It appears from checking the output of exponentiation of one numeric to
another, the output is actually in floating point. Is this normal and /
or expected?
Now, given that
create table test2 (i1 numeric(20,0), i2 numeric(20,0));
insert into test values (123456789012345,123456789012345);
select i1*i2 from test2;
gives:
?column?
-------------------------------
15241578753238669120562399025
it seems odd that
create table test (i1 numeric(20,0), i2 numeric(20,0));
insert into test values (2,55);
select i1^i2 from test;
gives:
?column?
---------------------
3.6028797018964e+16
Now, I can get an exact answer if I'm willing to twiddle with breaking
the exponent down:
select (2^60)::numeric;
Gives:
numeric
---------------------
1152921504606850000
While, select (2^30)::numeric*(2^30)::numeric;
Gives:
?column?
---------------------
1152921504606846976
So, numeric can hold the value, but it looks like the exponent math is
converting it to float.
I'm not bothered too much by it, as I don't really work with numbers
that big. I was mainly wondering if this is kosher is all.