ERROR: unterminated quoted string at or near - postgresql

Question

While executing below shown trigger code using ANT I am getting the error
org.postgresql.util.PSQLException: ERROR: unterminated quoted string at or near "' DECLARE timeout integer"
Position: 57
I am able to sucessfully execute the below code through PGADmin (Provided by postgres) and command line utility "psql" and the trigger function is added but while executing through ANT it fails everytime
BEGIN TRANSACTION;
CREATE OR REPLACE FUNCTION sweeper() RETURNS trigger as '
DECLARE
timeout integer;
BEGIN
timeout = 30 * 24 * 60 * 60 ;
DELETE FROM diagnosticdata WHERE current_timestamp - teststarttime > (timeout * ''1 sec''::interval);
return NEW;
END;
' LANGUAGE 'plpgsql';
-- Trigger: sweep on diagnosticdata
CREATE TRIGGER sweep
AFTER INSERT
ON diagnosticdata
FOR EACH ROW
EXECUTE PROCEDURE sweeper();
END;

Answer 1

I encountered this error in liquibase and this page was one of the first search results so I guess I share my solution at this page:
You can put your whole sql in a separate file and include this in the changeset.
Its important to set the splitStatements option to false.
The whole changeset would then look like
<changeSet author="fgrosse" id="530b61fec3ac9">
<sqlFile path="your_sql_file_here.sql" splitStatements="false"/>
</changeSet>
I always like to have those big SQL parts (like function updates and such) in separate files.
This way you get proper syntax highlighting when opening the sql file and dont have to intermix XML and SQL in one file.
Edit: as mentioned in the comments its worth noting that the sql change supports the splitStatements option as well (thx to AndreyT for pointing that out).

Answer 2

I had the same problem with the JDBC driver used by Liquibase.
It seems that the driver explodes each line ended by a semicolon and runs it as a separate SQL command. That is why the code below will be executed by the JDBC driver in the following sequence:
CREATE OR REPLACE FUNCTION test(text) RETURNS VOID AS ' DECLARE tmp text
BEGIN tmp := "test"
END;
' LANGUAGE plpgsql
Of course, this is invalid SQL and causes the following error:
unterminated dollar-quoted string at or near ' DECLARE tmp text
To correct this, you need to use backslashes after each line ended with semicolon:
CREATE OR REPLACE FUNCTION test(text)
RETURNS void AS ' DECLARE tmp text; \
BEGIN
tmp := "test"; \
END;' LANGUAGE plpgsql;
Alternatively, you can place the whole definition in one line.

Answer 3

I am using HeidiSQL client and this was solved by placing DELIMITER // before CREATE OR REPLACE statement. There is a also a 'Send batch in one go' option in HeidiSQL that essentially achieves the same thing.

Answer 4

This error arises as an interaction between the particular client used to connect to the server and the form of the function. To illustrate:
The following code will run without casualty in Netbeans 7, Squirrel, DbSchema, PgAdmin3
CREATE OR REPLACE FUNCTION author.revision_number()
RETURNS trigger AS
$BODY$
begin
new.rev := new.rev + 1;
new.revised := current_timestamp;
return new;
end;
$BODY$
LANGUAGE plpgsql VOLATILE
COST 100;
Please note that the 'begin' statement comes immediately after the '$' quoted string.
The next code will halt all the above clients except PgAdmin3.
CREATE OR REPLACE FUNCTION author.word_count()
RETURNS trigger AS
$BODY$
declare
wordcount integer := 0; -- counter for words
indexer integer := 1; -- position in the whole string
charac char(1); -- the first character of the word
prevcharac char(1);
begin
while indexer <= length(new.blab) loop
charac := substring(new.blab,indexer,1); -- first character of string
if indexer = 1 then
prevcharac := ' '; -- absolute start of counting
else
prevcharac := substring(new.blab, indexer - 1, 1); -- indexer has increased
end if;
if prevcharac = ' ' and charac != ' ' then
wordcount := wordcount + 1;
end if;
indexer := indexer + 1;
end loop;
new.words := wordcount;
return new;
end;
$BODY$
LANGUAGE plpgsql VOLATILE
COST 100;
The crucial difference in the second example is the 'declare' section. The ploy of using back-slashes raises an error with PgAdmin3.
In summary I suggest trying different tools. Some tools even though they are supposed to be writing text files put invisible stuff into the text. Notoriously this occurs with the Unicode BOM which will halt any php file that tries to implement sessions or namespaces.
Whilst this is no solution I hope it helps.

Answer 5

I had the same problem with zeos and c++ builder.
The solution in my case:
Change the property delimiter (usually ";") to another in the component (class) I used.
dm->ZSQLProcessor1->DelimiterType=sdGo;
Perhaps Ant have something similar.

Answer 6

I know this question was asked a long time ago but I had kind of the same issue with a Postgresql script (run from Jenkins) using Ant's SQL Task.
I tried to run this SQL (saved in a file named audit.sql):
DROP SCHEMA IF EXISTS audit CASCADE
;
CREATE SCHEMA IF NOT EXISTS audit AUTHORIZATION faktum
;
CREATE FUNCTION audit.extract_interval_trigger ()
RETURNS trigger AS $extractintervaltrigger$
BEGIN
NEW."last_change_ts" := current_timestamp;
NEW."last_change_by" := current_user;
RETURN NEW;
END;
$extractintervaltrigger$ LANGUAGE plpgsql
;
but got the error "unterminated dollar-quoted string". No problem running it from pgAdmin.
I found out that it is not the driver that split the script at every ";" but rather Ant.
At http://grokbase.com/t/postgresql/pgsql-jdbc/06cjx3s3y0/ant-sql-tag-for-dollar-quoting I found the answer:
Ant eats double-$$ as part of its variable processing. You have to use
$BODY$ (or similar) in the stored procs, and put the delimiter on its
own line (with delimitertype="row"). Ant will cooperate then.
My Ant SQL script looks like this and it works:
<sql
driver="org.postgresql.Driver" url="jdbc:postgresql://localhost:5432/jenkins"
userid="user" password="*****"
keepformat="true"
autocommit="true"
delimitertype="row"
encoding="utf-8"
src="audit.sql"
/>

Answer 7

This example worked for me with PostgreSQL 14.1 and HeidiSQL 9.4.0.5125
DROP TABLE IF EXISTS emp;
CREATE TABLE emp (
empname text NOT NULL,
salary integer
);
DROP TABLE IF EXISTS EMP_AUDIT;
CREATE TABLE emp_audit(
operation char(1) NOT NULL,
stamp timestamp NOT NULL,
userid text NOT NULL,
empname text NOT NULL,
salary integer
);
DELIMITER //
CREATE OR REPLACE FUNCTION process_emp_audit() RETURNS TRIGGER AS $$
BEGIN
--
-- Create a row in emp_audit to reflect the operation performed on emp,
-- make use of the special variable TG_OP to work out the operation.
--
IF (TG_OP = 'DELETE') THEN
INSERT INTO emp_audit SELECT 'D', now(), user, OLD.*;
RETURN OLD;
ELSIF (TG_OP = 'UPDATE') THEN
INSERT INTO emp_audit SELECT 'U', now(), user, NEW.*;
RETURN NEW;
ELSIF (TG_OP = 'INSERT') THEN
INSERT INTO emp_audit SELECT 'I', now(), user, NEW.*;
RETURN NEW;
END IF;
RETURN NULL; -- result is ignored since this is an AFTER trigger
END;
$$ LANGUAGE plpgsql;
DROP TRIGGER IF EXISTS emp_audit ON emp;
CREATE TRIGGER emp_audit
AFTER INSERT OR UPDATE OR DELETE ON emp
FOR EACH ROW EXECUTE PROCEDURE process_emp_audit();

Answer 8

I was receiving the same error because I had my semicolon in a new line like this:
WHERE colA is NULL
;
Make sure they are in a single line as
WHERE colA is NULL;