TRIGGERS using HR database - sql

I want to create a trigger “Salary_Not_Decrease” to ensure that the salary of an employee is not decreased during update of table Employee.
Please advise on how to start with creating such trigger.
I wrote the following code but not sure about it
CREATE OR REPLACE TRIGGER Salary_Not_Decrease
BEFORE INSERT OR UPDATE
ON employees
FOR EACH ROW
BEGIN
if :new.salary < :old.salary then
RAISE_APPLICATION_ERROR(-20001,'Salary should not be decreased ') ;
end if;
END;
Please advise

Your question indicates you want to prevent reductions in salary. You can't prevent a reduction in salary when there is no salary to reduce, so having this as a before insert trigger doesn't make sense. Make it just a before update trigger and you should be good to go also as pointed out in the comments you should check for nulls:
CREATE OR REPLACE TRIGGER Salary_Not_Decrease
BEFORE UPDATE
ON employees
FOR EACH ROW
BEGIN
if coalesce(:new.salary,:old.salary-1,0) < nvl(:old.salary,0) then
RAISE_APPLICATION_ERROR(-20001,'Salary should not be decreased ') ;
end if;
END;
Still reading the Documentation on triggers is a good place to learn more.

Related

Oracle trigger error ORA-04091

I get an error (ORA-04091: table DBPROJEKT_AKTIENDEPOT.AKTIE is mutating, trigger/function may not see it) when executing my trigger:
CREATE OR REPLACE TRIGGER Aktien_Bilanz_Berechnung
AFTER
INSERT OR UPDATE OF TAGESKURS
OR INSERT OR UPDATE OF WERT_BEIM_EINKAUF
ON AKTIE
FOR EACH ROW
DECLARE
bfr number;
Begin
bfr := :new.TAGESKURS - :new.WERT_BEIM_EINKAUF;
UPDATE AKTIE
SET BILANZ = TAGESKURS - WERT_BEIM_EINKAUF;
IF bfr < -50
THEN
DBMS_OUTPUT.PUT_LINE('ACHTUNG: The value (Nr: '||:new.AKTIEN_NR||') is very low!');
END IF;
END;
I want to check the value "BILANZ" after calculating it, wether it is under -50.
Do you have any idea why this error is thrown?
Thanks for any help!
There are several issues here:
Oracle does not allow you to perform a SELECT/INSERT/UPDATE/DELETE against a table within a row trigger defined on that table or any code called from such a trigger, which is why an error occurred at run time. There are ways to work around this - for example, you can read my answers to this question and this question - but in general you will have to avoid accessing the table on which a row trigger is defined from within the trigger.
The calculation which is being performed in this trigger is what is referred to as business logic and should not be performed in a trigger. Putting logic such as this in a trigger, no matter how convenient it may seem to be, will end up being very confusing to anyone who has to maintain this code because the value of BILANZ is changed where someone who is reading the application code's INSERT or UPDATE statement can't see it. This calculation should be performed in the INSERT or UPDATE statement, not in a trigger. It considered good practice to define a procedure to perform INSERT/UPDATE/DELETE operations on a table so that all such calculations can be captured in one place, instead of being spread out throughout your code base.
Within a BEFORE ROW trigger you can modify the values of the fields in the :NEW row variable to change values before they're written to the database. There are times that this is acceptable, such as when setting columns which track when and by whom a row was last changed, but in general it's considered a bad idea.
Best of luck.
You are modifying the table with the trigger. Use a before update trigger:
CREATE OR REPLACE TRIGGER Aktien_Bilanz_Berechnung
BEFORE INSERT OR UPDATE OF TAGESKURS OR INSERT OR UPDATE OF WERT_BEIM_EINKAUF
ON AKTIE
FOR EACH ROW
DECLARE
v_bfr number;
BEGIN
v_bfr := :new.TAGESKURS - :new.WERT_BEIM_EINKAUF;
:new.BILANZ := v_bfr;
IF v_bfr < -50 THEN
Raise_Application_Error(-20456,'ACHTUNG: The value (Nr: '|| :new.AKTIEN_NR || ') is very low!');
END IF;
END;

Using trigger to update a value

How do I write a simple trigger to check when salary is updated it is not over 5% for an existing faculty member.
I have a block of code here.
create or replace TRIGGER TRG_Not_over_5per
BEFORE UPDATE OF F_SALARY ON FACULTY
DECLARE
sal FACULTY.F_SALARY%TYPE;
BEGIN
SELECT FACULTY.F_SALARY INTO sal FROM FACULTY
-- how do I use the WHERE CLAUSE here so that I get the salary affected
-- do some math on the first and second salary
-- if less than 5%, keep update, if not, reject update.
END;
Thanks in advance.
You don't need to use a SELECT in the trigger (*). Define the trigger as FOR EACH ROW and you can have access to the old and new values of any column belonging to the table.
create or replace TRIGGER TRG_Not_over_5per
BEFORE UPDATE OF F_SALARY ON FACULTY
FOR EACH ROW
So your code would look like:
if :new.f_salary < :old.f_salary * 1.05 then
raise_application_error (
-20000
, 'salary increase must be at least 5%'
);
end if;
This way of handling the rule violation is just a suggestion. You do whatever you need to. You don't need to handle the ELSE branch: Oracle will apply the update by default.
(*) In fact Oracle will hurl a mutating table exception if you do try to execute the query you want to write. Find out more.

Count(*) not working properly

I create the trigger A1 so that an article with a certain type, that is 'Bert' cannot be added more than once and it can have only 1 in the stock.
However, although i create the trigger, i can still add an article with the type 'Bert'. Somehow, the count returns '0' but when i run the same sql statement, it returns the correct number. It also starts counting properly if I drop the trigger and re-add it. Any ideas what might be going wrong?
TRIGGER A1 BEFORE INSERT ON mytable
FOR EACH ROW
DECLARE
l_count NUMBER;
PRAGMA AUTONOMOUS_TRANSACTION;
BEGIN
SELECT COUNT(*) INTO l_count FROM mytable WHERE article = :new.article;
dbms_output.put_line('Count: ' || l_count);
IF l_count >0 THEN
IF(:new.TYPEB = 'Bert') THEN
dbms_output.put_line('article already exists!');
ROLLBACK;
END IF;
ELSIF (:new.TYPEB = 'Bert' AND :new.stock_count>1) THEN
dbms_output.put_line('stock cannot have more than 1 of this article with type Bert');
ROLLBACK;
END IF;
END;
This is the insert statement I use:
INSERT INTO mytable VALUES('Chip',1,9,1,'Bert');
A couple of points. First, you are misusing the autonomous transaction pragma. It is meant for separate transactions you need to commit or rollback independently of the main transaction. You are using it to rollback the main transaction -- and you never commit if there is no error.
And those "unforeseen consequences" someone mentioned? One of them is that your count always returns 0. So remove the pragma both because it is being misused and so the count will return a proper value.
Another thing is don't have commits or rollbacks within triggers. Raise an error and let the controlling code do what it needs to do. I know the rollbacks were because of the pragma. Just don't forget to remove them when you remove the pragma.
The following trigger works for me:
CREATE OR REPLACE TRIGGER trg_mytable_biu
BEFORE INSERT OR UPDATE ON mytable
FOR EACH ROW
WHEN (NEW.TYPEB = 'Bert') -- Don't even execute unless this is Bert
DECLARE
L_COUNT NUMBER;
BEGIN
SELECT COUNT(*) INTO L_COUNT
FROM MYTABLE
WHERE ARTICLE = :NEW.ARTICLE
AND TYPEB = :NEW.TYPEB;
IF L_COUNT > 0 THEN
RAISE_APPLICATION_ERROR( -20001, 'Bert already exists!' );
ELSIF :NEW.STOCK_COUNT > 1 THEN
RAISE_APPLICATION_ERROR( -20001, 'Can''t insert more than one Bert!' );
END IF;
END;
However, it's not a good idea for a trigger on a table to separately access that table. Usually the system won't even allow it -- this trigger won't execute at all if changed to "after". If it is allowed to execute, one can never be sure of the results obtained -- as you already found out. Actually, I'm a little surprised the trigger above works. I would feel uneasy using it in a real database.
The best option when a trigger must access the target table is to hide the table behind a view and write an "instead of" trigger on the view. That trigger can access the table all it wants.
You need to do an AFTER trigger, not a BEFORE trigger. Doing a count(*) "BEFORE" the insert occurs results in zero rows because the data hasn't been inserted yet.

PL/SQL Triggers Library Infotainment System

I am trying to make a Library Infotainment System using PL/SQL. Before any of you speculate, yes it is a homework assignment but I've tried hard and asking a question here only after trying hard enough.
Basically, I have few tables, two of which are:
Issue(Bookid, borrowerid, issuedate, returndate) and
Borrower(borrowerid, name, status).
The status in Borrower table can be either 'student' or 'faculty'. I have to implement a restriction using trigger, that per student, I can issue only 2 books at any point of time and per faculty, 3 books at any point of time.
I am totally new to PL/SQL. It might be easy, and I have an idea of how to do it. This is the best I could do. Please help me in finding design/compiler errors.
CREATE OR REPLACE TRIGGER trg_maxbooks
AFTER INSERT ON ISSUE
FOR EACH ROW
DECLARE
BORROWERCOUNT INTEGER;
SORF VARCHAR2(20);
BEGIN
SELECT COUNT(*) INTO BORROWERCOUNT
FROM ISSUE
WHERE BORROWER_ID = :NEW.BORROWER_ID;
SELECT STATUS INTO SORF
FROM BORROWER
WHERE BORROWER_ID = :NEW.BORROWER_ID;
IF ((BORROWERCOUNT=2 AND SORF='STUDENT')
OR (BORROWERCOUNT=3 AND SORF='FACULTY')) THEN
ROLLBACK TRANSACTION;
END IF;
END;
Try something like this:
CREATE OR REPLACE TRIGGER TRG_MAXBOOKS
BEFORE INSERT
ON ISSUE
FOR EACH ROW
BEGIN
IF ( :NEW.BORROWERCOUNT > 2
AND :NEW.SORF = 'STUDENT' )
OR ( :NEW.BORROWERCOUNT > 3
AND :NEW.SORF = 'FACULTY' )
THEN
RAISE_APPLICATION_ERROR (
-20001,
'Cannot issue beyond the limit, retry as per the limit' );
END IF;
END;
/
There should not be a commit or rollback inside a trigger. The logical exception is equivalent to ROLLBACK
This is so ugly I can't believe you're being asked to do something like this. Triggers are one of the worst ways to implement business logic. They will often fail utterly when confronted with more than one user. They are also hard to debug because they have hard-to-anticipate side effects.
In your example for instance what happens if two people insert at the same time? (hint: they won't see the each other's modification until they both commit, nice way to generate corrupt data :)
Furthermore, as you are probably aware, you can't reference other rows of a table inside a row level trigger (this will raise a mutating error).
That being said, in your case you could use an extra column in Borrower to record the number of books being borrowed. You'll have to make sure that the trigger correctly updates this value. This will also take care of the multi-user problem since as you know only one session can update a single row at the same time. So only one person could update a borrower's count at the same time.
This should help you with the insert trigger (you'll also need a delete trigger and to be on the safe side an update trigger in case someone updates Issue.borrowerid):
CREATE OR REPLACE TRIGGER issue_borrower_trg
AFTER INSERT ON issue
FOR EACH ROW
DECLARE
l_total_borrowed NUMBER;
l_status borrower.status%type;
BEGIN
SELECT nvl(total_borrowed, 0) + 1, status
INTO l_total_borrowed, l_status
FROM borrower
WHERE borrower_id = :new.borrower_id
FOR UPDATE;
-- business rule
IF l_status = 'student' and l_total_borrowed >= 3
/* OR faculty */ THEN
raise_application_error(-20001, 'limit reached!');
END IF;
UPDATE borrower
SET total_borrowed = l_total_borrowed
WHERE borrower_id = :new.borrower_id;
END;
Update: the above approach won't even work in your case because you record the issue date/return date in the issue table so the number of books borrowed is not a constant over time. In that case I would go with a table-level POST-DML trigger. After each DML verify that every row in the table validates your business rules (it won't scale nicely though, for a solution that scales, see this post by Tom Kyte).

Oracle SQL Trigger

I want to prevent the database from storing any values bigger than 20 into a table.
CREATE OR REPLACE TRIGGER Dont_Allow
AFTER INSERT ON Cities
FOR EACH ROW
WHEN (new.IDCity > 20)
BEGIN
dbms_output.put_line(' Failed to insert ' || :new.IDCity);
delete from orase where IDCity=:new.IDCity;
END;
While this does work in terms of not actually adding anything with an ID > 20, every time the trigger tries to do its magic, this shows up:
ORA-04091: table SYSTEM.ORASE is mutating, trigger/function may not see it
ORA-06512: at "SYSTEM.DONT_ALLOW", line 6
ORA-04088: error during execution of trigger 'SYSTEM.DONT_ALLOW'
What's a proper way of doing what I want?
EDIT:
I've decided to use a trigger for this:
After a new row is inserted into Employees, a trigger checks the new guy's salary and if it's above 21 units / hour, it takes 5% off management's bonus. Lame, but hey - I'm using a trigger to solve a problem I don't have: the outcome won't be pretty.
CREATE OR REPLACE TRIGGER Bite_Bonus
AFTER INSERT ON Employees
FOR EACH ROW
WHEN (new.HourSalary > 20)
BEGIN
update Management set Bonus = Bonus - 5/100 * Bonus;
END;
You shouldn't be using a TRIGGER for that, you should be using a CHECK, like CONSTRAINT city_id_below_20 CHECK (IDCity < 20). You can use ALTER TABLE ADD CONSTRAINT to put it on an existing table.
As TC1 indicated, the proper way to enforce this sort of requirement is to use a constraint.
If you are forced to use the inferior approach because this is a school assignment, you most likely want to raise an exception in your trigger
CREATE OR REPLACE TRIGGER Dont_Allow
BEFORE INSERT OR UPDATE ON Cities
FOR EACH ROW
WHEN (new.IDCity > 20)
BEGIN
RAISE_APPLICATION_ERROR( -20001, 'IDCity cannot exceed 20 so rejecting invalid value: ' || :new.IDCity );
END;
If you need to use a trigger for this, make it a BEFORE INSERT trigger, not an AFTER INSERT - you don't want that insert to happen at all. Trying to "undo" it after the fact is not a good approach.
To abort the insert, all you need to do is raise an exception within that trigger. Probably the best thing for this is to raise an application error.