Pg - Perl5 extension for PostgreSQL

    use Pg;
    $conn = Pg::connectdb("dbname=template1");
    $res  = $conn->exec("SELECT * from pg_user");
    while (@row = $res->fetchrow) {
        print = join(" ", @row);
    }

The Pg module permits you to access all functions of the Libpq interface of PostgreSQL. Libpq is the programmer's interface to PostgreSQL. For examples of how to use this module, look at the file test.pl.

This perl interface uses blessed references as objects. After creating a new connection or result object, the relevant Libpq functions serve as virtual methods. You do not have to care about freeing the connection- and result-structures. Perl calls the destructor whenever the last reference to an object goes away.

The method fetchrow can be used to fetch the next row from the server: while (@row = CW$result->fetchrow). Columns which have NULL as value will be set to CWundef.

Pg.pm contains one convenience function: doQuery. It fills a two-dimensional array with the result of your query. Usage:

    Pg::doQuery($conn, "select attr1, attr2 from tbl", \@ary);

    for $i ( 0 .. $#ary ) {
        for $j ( 0 .. $#{$ary[$i]} ) {
            print "$ary[$i][$j]\t";
        }
        print "\n";
    }

Notice the inner loop !

The functions have been divided into three sections: Connection, Result, Large Objects. For details please read libpq.

With these functions you can establish and close a connection to a database. In Libpq a connection is represented by a structure called PGconn.

When opening a connection a given database name is always converted to lower-case, unless it is surrounded by double quotes. All unspecified parameters are replaced by environment variables or by hard coded defaults:

    parameter     environment variable  hard coded default
    ------------------------------------------------------
    host           PGHOST                localhost
    port           PGPORT                5432
    options        PGOPTIONS             ""
    tty            PGTTY                 ""
    dbname         PGDATABASE            current userid
    user           PGUSER                current userid
    password       PGPASSWORD            ""
    passwordfile   PGPASSWORDFILE        ""

Using appropriate methods you can access almost all fields of the returned PGconn structure.

    $conn = Pg::setdbLogin($pghost, $pgport, $pgoptions, $pgtty, $dbname, $login, $pwd)

Opens a new connection to the backend. The connection identifier CW$conn ( a pointer to the PGconn structure ) must be used in subsequent commands for unique identification. Before using CW$conn you should call CW$conn->status to ensure, that the connection was properly made. Closing a connection is done by deleting the connection handle, eg 'undef CW$conn;'.

    $conn = Pg::setdb($pghost, $pgport, $pgoptions, $pgtty, $dbname)

The method setdb should be used when username/password authentication is not needed.

    $conn = Pg::connectdb("option1=value option2=value ...")

Opens a new connection to the backend using connection information in a string. Possible options are: host, port, options, tty, dbname, user, password. The connection identifier CW$conn (a pointer to the PGconn structure) must be used in subsequent commands for unique identification. Before using CW$conn you should call CW$conn->status to ensure, that the connection was properly made.

    $Option_ref = Pg::conndefaults()

    while(($key, $val) = each %$Option_ref) {
        print "$key, $val\n";

Returns a reference to a hash containing as keys all possible options for connectdb(). The values are the current defaults. This function differs from his C-counterpart, which returns the complete conninfoOption structure.

    $conn->reset

Resets the communication port with the backend and tries to establish a new connection.

    $ret = $conn->requestCancel

Abandon processing of the current query. Regardless of the return value of requestCancel, the application must continue with the normal result-reading sequence using getResult. If the current query is part of a transaction, cancellation will abort the whole transaction.

    $dbname = $conn->db

Returns the database name of the connection.

    $pguser = $conn->user

Returns the Postgres user name of the connection.

    $pguser = $conn->pass

Returns the Postgres password of the connection.

    $pghost = $conn->host

Returns the host name of the connection.

    $pgport = $conn->port

Returns the port of the connection.

    $pgtty = $conn->tty

Returns the tty of the connection.

    $pgoptions = $conn->options

Returns the options used in the connection.

    $status = $conn->status

Returns the status of the connection. For comparing the status you may use the following constants:

  - PGRES_CONNECTION_OK
  - PGRES_CONNECTION_BAD

    $errorMessage = $conn->errorMessage

Returns the last error message associated with this connection.

    $fd = $conn->socket

Obtain the file descriptor number for the backend connection socket. A result of -1 indicates that no backend connection is currently open.

    $pid = $conn->backendPID

Returns the process-id of the corresponding backend proceess.

    $conn->trace(debug_port)

Messages passed between frontend and backend are echoed to the debug_port file stream.

    $conn->untrace

Disables tracing.

    $result = $conn->exec($query)

Submits a query to the backend. The return value is a pointer to the PGresult structure, which contains the complete query-result returned by the backend. In case of failure, the pointer points to an empty structure. Before using CW$result you should call resultStatus to ensure, that the query was properly executed.

    ($table, $pid) = $conn->notifies

Checks for asynchronous notifications. This functions differs from the C-counterpart which returns a pointer to a new allocated structure, whereas the perl implementation returns a list. CW$table is the table which has been listened to and CW$pid is the process id of the backend.

    $ret = $conn->sendQuery($string, $query)

Submit a query to Postgres without waiting for the result(s). After successfully calling PQsendQuery, call PQgetResult one or more times to obtain the query results. PQsendQuery may not be called again until getResult has returned NULL, indicating that the query is done.

    $result = $conn->getResult

Wait for the next result from a prior PQsendQuery, and return it. NULL is returned when the query is complete and there will be no more results. getResult will block only if a query is active and the necessary response data has not yet been read by PQconsumeInput.

    $ret = $conn->isBusy

Returns TRUE if a query is busy, that is, PQgetResult would block waiting for input. A FALSE return indicates that PQgetResult can be called with assurance of not blocking.

    $result = $conn->consumeInput

If input is available from the backend, consume it. After calling consumeInput, the application may check isBusy and/or notifies to see if their state has changed.

    $ret = $conn->getline($string, $length)

Reads a string up to CW$length - 1 characters from the backend. getline returns EOF at EOF, 0 if the entire line has been read, and 1 if the buffer is full. If a line consists of the two characters \. the backend has finished sending the results of the copy command.

    $ret = $conn->putline($string)

Sends a string to the backend. The application must explicitly send the two characters \. to indicate to the backend that it has finished sending its data.

    $ret = $conn->getlineAsync($buffer, $bufsize)

Non-blocking version of getline. It reads up to CW$bufsize characters from the backend. getlineAsync returns -1 if the end-of-copy-marker has been recognized, 0 if no data is avilable, and >0 the number of bytes returned.

    $ret = $conn->putnbytes($buffer, $nbytes)

Sends n bytes to the backend. Returns 0 if OK, EOF if not.

    $ret = $conn->endcopy

This function waits until the backend has finished the copy. It should either be issued when the last string has been sent to the backend using putline or when the last string has been received from the backend using getline. endcopy returns 0 on success, 1 on failure.

    $result = $conn->makeEmptyPGresult($status);

Returns a newly allocated, initialized result with given status.

With these functions you can send commands to a database and investigate the results. In Libpq the result of a command is represented by a structure called PGresult. Using the appropriate methods you can access almost all fields of this structure.

    $result_status = $result->resultStatus

Returns the status of the result. For comparing the status you may use one of the following constants depending upon the command executed:

  - PGRES_EMPTY_QUERY
  - PGRES_COMMAND_OK
  - PGRES_TUPLES_OK
  - PGRES_COPY_OUT
  - PGRES_COPY_IN
  - PGRES_BAD_RESPONSE
  - PGRES_NONFATAL_ERROR
  - PGRES_FATAL_ERROR

Use the functions below to access the contents of the PGresult structure.

    $ntuples = $result->ntuples

Returns the number of tuples in the query result.

    $nfields = $result->nfields

Returns the number of fields in the query result.

    $ret = $result->binaryTuples

Returns 1 if the tuples in the query result are bianry.

    $fname = $result->fname($field_num)

Returns the field name associated with the given field number.

    $fnumber = $result->fnumber($field_name)

Returns the field number associated with the given field name.

    $ftype = $result->ftype($field_num)

Returns the oid of the type of the given field number.

    $fsize = $result->fsize($field_num)

Returns the size in bytes of the type of the given field number. It returns -1 if the field has a variable length.

    $fmod = $result->fmod($field_num)

Returns the type-specific modification data of the field associated with the given field index. Field indices start at 0.

    $cmdStatus = $result->cmdStatus

Returns the command status of the last query command. In case of DELETE it returns also the number of deleted tuples. In case of INSERT it returns also the OID of the inserted tuple followed by 1 (the number of affected tuples).

    $oid = $result->oidStatus

In case the last query was an INSERT command it returns the oid of the inserted tuple.

    $oid = $result->cmdTuples

In case the last query was an INSERT or DELETE command it returns the number of affected tuples.

    $value = $result->getvalue($tup_num, $field_num)

Returns the value of the given tuple and field. This is a null-terminated ASCII string. Binary cursors will not work.

    $length = $result->getlength($tup_num, $field_num)

Returns the length of the value for a given tuple and field.

    $null_status = $result->getisnull($tup_num, $field_num)

Returns the NULL status for a given tuple and field.

    $res->fetchrow

Fetches the next row from the server and returns NULL if all rows have been processed. Columns which have NULL as value will be set to CWundef.

    $result->print($fout, $header, $align, $standard, $html3, $expanded, $pager, $fieldSep, $tableOpt, $caption, ...)

Prints out all the tuples in an intelligent manner. This function differs from the C-counterpart. The struct PQprintOpt has been implemented with a list. This list is of variable length, in order to care for the character array fieldName in PQprintOpt. The arguments CW$header, CW$align, CW$standard, CW$html3, CW$expanded, CW$pager are boolean flags. The arguments CW$fieldSep, CW$tableOpt, CW$caption are strings. You may append additional strings, which will be taken as replacement for the field names.

    $result->displayTuples($fp, $fillAlign, $fieldSep, $printHeader, qiet)

Kept for backward compatibility. Use print.

    $result->printTuples($fout, $printAttName, $terseOutput, $width)

Kept for backward compatibility. Use print.

These functions provide file-oriented access to user data. The large object interface is modeled after the Unix file system interface with analogies of open, close, read, write, lseek, tell.

Starting with postgresql-6.5 it is required to use large objects only inside a transaction ! See eg/lo_demo.pl for an example, how to handle large objects.

    $lobj_fd = $conn->lo_open($lobjId, $mode)

Opens an existing large object and returns an object id. For the mode bits see lo_create. Returns -1 upon failure.

    $ret = $conn->lo_close($lobj_fd)

Closes an existing large object. Returns 0 upon success and -1 upon failure.

    $nbytes = $conn->lo_read($lobj_fd, $buf, $len)

Reads CW$len bytes into CW$buf from large object CW$lobj_fd. Returns the number of bytes read and -1 upon failure.

    $nbytes = $conn->lo_write($lobj_fd, $buf, $len)

Writes CW$len bytes of CW$buf into the large object CW$lobj_fd. Returns the number of bytes written and -1 upon failure.

    $ret = $conn->lo_lseek($lobj_fd, $offset, $whence)

Change the current read or write location on the large object CW$obj_id. Currently CW$whence can only be 0 (L_SET).

    $lobjId = $conn->lo_creat($mode)

Creates a new large object. CW$mode is a bit-mask describing different attributes of the new object. Use the following constants:

  - PGRES_INV_SMGRMASK
  - PGRES_INV_WRITE
  - PGRES_INV_READ

Upon failure it returns PGRES_InvalidOid.

    $location = $conn->lo_tell($lobj_fd)

Returns the current read or write location on the large object CW$lobj_fd.

    $ret = $conn->lo_unlink($lobjId)

Deletes a large object. Returns -1 upon failure.

    $lobjId = $conn->lo_import($filename)

Imports a Unix file as large object and returns the object id of the new object.

    $ret = $conn->lo_export($lobjId, $filename)

Exports a large object into a Unix file. Returns -1 upon failure, 1 otherwise.

    Edmund Mergl <E.Mergl@bawue.de>

PostgreSQL Programmer's Guide, Large Objects and libpq