[postgis-users] addgeometrycolumn() does not exist

[Aaron Steele]

dear readers,

i'm running postgresql 7.4.2 with postgis 0.8.1 on linux redhat 8.

i successfully converted a shapefile (cnty24k97.shp from  
http://gis.ca.gov/BrowseCatalog.epl) into sql (shp2pgsql cnty24k97.shp  
counties mapitdb > counties.sql). while uploading it to my database  
(psql -d mapitdb -f counties.sql), i get this error:

<error>
psql:counties.sql:1: ERROR:  syntax error at or near "#" at character 76
psql:counties.sql:2: ERROR:  function addgeometrycolumn("unknown",  
"unknown", "unknown", integer, "unknown", integer) does not exist
HINT:  No function matches the given name and argument types. You may  
need to add explicit type casts.
BEGIN
...
psql:counties.sql:174: ERROR:  syntax error at or near "#" at character  
51
psql:counties.sql:175: ERROR:  syntax error at or near "#" at character  
51
COMMIT
psql:counties.sql:176: ERROR:  relation "counties" does not exist
psql:counties.sql:177: ERROR:  relation "counties_gid_seq" does not  
exist
</error>

here is a snippit from the converted shapefile:

<snippit>
CREATE TABLE counties (gid serial, AREA float8, PERIMETER float8,  
CNTY24K97# int4, CNTY24K97- int4, NAME varchar, NAME_CAP varchar, NUM  
int4, FIPS_CODE int4);
select  
AddGeometryColumn('','counties','the_geom','-1','MULTIPOLYGON',2);
begin;
Insert into counties  
(gid,AREA,PERIMETER,CNTY24K97#,CNTY24K97- 
,NAME,NAME_CAP,NUM,FIPS_CODE,the_geom)  
values('0','2625844992.000000','306174.219000','2','3','Del Norte','DEL  
NORTE','8','15',GeometryFromText('MULTIPOLYGON(((-346072.6875  
440055.6875 ,-346105.3125 440068.65625 ,-346134.65625 440091.03125  
,-346175.34375 440118.75 ,-346328.84375 440208.3125 ,-346462.90625  
440279.8125 ,-346547.65625 440322.875 ,-346624.65625 440345.6875  
,-346687.46875 440362.0625 ,-346797.8125 440381.90625 ,-346850.78125  
440393 ,-346927.84375 440413.84375 ,-346956.21875 440425.6875  
,-347058.15625 440439.78125 ,-347101.46875 440440.09375 ,-347178.28125  
440433.4375 ,-347243.34375 440432.40625 ,-347343.28125 440426.46875  
,-347395.28125 440426.03125 ,-347449.1875 440415.6875 ,-347486.875  
440412.34375 ,-347517.9375 440396.8125 ,-347558.875 440385.0625  
,-347583.40625 440385.812...
</snippit>

any thoughts?

thanks,
aaron