RE: Big Performance drop of Exceptions in UDFs between V11.2 and 13.4

   >  I see on https://www.postgresql.org/download/ that there is a different
   >  installer from 2ndQuadrant. I am going to try that one and see what I
   >  come up with. Are there any other "standard" distros of Postgres that I
   >  could try out?
   >  
   >  I found out I could download Visual Studio community edition so I am
   >  trying this, but may not have the time to get through a build any time
   >  soon as per my unfamiliarity with the process. I'll follow Ranier's steps
   >  and see if that gets me somewhere.
   >  
   >  Thank you,
   >  Laurent.


Hello all,

I think I had a breakthrough. I tried to create a local build and wasn't able to. But I downloaded the 2nd Quadrant
installerand the issue disappeared!!! I think this is proof that it's not my personal environment, nor something
intrinsicin the codebase, but definitely something in the standard EDB installer.
 


create table sampletest (a varchar, b varchar);
insert into sampletest (a, b)
select substr(md5(random()::text), 0, 15), (100000000*random())::integer::varchar
  from generate_series(1,100000);

CREATE OR REPLACE FUNCTION toFloat(str varchar, val real)
RETURNS real AS $$
BEGIN
  RETURN case when str is null then val else str::real end;
EXCEPTION WHEN OTHERS THEN
  RETURN val;
END;
$$ LANGUAGE plpgsql COST 1 IMMUTABLE;

explain (analyze,buffers,COSTS,TIMING) select MAX(toFloat(a, null)) as "a" from sampletest;
--Aggregate  (cost=2137.00..2137.01 rows=1 width=4) (actual time=2092.922..2092.923 rows=1 loops=1)
--  Buffers: shared hit=637
--  ->  Seq Scan on sampletest  (cost=0.00..1637.00 rows=100000 width=15) (actual time=0.028..23.925 rows=100000
loops=1)
--        Buffers: shared hit=637
--Planning Time: 0.168 ms
--Execution Time: 2092.957 ms

explain (analyze,buffers,COSTS,TIMING) select MAX(toFloat(b, null)) as "b" from sampletest;
--Aggregate  (cost=2137.00..2137.01 rows=1 width=4) (actual time=369.475..369.476 rows=1 loops=1)
--  Buffers: shared hit=637
--  ->  Seq Scan on sampletest  (cost=0.00..1637.00 rows=100000 width=8) (actual time=0.020..18.746 rows=100000
loops=1)
--        Buffers: shared hit=637
--Planning Time: 0.129 ms
--Execution Time: 369.507 ms


Thank you,
Laurent!