From c319efc2282a582f86fbd3ee4950af2fe99c2e75 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: jbranchaud <jbranchaud@gmail.com>
Date: Fri, 25 Sep 2015 23:56:38 -0500
Subject: [PATCH] Add Integers In Postgres as a postgres til.

---
 README.md                        |  1 +
 postgres/integers-in-postgres.md | 32 ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
 2 files changed, 33 insertions(+)
 create mode 100644 postgres/integers-in-postgres.md

diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
index 3262b16..6d65c6c 100644
--- a/README.md
+++ b/README.md
@@ -79,6 +79,7 @@ smart people at [Hashrocket](http://hashrocket.com/).
 - [Extracting Nested JSON Data](postgres/extracting-nested-json-data.md)
 - [Fizzbuzz With Common Table Expressions](postgres/fizzbuzz-with-common-table-expressions.md)
 - [Generate Series Of Numbers](postgres/generate-series-of-numbers.md)
+- [Integers In Postgres](postgres/integers-in-postgres.md)
 - [Intervals Of Time By Week](postgres/intervals-of-time-by-week.md)
 - [Limit Execution Time Of Statements](postgres/limit-execution-time-of-statements.md)
 - [List All Columns Of A Specific Type](postgres/list-all-columns-of-a-specific-type.md)
diff --git a/postgres/integers-in-postgres.md b/postgres/integers-in-postgres.md
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..610f664
--- /dev/null
+++ b/postgres/integers-in-postgres.md
@@ -0,0 +1,32 @@
+# Integers In Postgres
+
+Postgres has three kinds of integers. Or rather three sizes of integers.
+There are `smallint` (`int2`), `integer` (`int4`), and `bigint` (`int8`)
+integers. As you might expect, they are 2 byte, 4 byte, and 8 byte integers
+respectively. They are also signed integers. All of this has implications
+for what ranges of integers can be represented by each type.
+
+The `smallint` integers have 2 bytes to use, so they can be used to
+represent integers from -32768 to +32767.
+
+The `integer` integers have 4 bytes to use, so they can be used to represent
+integers from -2147483648 to +2147483647.
+
+The `bigint` integers have 8 bytes to use, so they can be used to represent
+integers from -9223372036854775808 to +9223372036854775807.
+
+Though columns can be restricted to use a particular-sized integer, postgres
+is smart enough to default to `integer` and only use `bigint` as necessary
+when working with integers on the fly.
+
+```sql
+> select pg_typeof(55);
+ pg_typeof
+-----------
+ integer
+
+> select pg_typeof(99999999999999999);
+ pg_typeof
+-----------
+ bigint
+```