diff -ruN htdocs.orig/include/database/PearDatabase.php htdocs/include/database/PearDatabase.php
--- htdocs.orig/include/database/PearDatabase.php	2007-05-11 02:17:06.000000000 +0200
+++ htdocs/include/database/PearDatabase.php	2007-05-11 02:55:29.000000000 +0200
@@ -434,6 +434,31 @@
 	return $this->change_key_case($result->FetchRow());
     }
 
+    function sql_concat($list)
+    {
+	switch ($this->dbType)
+	{
+	    case 'mysql':
+		return 'concat('.implode(',',$list).')';
+	    case 'pgsql':
+		return '('.implode('||',$list).')';
+	    default:
+		throw new Exception("unsupported dbtype \"".$this->dbType."\"");
+	}
+    }	
+
+    function run_query_field($sql)
+    {
+	$this->checkConnection();
+	$result = $this->database->Execute($sql);
+    
+	if (!is_object($result))
+	    throw new Exception("query failed: $sql");
+
+	$row = $result->FetchRow();
+	return array_shift($row);
+    }
+	
     /* ADODB newly added. replacement for mysql_result() */
     function query_result(&$result, $row, $col=0)
     {