<varlistentry id="ecpg-pgtypes-numeric-to-long">
     <term><function>PGTYPESnumeric_to_long</function></term>
     <listitem>
      <para>
       Convert a variable of type numeric to long.
<synopsis>
int PGTYPESnumeric_to_long(numeric *nv, long *lp);
</synopsis>
       The function converts the numeric value from the variable that
       <literal>nv</literal> points to into the long integer variable that
       <literal>lp</literal> points to. It returns 0 on success and -1 if an error
       occurs, including overflow and underflow. On overflow, the global variable
       <literal>errno</literal> will be set to <literal>PGTYPES_NUM_OVERFLOW</literal>
       and on underflow <literal>errno</literal> will be set to
       <literal>PGTYPES_NUM_UNDERFLOW</literal>.
      </para>
     </listitem>
    </varlistentry>

    <varlistentry id="ecpg-pgtypes-numeric-to-decimal">
     <term><function>PGTYPESnumeric_to_decimal</function></term>
     <listitem>
      <para>
       Convert a variable of type numeric to decimal.
<synopsis>
int PGTYPESnumeric_to_decimal(numeric *src, decimal *dst);
</synopsis>
       The function converts the numeric value from the variable that
       <literal>src</literal> points to into the decimal variable that
       <literal>dst</literal> points to. It returns 0 on success and -1 if an error
       occurs, including overflow. On overflow, the global variable
       <literal>errno</literal> will be set to <literal>PGTYPES_NUM_OVERFLOW</literal>
       additionally.
      </para>
     </listitem>
    </varlistentry>

    <varlistentry id="ecpg-pgtypes-numeric-from-decimal">
     <term><function>PGTYPESnumeric_from_decimal</function></term>
     <listitem>
      <para>
       Convert a variable of type decimal to numeric.
<synopsis>
int PGTYPESnumeric_from_decimal(decimal *src, numeric *dst);
</synopsis>
       The function converts the decimal value from the variable that
       <literal>src</literal> points to into the numeric variable that
       <literal>dst</literal> points to. It returns 0 on success and -1 if an error
       occurs. Since the decimal type is implemented as a limited version of
       the numeric type, overflow cannot occur with this conversion.
      </para>
     </listitem>
    </varlistentry>
   </variablelist>
   </para>
  </sect2>

  <sect2 id="ecpg-pgtypes-date">
   <title>The date Type</title>
   <para>
    The date type in C enables your programs to deal with data of the SQL type
    date. See <xref linkend="datatype-datetime"/> for the equivalent type in the
    <productname>PostgreSQL</productname> server.
   </para>
   <para>
    The following functions can be used to work with the date type:
    <variablelist>
     <varlistentry id="pgtypesdatefromtimestamp">
      <term><function>PGTYPESdate_from_timestamp</function></term>
      <listitem>
       <para>
        Extract the date part from a timestamp.
<synopsis>
date PGTYPESdate_from_timestamp(timestamp dt);
</synopsis>
        The function receives a timestamp as its only argument and returns the
        extracted date part from this timestamp.
       </para>
      </listitem>
     </varlistentry>

     <varlistentry id="pgtypesdatefromasc">
      <term><function>PGTYPESdate_from_asc</function></term>
      <listitem>
       <para>
       Parse a date from its textual representation.
<synopsis>
date PGTYPESdate_from_asc(char *str, char **endptr);
</synopsis>
        The function receives a C char* string <literal>str</literal> and a pointer to
        a C char* string <literal>endptr</literal>. At the moment ECPG always parses
        the complete string and so it currently does not support to store the
        address of the first invalid character in <literal>*endptr</literal>.
        You can safely set <literal>endptr</literal> to NULL.
       </para>
       <para>
        Note that the function always assumes MDY-formatted dates and there is
        currently no variable to change that within ECPG.
       </para>