Mike Nolan <nolan@gw.tssi.com> writes:
>> Can't you just create a TEXT(255) field same as you can just create
>> VARCHAR (with no length) field? I think they're basically synonyms for
>> each other these days.
> I'll defer to the SQL standard gurus on this, as well as to the internals
> guys, but I suspect there is a difference between the standard itself
> and implementor details, such as how char, varchar, varchar2 and text
> are implemented. As long as things work as specified, I don't think
> the standard cares much about what's happening behind the curtain.
TEXT is not a standard datatype at all; that is, you will not find it
in the standard, even though quite a few DBMSes have a datatype that
they call by that name.
Postgres' interpretation of TEXT is that there is no length-limitation
option. I don't know what other DBMSes do with their versions of TEXT.
regards, tom lane