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Thread: Drop Database

Drop Database

From
Forest W Felling
Date:
I can not find an explanation to help me understand why
mydb=# drop database November;
fails, while
[Forest-Fellings-Computer:~] dropdb -i -e November
succeeds.

Will appreciate any help to point me to an understanding of this.

Mac OS 10.2.2; PostgreSQL 7.2.3
Learning SQL with "Practical PostgreSQL" by Worsley & Drake, "PostgreSQL Essential Reference" by Barry Stinson, "SQL for Smarties" by Joe Celko and the docs downloaded from http://www.postgresql.org. Can not find an answer in any of these books.

Complete shell listing follows.

mydb=# \l
        List of databases
   Name    |  Owner   | Encoding
-----------+----------+----------
 November  | fwf      | UNICODE
 booktown  | fwf      | UNICODE
 homepage  | mitch    | UNICODE
 hospice   | fwf      | UNICODE
 mydb      | fwf      | UNICODE
 template0 | postgres | UNICODE
 template1 | postgres | UNICODE
(7 rows)
mydb=# drop database November;
ERROR:  DROP DATABASE: database "november" does not exist
mydb=# \q
[Forest-Fellings-Computer:~] fwf% dropdb -i -e November
Database "November" will be permanently deleted.
Are you sure? (y/n) y
DROP DATABASE "November"
DROP DATABASE
[Forest-Fellings-Computer:~] fwf%

Re: Drop Database

From
Tom Lane
Date:
Forest W Felling <res08i7v@verizon.net> writes:
> I can not find an explanation to help me understand why
> mydb=# drop database November;
> fails, while
> [Forest-Fellings-Computer:~] dropdb -i -e November
> succeeds.

In the SQL command, you need
    drop database "November";
See the User's Guide's discussion of identifiers, particularly
case-folding and quoting.

Our command-line tools generally double-quote whatever they find
on their command lines, so that what dropdb sent to the server
was in fact DROP DATABASE "November".  This makes their behavior a
little inconsistent compared to raw SQL, but the other way proved
too unwieldy because of shell quoting rules.  If dropdb did not supply
double quotes then you'd have had to type something like
    dropdb '"November"'
which is awfully tedious.

            regards, tom lane