Django and PostgreSQL - value too long for type character varying(512)

Question

I am migrating from a test SQLite database to a PostgreSQL database.

I have a sample object that is inserted in the database, that worked on SQLite but is giving me an error in PostgreSQL.

Code snippet is:

car = CarItem.objects.create(
    user = motor_trend,
    name = 'Camaro 2010',
    category = cars,
    condition = 'Used',
    price = '28,547.00',
    production_year = '2010',
    color_interior = 'Black',
    color_exterior = 'Inferno Orange Metallic',
    reference = 'PRC17288',
    location_of_creation = 'Undisclosed',
    location_current = 'Columbus, OH, USA',
    description = 'GORGEOUS ORANGE SS!!',
)
car.save()

I am getting a:

DatabaseError at /create/
value too long for type character varying(512)

Traceback
(...)
    description = 'GORGEOUS ORANGE SS!!',
(...)

The description field of my model has a 512 max char length:

description = models.CharField(max_length=512,default='')

But there is no way that string is over 512 bytes.

I have read previous posts about this error, one referring to the encoding. Does not appear to be the case.

I am hosted on Webfaction. I created a database, with utf-8 encoding, and proceeded to use syncdb. Syncdb worked perfectly but now this object insertion fails.

Can somebody give some input? Thank you.

Erwin Brandstetter · Accepted Answer · 2012-01-07T18:02:03.170

4

After some digging in the Django documentation:

Character fields

Any fields that are stored with VARCHAR column types have their max_length restricted to 255 characters if you are using unique=True for the field.

Emphasis mine. Do you have unique=True for the field? This is a Django restriction, PostgreSQL wouldn't mind. You might want to switch to data type text. TextField in Django parlance.

Old ideas:

user is a reserved word in PostgreSQL and any SQL standard. Don't use it as column name.

You could use it, if you enclosed it in double quotes, but stay away from that folly. Just don't use reserved words for identifiers. Ever.

Also ...

user = motor_trend,
name = 'Camaro 2010',
category = cars,

Any particular reason why motor_trend and cars are not quoted like the other values? Foreign keys, like @Ignacio commented?

edited Jan 07 '12 at 18:02

answered Jan 07 '12 at 05:45

Erwin Brandstetter

605,456
145
1,078
1,228

Because they're foreign keys. And Django's ORM probably quotes the field names properly. – Ignacio Vazquez-Abrams Jan 07 '12 at 05:57
Yes, those are Django variables defined previously, some strings, other objects. However, is this related to the description problem? Is the fact I have a user field causing the description problem? – Jan 07 '12 at 14:38
@VascoPatricio: No obvious connection to the problem, no. As there was nothing obvious I was hunting for anything suspicious. I dug into the manual and think I found something now. Amended my answer, have a look. – Erwin Brandstetter Jan 07 '12 at 17:54
Thank you for the tip. It does make more sense to use a TextField rather than a CharField for long text fields. I will try this and report back. – Jan 07 '12 at 19:07

Django and PostgreSQL - value too long for type character varying(512)

1 Answers1

Linked