Suppose I have the following table named "metrics": metric_type | val ------------+----- 0 | 1 0 | 1 1 | 0 1 | 3 Now suppose I run the following simple query: select metric_type, case metric_type when 0 then sum (1 / val) when 1 then sum (val) end as result from metrics group by metric_type I expect to get the following result set: metric_type | result ------------+------- 0 | 2 1 | 3 But in reality I get the following error: ERROR: division by zero SQL state: 22012 So it appears that Postgres executes all cases and select the result in the end. Is this expected behavior? Thanks - Jimmy ---------------------------(end of broadcast)--------------------------- TIP 1: if posting/reading through Usenet, please send an appropriate subscribe-nomail command to majordomo@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx so that your message can get through to the mailing list cleanly