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[MINOR][DOCS] Clarify docs on default fractional numeric literals in SQL - #45027

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[MINOR][DOCS] Clarify docs on default fractional numeric literals in SQL#45027
nchammas wants to merge 2 commits into
apache:masterfrom
nchammas:fractional-literal-take2

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@nchammas

@nchammasnchammas commented Feb 5, 2024

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What changes were proposed in this pull request?

Provide examples showing what type literals like 123.456 and 123.456E0 have in SQL.

Why are the changes needed?

In Python (and I think Java too) fractional numeric literals are typically floats. To get decimals, you need to provide an explicit postfix or use an explicit class. In Spark, it's the other way around. I found this surprising and couldn't find documentation about it.

I discovered this after reading SPARK-45786. I did a little searching and came across #10796, which shows that we used to default to floats as the fractional numeric literal, but then switched to decimals.

There is an additional wrinkle I discovered in #45003. If the fractional literal has an exponent, then it's a double, not a decimal.

The existing syntax documents this, but that alone is not user-friendly. The new examples make this clearer.

Does this PR introduce any user-facing change?

Yes, it clarifies the user-facing documentation about fractional numeric literals.

How was this patch tested?

No testing.

Was this patch authored or co-authored using generative AI tooling?

No.

@nchammas

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cc @yaooqinn@HyukjinKwon

Comment threaddocs/sql-ref-literals.md Outdated
@nchammasnchammas changed the title [MINOR][DOCS] Document default fractional numeric literals in SQL[MINOR][DOCS] Clarify docs on default fractional numeric literals in SQLFeb 5, 2024
@yaooqinn

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Thanks, merged to master

@nchammas
nchammas deleted the fractional-literal-take2 branch February 6, 2024 04:48
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@nchammas@yaooqinn@HyukjinKwon