generate static unique number from a string in sql - sql

Question

I have a view to maintain a componentid and componentname.
CREATE VIEW [dbo].[vDimNIS]
AS
SELECT
IndicatorID as TINYINT
IndicatorName as varchar(20)
FROM (
VALUES
(1,ant),
(2,bat),
(3,cat)
)AS Nis (IndicatorID , IndicatorName)
I would like to have an unique static IndicatorID for this table. What is the best to achieve this.

Answer 1

i assume you would like this view to eventually point to a table, e.g. DimNis, where all your entries have an indicatorid. the easiest way i know to achieve this would be to use an identitiy. this way each time you insert a new indicatorname into your table, a new indicatorid will be issued:
create table DimNis
( indicatorid tinyint identity(1,1) not null
, indicatorname varchar(20));
insert into DimNis
( indicatorname )
values
('ant');
insert into DimNis
( indicatorname )
values
('bat');
insert into DimNis
( indicatorname )
values
('cat');
select * from DimNis;
i hope this settles your issue.

Answer 2

If you add an identity column to your table (as suggested by Brett), the id will be autogenerated.
If you want to generate it on the fly, you can use ROW_NUMBER() that will give you a incremented number like identity, or you can use the hash function CHECKSUM that will compute an integer but may be with collisions.
The code with both Ids:
if object_id('vdimnis') is not null
drop view vDimNis
go
CREATE VIEW [dbo].[vDimNIS]
AS
SELECT
row_number() over (order by IndicatorName) as IndicatorId,
checksum(IndicatorName) as ChecksumId,
cast( IndicatorName as varchar(20) ) as IndicatorName
FROM ( VALUES
('ant'),
('bat'),
('cat')
) AS Nis ( IndicatorName)
go
select * from vDimNis