine architectures and PostgreSQL versions."

I do recall someone telling me that text mode transfer could actually be 
faster than binary, somewhat to their (and my) surprise.

cheers

andrew