trigger execution against condition satisfaction - sql

I have created this trigger which should give a error, whenever the value of new rctmemenrolno of table-receipts1 is matched with the memenrolno of table- memmast, but it is giving error in both condition(it is matched or not matched).
kindly help me.
CREATE OR REPLACE TRIGGER HDD_CABLE.trg_rctenrolno
before insert ON HDD_CABLE.RECEIPTS1 for each row
declare
v_enrolno varchar2(9);
cursor c1 is select memenrolno from memmast;
begin
open c1;
fetch c1 into v_enrolno;
LOOP
If :new.rctmemenrolno<>v_enrolno
then
raise_application_error(-20186,'PLEASE ENTER CORRECT ENROLLMENT NO');
close c1;
end if;
END LOOP;
end;

You are validating whether the entered RECEIPTS1.rctmemenrolno matches a memenrolno in MEMAST, right? Well a trigger is the wrong way to do this.
The loop completely won't scale (the more rows in MEMAST the longer it will take to insert a record in RECEIPTS1). But even a direct lookup to check for the existence of the specified key will still suck. Also this approach fails to work safely in a multi-user environment because Oracle uses the READ COMMITTED isolation level. In other words while your transaction is making the check some other session is deleting the row you have just found. Which results in a corrupt database.
The one and only correct way to do this is with a foreign key constraint.
alter table receipt1
add constraint receipts1_memast_fk foreign key (rctmemenrolno)
references memast (memenrolno);
Of course, this presumes you have a primary key - or a unique constraint - on memast to enforce the uniquess of memenrolno. I fervently hope you are not trying to enforce its uniqueness through triggers.
edit
"already I have 1 primary key as MEMID on memmast table"
If there is a one-to-one relationship between MEMID and MEMENROLNO, which is common when we have a business key and a surrogate key, then the proper solution is to use the primary key on RECEIPTS1. That is, drop the column RCTMEMENROL and replace it with RCTMEMID. Then plug those column names into that alter table statement. The front end would be responsible for providing the users with a facility to lookup the MEMID for a given MEMENROLNO, such as a List Of Values widget.
A yuckier solution would be to build a unique constraint on MEMAST.MEMENROLNO. That is not advisable because using natural keys to enforce foreign keys is a bad idea, and utterly mad when the table in question already has a synthetic primary key.
If there isn't a one-to-one relationship between MEMID and MEMENROLNO then I don't know what the purpose of the check is. A query on MEMAST can assert the existence of a given MEMENROLNO now but without a foreign key it can say nothing about the state of the database in five minutes time. So why bother with the check at all?

It looks like you're looping through all possible values of memenrolno and making sure the new value matches every possible value, which will always be false when there is more than one possible memenrolno.
Try this instead.
CREATE OR REPLACE TRIGGER HDD_CABLE.trg_rctenrolno
before insert ON HDD_CABLE.RECEIPTS1 for each row
begin
If NOT EXISTS SELECT 1 FROM memast WHERE memenrolno = :new.rctmemenrolno
then
raise_application_error(-20186,'PLEASE ENTER CORRECT ENROLLMENT NO');
end if;
end;

Related

Prohibit users from updating a column if another column is null?

I have mytable which has 3 integer fields: id, status, project_id.
I've told people that they should not progress status past 4 before assigning it a project_id value. Naturally people don't listen and then there are problems down the road.
Is there a way to return an error if someone tries to update from status 4 to 5 while project_id column is null? I still need people to be able to update status from 2 or 3 to status 4 regardless of it having a project_id.
You can use CHECK constraint as suggested by #stickbit if you need very simple checks.
If you need a more complicated logic, you can use TRIGGER functionality
CREATE FUNCTION check_status()
RETURNS trigger AS
$mytrigger$
BEGIN
IF OLD.status = 4 AND NEW.status >= 5 AND NEW.project_id IS NULL THEN
RAISE EXCEPTION 'Project ID must be assigned before progressing to status 5';
END IF;
RETURN NEW;
END
$mytrigger$
LANGUAGE plpgsql;
CREATE TRIGGER project_id_check
BEFORE UPDATE ON "MyTable"
FOR EACH ROW EXECUTE PROCEDURE check_status();
How about a check constraint on the table:
CHECK (project_id IS NOT NULL OR status < 5)
If you have data violating your desired rules, you can still use a CHECK constraint like demonstrated by sticky bit. Just make it NOT VALID:
ALTER TABLE mytable ADD CONSTRAINT project_id_required_for_status_5_or_higher
CHECK project_id IS NOT NULL OR status < 5) NOT VALID;
Then the constraint is only applied to subsequent inserts and updates. Existing rows are ignored. (But any new update must fix violating values or it will fail.)
You should also have a FOREIGN KEY constraint enforcing referential integrity for project_id, else the constraint can easily be circumvented with dummy values.
Fine point: a CHECK constraint not only prohibits the updates you mentioned, but inserts with a violating state as well.
Once all rows are fixed to comply with the new rule, you can VALIDATE the constraint:
ALTER TABLE mytable VALIDATE CONSTRAINT project_id_required_for_status_5_or_higher;
More:
Trigger vs. check constraint

How to make trigger on two tables?

I have a two tables which insert using jdbc. For example its parcelsTable and filesTableAnd i have some cases:
1. INSERT new row in both tables.
2. INSERT new row only in parcelsTable.
TABLES:
DROP parcelsTable;
CREATE TABLE(
num serial PRIMARY KEY,
parcel_name text,
filestock_id integer
)
DROP filesTable;
CREATE TABLE(
num serial PRIMARY KEY,
file_name text,
files bytea
)
I want to set parcelsTable.filestock_id=filesTable.num when i have INSERT in both tables using TRIGGER.
Its possible? How to know that i insert in both tables?
You don't need to use a trigger to get the foreign key value in this case. Since you have it set as serial you can access the latest value using currval. Run something like this this from your app:
insert into filesTable (file_name, files) select 'f1', 'asdf';
insert into parcelsTable (parcel_name, filestock_id) select 'p1', currval('filesTable_num_seq');
Note that this should only be used when inserting one record at a time to grab individual key values from currval. I'm calling the default sequence name of table_column_seq, which you should be able to use unless you've explicitly declared something different.
I would also recommend explicitly declaring nullability and the relationship:
CREATE TABLE parcelsTable (
...
filestock_id integer NULL REFERENCES filesTable (num)
);
Here is a working demo at SqlFiddle.
This might not be an answer, but it may be what you need. I am making this an answer instead of a comment because I need the space.
I don't know if you can have a trigger on two tables. Typically this is not needed. As in your case, typically either you are creating a parent record and a child record, or you are just creating a child record of an existing record.
So, typically, if you need a trigger when creating both, it is sufficient to put the trigger on the parent record.
I don't think you can do what you need. What you are trying to do is populate the foreign key with the parent record primary key in the same transaction. I don't think you can do that. I think you will have to provide the foreign key in the insert for parcelsTable.
You will end up leaving this NULL when you are creating a record in the parcelsTable at times when you are not creating a record in filesTable. So I think you will want to set the foreign key in the INSERT statement.
Only idea I've got by now is that you can create function that do indirect insert to the tables. then you can have whatever condition you need, with parallel inserts too.

Oracle Unique Constraint - Trigger to check value of property in new relation

Hi I'm having trouble getting my sql syntax correct. I want to create a unique constraint that looks at the newly added foreign key, looks at some properties of the newly related entity to decided if the relationship is allowed.
CREATE or replace TRIGGER "New_Trigger"
AFTER INSERT OR UPDATE ON "Table_1"
FOR EACH ROW
BEGIN
Select "Table_2"."number"
(CASE "Table_2"."number" > 0
THEN RAISE_APPLICATION_ERROR(-20000, 'this is not allowed');
END)
from "Table_1"
WHERE "Table_2"."ID" = :new.FK_Table_2_ID
END;
Edit: APC answer is wonderfully comprehensive, however leads me to think im doing it in the wrong way.
The situation is I have a table of people with different privilege levels, and I want to check these privilege levels, e.g. A user, 'Bob', has low level privileges and he tries to become head of department which requires requires high privileges so the system prevents this happening.
There is a follow-up question which poses a related scenario but with a different data model. Find it here.
So the rule you want to enforce is that TABLE_1 can only reference TABLE_2 if some column in TABLE_2 is zero or less. Hmmm.... Let's sort out the trigger logic and then we'll discuss the rule.
The trigger should look like this:
CREATE or replace TRIGGER "New_Trigger"
AFTER INSERT OR UPDATE ON "Table_1"
FOR EACH ROW
declare
n "Table_2"."number".type%;
BEGIN
Select "Table_2"."number"
into n
from "Table_2"
WHERE "Table_2"."ID" = :new.FK_Table_2_ID;
if n > 0
THEN RAISE_APPLICATION_ERROR(-20000, 'this is not allowed');
end if;
END;
Note that your error message should include some helpful information such as the value of the TABLE_1 primary key, for when you are inserting or updating multiple rows on the table.
What you are trying to do here is to enforce a type of constraint known as an ASSERTION. Assertions are specified in the ANSI standard but Oracle has not implemented them. Nor has any other RDBMS, come to that.
Assertions are problematic because they are symmetrical. That is, the rule also needs to be enforced on TABLE_2. At the moment you check the rule when a record is created in TABLE_1. Suppose at some later time a user updates TABLE_2.NUMBER so it is greater than zero: your rule is now broken, but you won't know that it is broken until somebody issues a completely unrelated UPDATE on TABLE_1, which will then fail. Yuck.
So, what to do?
If the rule is actually
TABLE_1 can only reference TABLE_2 if
TABLE_2.NUMBER is zero
then you can enforce it without triggers.
Add a UNIQUE constraint on TABLE_2 for (ID, NUMBER); you need an additional constraint because ID remains the primary key for TABLE_2.
Add a dummy column on TABLE_1 called TABLE_2_NUMBER. Default it to zero and have a check constraint to ensure it is always zero. (If you are on 11g you should consider using a virtual column for this.)
Change the foreign key on TABLE_1 so (FK_Table_2_ID, TABLE_2_NUMBER) references the unique constraint rather than TABLE_2's primary key.
Drop the "New_Trigger" trigger; you don't need it anymore as the foreign key will prevent anybody updating TABLE_2.NUMBER to a value other than zero.
But if the rule is really as I formulated it at the top i.e.
TABLE_1 can only reference TABLE_2 if
TABLE_2.NUMBER is not greater than zero (i.e. negative values are okay)
then you need another trigger, this time on TABLE_2, to enforce it the other side of the rule.
CREATE or replace TRIGGER "Assertion_Trigger"
BEFORE UPDATE of "number" ON "Table_2"
FOR EACH ROW
declare
x pls_integer;
BEGIN
if :new."number" > 0
then
begin
Select 1
into x
from "Table_1"
WHERE "Table_1"."FK_Table_2_ID" = :new.ID
and rownum = 1;
RAISE_APPLICATION_ERROR(-20001, :new.ID
||' has dependent records in Table_1');
exception
when no_data_found then
null; -- this is what we want
end;
END;
This trigger will not allow you to update TABLE_2.NUMBER to a value greater than zero if it is referenced by records in TABLE_2. It only fires if the UPDATE statement touches TABLE_2.NUMBER to minimise the performance impact of executing the lookup.
Don't use a trigger to create a unique constraint or a foreign key constraint. Oracle has declarative support for unique and foreign keys, e.g.:
Add a unique constraint on a column:
ALTER TABLE "Table_1" ADD (
CONSTRAINT table_1_uk UNIQUE (column_name)
);
Add a foreign key relationship:
ALTER TABLE "ChildTable" ADD (
CONSTRAINT my_fk FOREIGN KEY (parent_id)
REFERENCES "ParentTable" (id)
);
I'm not clear on exactly what you're trying to achieve with your trigger - it's a bit of a mess of SQL and PL/SQL munged together which will not work, and seems to refer to a column on "Table_2" which is not actually queried.
A good rule of thumb is, if your trigger is querying the same table that the trigger is on, it's probably wrong.
I'm not sure, but are you after some kind of conditional foreign key relationship? i.e. "only allow child rows where the parent satisfies condition x"? If so, the problem is in the data model and should be fixed there. If you provide more explanation of what you're trying to achieve we should be able to help you.

Database table id-key Null value and referential integrity

I'm learning databases, using SQLce. Got some problems, with this error:
A foreign key value cannot be inserted because a corresponding primary key value does not exist.
How does the integrity and acceptance of data work when attempting to save a data row that does not have specified one foreign key. Isn't it possible to set it to NULL in some way, meaning it will not reference the other table? In case, how would I do that? (For an integer key field)
Also, what if you save a row with a valid foreign key that corresponds to an existing primary key in other table. But then decide to delete that entry in this other table. So the foreign key will no longer be valid. Will I be allowed to delete? How does it work? I would think it should then be simply reset to a null value.. But maybe it's not that simple?
What you need to do is insert your data starting from the parent down.
So if you have an orders table and an items table that refers to orders, you have to create the new order first before adding all the children to the list.
Many of the data access libraries that you can get (in C# there is Linq to SQL) which will try and abstract this problem.
If you need to delete data you actually have to go the other way, delete the items before you delete the parent order record.
Of course, this assumes you are enforcing the foreign key, it is possible to not enforce the key, which might be useful during a bulk delete.
This is because of "bad data" you have in the tables. Check if you have all corresponding values in the primary table.
DBMS checks the referential integrity for ensuring the "correctness" of data within database.
For example, if you have a column called some_id in TableA with values 1 through 10 and a column called some_id in TableB with values 1 through 11 then TableA has no corresponding value (11) for that which you have already in TableB.
You can make a foreign key nullable but I don't recommend it. There are too many problems and inconsistencies that can arise. Redesign your tables so that you don't need to populate the foreign key for values that don't exist. Usually you can do that by moving the column to a new table for example.

SQL Delete if the row is not affected by constraints

First note that I have seen this question:TSQL delete with an inner join
I have a large table and several foreign key relations, each of which have data of a given age. We need to remove data older than a given data on a regular basis to stop the DB from growing without bound.
I'm writing a query that will delete from each point on the star if you will by the given parameters (unfortunately these are configurable and different between the tables).
After this first deletion, I have a central table that I'm worried that I'm doing twice the work attempting to delete, as on delete the database checks the conditionals. I have a set of:
AND NOT EXISTS
(SELECT key
FROM table
WHERE table.key = centretable.key)
which TSQL is making into a right anti semi join and doing it nicely on the indexes. The problem is it creates a list of stuff to delete and then does the same checks again as it performs the delete.
I guess my question is whether there is a try delete by row, (I'm not going to do that in a cursor as I know how slow it would be), but you would think that such a keyword would exist, I haven't had any luck finding it though.
In terms of a single command that only checks the relationships once (rather than twice in your example - once for the NOT EXISTS, once for the DELETE), then I expect the answer is a big fat no, sorry.
(off the wall idea):
If this is a major problem, you could try some kind of reference-counting implementation, using triggers to update the counter - but in reality I expect this will be a lot more overhead to maintain than simply checking the keys like you are already.
You could also investigate NOCHECK during the delete (since you are checking it yourself); but you can only do this at the table level (so probably OK for admin scripts, but not for production code) - i.e.:
-- disable
alter table ChildTableName nocheck constraint ForeignKeyName
-- enable
alter table ChildTableName check constraint ForeignKeyName
A quick test shows that with it enabled it does an extra Clustered Index Scan on the foreign key; with it disabled, this is omitted.
Here's a full example; you can look at the query plan of the two DELETE operations... (ideally in isolation from the rest of the code):
create table parent (id int primary key)
create table child (id int primary key, pid int)
alter table child add constraint fk_parent foreign key (pid)
references parent (id)
insert parent values (1)
insert parent values (2)
insert child values (1,1)
insert child values (2,1)
-- ******************* THIS ONE CHECKS THE FOREIGN KEY
delete from parent
where not exists (select 1 from child where pid = parent.id)
-- reset
delete from child
delete from parent
insert parent values (1)
insert parent values (2)
insert child values (1,1)
insert child values (2,1)
-- re-run with check disabled
alter table child nocheck constraint fk_parent
-- ******************* THIS ONE DOESN'T CHECK THE FOREIGN KEY
delete from parent
where not exists (select 1 from child where pid = parent.id)
-- re-enable
alter table child check constraint fk_parent
Again - I stress this should only be run from things like admin scripts.
You could create an Indexed view of your select sentence:
SELECT key FROM table WHERE table.key = centretable.key
The indexed view is a physical copy of the data it would therefore be very fast to check.
You do have the overhead of updating the view, so you would need to test this against your usage pattern.
If you're reusing the same list of stuff to delete then you could consider inserting the keys to delete into a temp table and then using this in the second query.
SELECT Key, ...
INTO #ToDelete
FROM Table T
WHERE ...
Then something like this
...
LEFT OUTER JOIN #ToDelete D
ON T.Key=D.Key
WHERE D.Key IS NULL
DROP #ToDelete
If you specified the foreign key as a constraint when creating the table in the database you can tell the database what to do in case of a delete, by setting the delete rule. This rule specifies what happens if a user tries to delete a row with data that is involved in a foreign key relationship. The "No action" setting tells the user that the deletion is not allowed and the DELETE is rolled back. Implementing it like that would keep you from checking it yourself before deleting it, and thus could be seen as some kind of try.
Well, at least it works like that in MS SQL. http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms177288.aspx
I did find one article that discusses using an outer join in a delete:
http://www.bennadel.com/blog/939-Using-A-SQL-JOIN-In-A-SQL-DELETE-Statement-Thanks-Pinal-Dave-.htm
I hope this works for you!
The short answer to your question is no, there is no standard RDBMS keyword for deleting a master record when all foreign key references to it go away (and certainly none that would account for foreign keys in multiple tables).
Your most efficient option is a second query that is run on an as-needed basis to delete from "centre" based on a series of NOT EXISTS() clauses for each of the tables with foreign keys.
This is based on two statements I believe are both true for your situation:
You will delete more "related" records than "centre" (parent) records. Thus, any operation that attempts to adjust "centre" every time you delete from one of the other tables will result in an instantaneous update to "centre", but will require much wasted querying to delete a "centre" record only occasionally.
Given that there are multiple points on the star from "centre," any "wasted effort" checking for a foreign key in one of them is minimal compared to the whole. For instance, if there are four foreign keys to check before deleting from "centre", you can only save, at best, 25% of the time.