Thread: Unusual psql behavior

Postgres 9.4.4.

I am seeing something I cannot figure out when using psql.

This is what I see:

psql (9.4.4)
Type "help" for help.

production_5432=> select from cell_per ;
--
(56 rows)


This is when I am logged in as system user aklaver. If I log in as
another user on the same machine I see the query results. I see no
differences in the user environments that would account for this.  Also
if I log in as system user aklaver but do psql -d production -U aklaver
-n I can see the results.  So it seems to be some interaction between
readline and whatever code supplies the actual query results. Not sure
where to go from here.

Thanks,
--
Adrian Klaver
adrian.klaver@aklaver.com

Adrian Klaver <adrian.klaver@aklaver.com> writes:
> I am seeing something I cannot figure out when using psql.

> This is what I see:

> psql (9.4.4)
> Type "help" for help.

> production_5432=> select from cell_per ;
> --
> (56 rows)

I believe this is the expected output for a table with 56 rows and zero
columns.  (It's probably a bug that psql doesn't display that as 56
empty lines, but nobody's cared enough to fix it.)  Since you did not
include anything in "select", you've got a zero-column result table.

> This is when I am logged in as system user aklaver. If I log in as
> another user on the same machine I see the query results. I see no
> differences in the user environments that would account for this.

You didn't say what query results you expected to get, but it's hard
to see how you get anything but zero columns from this query.

            regards, tom lane

On 08/27/2015 01:38 PM, Tom Lane wrote:
> Adrian Klaver <adrian.klaver@aklaver.com> writes:
>> I am seeing something I cannot figure out when using psql.
>
>> This is what I see:
>
>> psql (9.4.4)
>> Type "help" for help.
>
>> production_5432=> select from cell_per ;
>> --
>> (56 rows)
>
> I believe this is the expected output for a table with 56 rows and zero
> columns.  (It's probably a bug that psql doesn't display that as 56
> empty lines, but nobody's cared enough to fix it.)  Since you did not
> include anything in "select", you've got a zero-column result table.
>
>> This is when I am logged in as system user aklaver. If I log in as
>> another user on the same machine I see the query results. I see no
>> differences in the user environments that would account for this.
>
> You didn't say what query results you expected to get, but it's hard
> to see how you get anything but zero columns from this query.

Correct. Turns out I was using the above query as aklaver and kept on
going back to it in history with out thinking. When I logged in as other
users I added the *, so select * from cell_per. In the no readline
version I was forced to re-enter the query and did the 'right' thing.
Just not paying attention, thanks for the heads up.

>
>             regards, tom lane
>


--
Adrian Klaver
adrian.klaver@aklaver.com