SQLlite3 Update statment has no effect - iphone

I'm no SQL expert, but have a bug in an iPhone app where and UPDATE statement has no effect on the db.
I have been using the SQLlite manger plugin for FireFox to try dbug by repeatedly amending and running the UPDATE on the db. I also ran the statement thorough and SQL Validator which said it complied to the core SQL standard.
Can you spot anything wrong with the statement given below?
UPDATE sections
SET
title = 'What is acne ? ABC',
text = 'Pus on your face',
created = '2010-03-10 18:46:55',
modified = '2011-07-04 17:38:44',
position = 1,
condition_id = 4
WHERE id = 10;

There is some confusion and inconsistency in the way SQLite and the various implementations by Mozilla, Google, Adobe, and others handle numeric primary keys in databases whose tables were created outside of these implementations and where the primary keys were defined as an integer type but not as "INTEGER" [verbatim] -- that is, they were defined as INT or INT16 or INT32 etc.
INTEGER PRIMARY KEY in mothership SQLite is an alias for the rowid.
INT PRIMARY KEY in mothership SQLite is not an alias for the rowid.
A consortium member (or any implementor) may or may not follow this rule. (SQLite is in the public domain, of course.)
See section 2.0 here: http://www.sqlite.org/datatypes.html
and see section on RowId and Primary Key here: http://www.sqlite.org/lang_createtable.html#rowid
A PRIMARY KEY column only becomes an integer primary key if the
declared type name is exactly "INTEGER". Other integer type names like
"INT" or "BIGINT" or "SHORT INTEGER" or "UNSIGNED INTEGER" causes the
primary key column to behave as an ordinary table column with integer
affinity and a unique index, not as an alias for the rowid. [emphasis
added]
An implementor who does not follow the rule might not have even been aware that they were breaking the rule in the first place, since it is a "gotcha" arcane sort of rule. Anyway, what this means practically is that one implementation may treat a supplied value as an alias for the rowid and another implementation might not. If given the value 10, one might retrieve the tuple whose rowid = 10 and one might retrieve the tuple where the specified column's value = 10. This, of course, leads to spurious results in queries -- and they might look like perfectly good and plausible results but they are dead wrong.
Consider the following simple test: using flagship SQLite's utilities, not those provided by one of the implementors, execute the following DDL and DML statements; then, in your implementation, open the database and execute the DML statements again to compare the DML results:
CREATE TABLE TEST
("id" INT PRIMARY KEY, "name" text) -- ** NOTE "INT" not "INTEGER"
INSERT INTO TEST
(id, name)
VALUES
(7,'seven')
** *** N.B. THE ROWID OF THE ROW INSERTED ABOVE = 1 *** **
select rowid, id, name from test
result: 1 | 7 | seven
select * from TEST
result: 7 | seven
select * from TEST where id = 7
result: ????? [ymmv]
select * from TEST where id = 1
result: ????? [ymmv]
Depending on how the specific implementation treats an INT primary key the third select statement above (select * from TEST where id = 7) may return one row or it may return nothing!
If the implementation treats the INT PK as an alias for the row id, well, there is no row whose rowid = 7, and so it will return nothing. If the implementation treats the INT PK as a normal value, it will find the row.
Now, if you were to insert more rows into table TEST, you would eventually create a row whose rowid = 7. In one of these wayward implementations, when you use this where-clause -- where id = 7 --- you might think you were addressing the tuple whose id=7, but you'd actually be addressing the tuple whose rowid=7. You would get the wrong tuple and you might not realize it. Consider the possibilities when joining a child table to a parent table: the child table contains foreign key value of 7. What tuple does an inner join return from the parent table? It depends on whether the implementation honors the distinction between INT and INTEGER primary keys.
Last year, I documented this thoroughly for Adobe AIR, BTW, and also reported it on the SQLite news group. It is possible that some implementations have changed the behavior in the interim.
When creating SQLite tables, it is best to use INTEGER [verbatim] for primary keys, not any of the other recognized int types.

If your query is correct then You need to make sure about 2 things.
Have you written finalize_statement like this ?
sqlite3_finalize(selectStatement);
2.If you are testing in simulator. Are you sure you are checking database update in following path ?
/user/Libary/Application Support/iPhone Simulator/Your_Version_Number/Applications/YOUR_APPLICATION_GUID/Documents
Hope this help.

The only thing in the query that strikes me as worthy of further investigation is the question mark in the value for [title]. Remove it and see if that changes anything. Maybe it's being incorrectly parsed somewhere along the way as a parameter placeholder.

Related

Why am i getting postgresql error "Key (id)=(357) already exists"? [duplicate]

I have a question I know this was posted many times but I didn't find an answer to my problem. The problem is that I have a table and a column "id" I want it to be unique number just as normal. This type of column is serial and the next value after each insert is coming from a sequence so everything seems to be all right but it still sometimes shows this error. I don't know why. In the documentation, it says the sequence is foolproof and always works. If I add a UNIQUE constraint to that column will it help? I worked before many times on Postres but this error is showing for me for the first time. I did everything as normal and I never had this problem before. Can you help me to find the answer that can be used in the future for all tables that will be created? Let's say we have something easy like this:
CREATE TABLE comments
(
id serial NOT NULL,
some_column text NOT NULL,
CONSTRAINT id_pkey PRIMARY KEY (id)
)
WITH (
OIDS=FALSE
);
ALTER TABLE interesting.comments OWNER TO postgres;
If i add:
ALTER TABLE comments ADD CONSTRAINT id_id_key UNIQUE(id)
Will if be enough or is there some other thing that should be done?
This article explains that your sequence might be out of sync and that you have to manually bring it back in sync.
An excerpt from the article in case the URL changes:
If you get this message when trying to insert data into a PostgreSQL
database:
ERROR: duplicate key violates unique constraint
That likely means that the primary key sequence in the table you're
working with has somehow become out of sync, likely because of a mass
import process (or something along those lines). Call it a "bug by
design", but it seems that you have to manually reset the a primary
key index after restoring from a dump file. At any rate, to see if
your values are out of sync, run these two commands:
SELECT MAX(the_primary_key) FROM the_table;
SELECT nextval('the_primary_key_sequence');
If the first value is higher than the second value, your sequence is
out of sync. Back up your PG database (just in case), then run this command:
SELECT setval('the_primary_key_sequence', (SELECT MAX(the_primary_key) FROM the_table)+1);
That will set the sequence to the next available value that's higher
than any existing primary key in the sequence.
Intro
I also encountered this problem and the solution proposed by #adamo was basically the right solution. However, I had to invest a lot of time in the details, which is why I am now writing a new answer in order to save this time for others.
Case
My case was as follows: There was a table that was filled with data using an app. Now a new entry had to be inserted manually via SQL. After that the sequence was out of sync and no more records could be inserted via the app.
Solution
As mentioned in the answer from #adamo, the sequence must be synchronized manually. For this purpose the name of the sequence is needed. For Postgres, the name of the sequence can be determined with the command PG_GET_SERIAL_SEQUENCE. Most examples use lower case table names. In my case the tables were created by an ORM middleware (like Hibernate or Entity Framework Core etc.) and their names all started with a capital letter.
In an e-mail from 2004 (link) I got the right hint.
(Let's assume for all examples, that Foo is the table's name and Foo_id the related column.)
Command to get the sequence name:
SELECT PG_GET_SERIAL_SEQUENCE('"Foo"', 'Foo_id');
So, the table name must be in double quotes, surrounded by single quotes.
1. Validate, that the sequence is out-of-sync
SELECT CURRVAL(PG_GET_SERIAL_SEQUENCE('"Foo"', 'Foo_id')) AS "Current Value", MAX("Foo_id") AS "Max Value" FROM "Foo";
When the Current Value is less than Max Value, your sequence is out-of-sync.
2. Correction
SELECT SETVAL((SELECT PG_GET_SERIAL_SEQUENCE('"Foo"', 'Foo_id')), (SELECT (MAX("Foo_id") + 1) FROM "Foo"), FALSE);
Replace the table_name to your actual name of the table.
Gives the current last id for the table. Note it that for next step.
SELECT MAX(id) FROM table_name;
Get the next id sequence according to postgresql. Make sure this id is higher than the current max id we get from step 1
SELECT nextVal('"table_name_id_seq"');
if it's not higher than then use this step 3 to update the next sequence.
SELECT setval('"table_name_id_seq"', (SELECT MAX(id) FROM table_name)+1);
The primary key is already protecting you from inserting duplicate values, as you're experiencing when you get that error. Adding another unique constraint isn't necessary to do that.
The "duplicate key" error is telling you that the work was not done because it would produce a duplicate key, not that it discovered a duplicate key already commited to the table.
For future searchs, use ON CONFLICT DO NOTHING.
Referrence - https://www.calazan.com/how-to-reset-the-primary-key-sequence-in-postgresql-with-django/
I had the same problem try this:
python manage.py sqlsequencereset table_name
Eg:
python manage.py sqlsequencereset auth
you need to run this in production settings(if you have)
and you need Postgres installed to run this on the server
From http://www.postgresql.org/docs/current/interactive/datatype.html
Note: Prior to PostgreSQL 7.3, serial implied UNIQUE. This is no longer automatic. If you wish a serial column to be in a unique constraint or a primary key, it must now be specified, same as with any other data type.
In my case carate table script is:
CREATE TABLE public."Survey_symptom_binds"
(
id integer NOT NULL DEFAULT nextval('"Survey_symptom_binds_id_seq"'::regclass),
survey_id integer,
"order" smallint,
symptom_id integer,
CONSTRAINT "Survey_symptom_binds_pkey" PRIMARY KEY (id)
)
SO:
SELECT nextval('"Survey_symptom_binds_id_seq"'::regclass),
MAX(id)
FROM public."Survey_symptom_binds";
SELECT nextval('"Survey_symptom_binds_id_seq"'::regclass) less than MAX(id) !!!
Try to fix the proble:
SELECT setval('"Survey_symptom_binds_id_seq"', (SELECT MAX(id) FROM public."Survey_symptom_binds")+1);
Good Luck every one!
I had the same problem. It was because of the type of my relations. I had a table property which related to both states and cities. So, at first I had a relation from property to states as OneToOne, and the same for cities. And I had the same error "duplicate key violates unique constraint". That means that: I can only have one property related to one state and city. But that doesnt make sense, because a city can have multiple properties. So the problem is the relation. The relation should be ManyToOne. Many properties to One city
Table name started with a capital letter if tables were created by an ORM middleware (like Hibernate or Entity Framework Core etc.)
SELECT setval('"Table_name_Id_seq"', (SELECT MAX("Id") FROM "Table_name") + 1)
WHERE
NOT EXISTS (
SELECT *
FROM (SELECT CURRVAL(PG_GET_SERIAL_SEQUENCE('"Table_name"', 'Id')) AS seq, MAX("Id") AS max_id
FROM "Table_name") AS seq_table
WHERE seq > max_id
)
try that CLI
it's just a suggestion to enhance the adamo code (thanks a lot adamo)
SELECT setval('tableName_columnName_seq', (SELECT MAX(columnName) FROM tableName));
For programatically solution at Django. Based on Paolo Melchiorre's answer, I wrote a chunk as a function to be called before any .save()
from django.db import connection
def setSqlCursor(db_table):
sql = """SELECT pg_catalog.setval(pg_get_serial_sequence('"""+db_table+"""', 'id'), MAX(id)) FROM """+db_table+""";"""
with connection.cursor() as cursor:
cursor.execute(sql)
I have similar problem but I solved it by removing all the foreign key in my Postgresql

Way to migrate a create table with sequence from postgres to DB2

I need to migrate a DDL from Postgres to DB2, but I need that it works the same as in Postgres. There is a table that generates values from a sequence, but the values can also be explicitly given.
Postgres
create sequence hist_id_seq;
create table benchmarksql.history (
hist_id integer not null default nextval('hist_id_seq') primary key,
h_c_id integer,
h_c_d_id integer,
h_c_w_id integer,
h_d_id integer,
h_w_id integer,
h_date timestamp,
h_amount decimal(6,2),
h_data varchar(24)
);
(Look at the sequence call in the hist_id column to define the value of the primary key)
The business logic inserts into the table by explicitly providing an ID, and in other cases, it leaves the database to choose the number.
If I change this in DB2 to a GENERATED ALWAYS it will throw errors because there are some provided values. On the other side, if I create the table with GENERATED BY DEFAULT, DB2 will throw an error when trying to insert with the same value (SQL0803N), because the "internal sequence" does not take into account the already inserted values, and it does not retry with a next value.
And, I do not want to restart the sequence each time a provided ID was inserted.
This is the problem in BenchmarkSQL when trying to port it to DB2: https://sourceforge.net/projects/benchmarksql/ (File sqlTableCreates)
How can I implement the same database logic in DB2 as it does in Postgres (and apparently in Oracle)?
You're operating under a misconception: that sources external to the db get to dictate its internal keys. Ideally/conceptually, autogenerated ids will never need to be seen outside of the db, as conceptually there should be unique natural keys for export or reporting. Still, there are times when applications will need to manage some ids, often when setting up related entities (eg, JPA seems to want to work this way).
However, if you add an id value that you generated from a different source, the db won't be able to manage it. How could it? It's not efficient - for one thing, attempting to do so would do one of the following
Be unsafe in the face of multiple clients (attempt to add duplicate keys)
Serialize access to the table (for a potentially slow query, too)
(This usually shows up when people attempt something like: SELECT MAX(id) + 1, which would require locking the entire table for thread safety, likely including statements that don't even touch that column. If you try to find any "first-unused" id - trying to fill gaps - this gets more complicated and problematic)
Neither is ideal, so it's best to not have the problem in the first place. This is usually done by having id columns be autogenerated, but (as pointed out earlier) there are situations where we may need to know what the id will be before we insert the row into the table. Fortunately, there's a standard SQL object for this, SEQUENCE. This provides a db-managed, thread-safe, fast way to get ids. It appears that in PostgreSQL you can use sequences in the DEFAULT clause for a column, but DB2 doesn't allow it. If you don't want to specify an id every time (it should be autogenerated some of the time), you'll need another way; this is the perfect time to use a BEFORE INSERT trigger;
CREATE TRIGGER Add_Generated_Id NO CASCADE BEFORE INSERT ON benchmarksql.history
NEW AS Incoming_Entity
FOR EACH ROW
WHEN Incoming_Entity.id IS NULL
SET id = NEXTVAL FOR hist_id_seq
(something like this - not tested. You didn't specify where in the project this would belong)
So, if you then add a row with something like:
INSERT INTO benchmarksql.history (hist_id, h_data) VALUES(null, 'a')
or
INSERT INTO benchmarksql.history (h_data) VALUES('a')
an id will be generated and attached automatically. Note that ALL ids added to the table must come from the given sequence (as #mustaccio pointed out, this appears to be true even in PostgreSQL), or any UNIQUE CONSTRAINT on the column will start throwing duplicate-key errors. So any time your application needs an id before inserting a row in the table, you'll need some form of
SELECT NEXT VALUE FOR hist_id_seq
FROM sysibm.sysdummy1
... and that's it, pretty much. This is completely thread and concurrency safe, will not maintain/require long-term locks, nor require serialized access to the table.

T-SQL implicit conversion between 2 varchars

I have some T-SQL (SQL Server 2008) that I inherited and am trying to find out why some of queries are running really slow. In the Actual Execution Plan I have three clustered index scans which are costing me 19%, 21% and 26%, so this seems to be the source of my problem.
The contents of the fields are usually numeric (but some job numbers have an alpha prefix)
The database design (vendor supplied) is pretty poor. The max length of a job number in their application is 12 chars, but in the tables that are joined it is defined as varchar(50) in some places and varchar(15) in others. My parameter is a varchar(12), but I get same thing if I change it to a varchar(50)
The node contains this:
Predicate: [Live_Costing].[dbo].[TSTrans].[JobNo] as [sts1].[JobNo]=CONVERT_IMPLICIT(varchar(50),[#JobNo],0)
sts1 is a derived table, but the table it pulls jobno from is a varchar(50)
I don't understand why it's doing an implicit conversion between 2 varchars. Is it just because they are different lengths?
I'm fairly new to the execution plan
Is there an easy way to figure out which node in the exec plan relates to which part of the query?
Is the predicate, the join clause?
Regards
Mark
Some variables can have collation: enter link description here
Regardless you need to verify your collations, which can be specified at server, DB, table, and column level.
First, check your collation between tempdb and the vendor supplied database. It should match. If it doesn't, it will tend to do implicit conversions.
Assuming you cannot modify the vendor supplied code base, one or more of the following should help you:
1) Predefine your temp tables and specify the same collation for the key field as in the db in use, rather than tempdb.
2) Provide collations when doing string comparisons.
3) Specify collation for key values if using "select into" with a temp table
4) Make sure your collations on your tables and columns match your database collation (VERY important if you imported only specific tables from a vendor into an existing database.)
If you can change the vendor supplied code base, I would suggest reviewing the cost for making all of your char keys the same length and NOT varchar. Varchar has an overhead of 10. The caveat is that if you create a fixed length character field not null, it will be padded to the right (unavoidable).
Ideally, you would have int keys, and only use varchar fields for user interaction/lookup:
create table Products(ProductID int not null identity(1,1) primary key clustered, ProductNumber varchar(50) not null)
alter table Products add constraint uckProducts_ProductNumber unique(ProductNumber)
Then do all joins on ProductID, rather than ProductNumber. Just filter on ProductNumber.
would be perfectly fine.

postgresql duplicate key violates unique constraint

I have a question I know this was posted many times but I didn't find an answer to my problem. The problem is that I have a table and a column "id" I want it to be unique number just as normal. This type of column is serial and the next value after each insert is coming from a sequence so everything seems to be all right but it still sometimes shows this error. I don't know why. In the documentation, it says the sequence is foolproof and always works. If I add a UNIQUE constraint to that column will it help? I worked before many times on Postres but this error is showing for me for the first time. I did everything as normal and I never had this problem before. Can you help me to find the answer that can be used in the future for all tables that will be created? Let's say we have something easy like this:
CREATE TABLE comments
(
id serial NOT NULL,
some_column text NOT NULL,
CONSTRAINT id_pkey PRIMARY KEY (id)
)
WITH (
OIDS=FALSE
);
ALTER TABLE interesting.comments OWNER TO postgres;
If i add:
ALTER TABLE comments ADD CONSTRAINT id_id_key UNIQUE(id)
Will if be enough or is there some other thing that should be done?
This article explains that your sequence might be out of sync and that you have to manually bring it back in sync.
An excerpt from the article in case the URL changes:
If you get this message when trying to insert data into a PostgreSQL
database:
ERROR: duplicate key violates unique constraint
That likely means that the primary key sequence in the table you're
working with has somehow become out of sync, likely because of a mass
import process (or something along those lines). Call it a "bug by
design", but it seems that you have to manually reset the a primary
key index after restoring from a dump file. At any rate, to see if
your values are out of sync, run these two commands:
SELECT MAX(the_primary_key) FROM the_table;
SELECT nextval('the_primary_key_sequence');
If the first value is higher than the second value, your sequence is
out of sync. Back up your PG database (just in case), then run this command:
SELECT setval('the_primary_key_sequence', (SELECT MAX(the_primary_key) FROM the_table)+1);
That will set the sequence to the next available value that's higher
than any existing primary key in the sequence.
Intro
I also encountered this problem and the solution proposed by #adamo was basically the right solution. However, I had to invest a lot of time in the details, which is why I am now writing a new answer in order to save this time for others.
Case
My case was as follows: There was a table that was filled with data using an app. Now a new entry had to be inserted manually via SQL. After that the sequence was out of sync and no more records could be inserted via the app.
Solution
As mentioned in the answer from #adamo, the sequence must be synchronized manually. For this purpose the name of the sequence is needed. For Postgres, the name of the sequence can be determined with the command PG_GET_SERIAL_SEQUENCE. Most examples use lower case table names. In my case the tables were created by an ORM middleware (like Hibernate or Entity Framework Core etc.) and their names all started with a capital letter.
In an e-mail from 2004 (link) I got the right hint.
(Let's assume for all examples, that Foo is the table's name and Foo_id the related column.)
Command to get the sequence name:
SELECT PG_GET_SERIAL_SEQUENCE('"Foo"', 'Foo_id');
So, the table name must be in double quotes, surrounded by single quotes.
1. Validate, that the sequence is out-of-sync
SELECT CURRVAL(PG_GET_SERIAL_SEQUENCE('"Foo"', 'Foo_id')) AS "Current Value", MAX("Foo_id") AS "Max Value" FROM "Foo";
When the Current Value is less than Max Value, your sequence is out-of-sync.
2. Correction
SELECT SETVAL((SELECT PG_GET_SERIAL_SEQUENCE('"Foo"', 'Foo_id')), (SELECT (MAX("Foo_id") + 1) FROM "Foo"), FALSE);
Replace the table_name to your actual name of the table.
Gives the current last id for the table. Note it that for next step.
SELECT MAX(id) FROM table_name;
Get the next id sequence according to postgresql. Make sure this id is higher than the current max id we get from step 1
SELECT nextVal('"table_name_id_seq"');
if it's not higher than then use this step 3 to update the next sequence.
SELECT setval('"table_name_id_seq"', (SELECT MAX(id) FROM table_name)+1);
The primary key is already protecting you from inserting duplicate values, as you're experiencing when you get that error. Adding another unique constraint isn't necessary to do that.
The "duplicate key" error is telling you that the work was not done because it would produce a duplicate key, not that it discovered a duplicate key already commited to the table.
For future searchs, use ON CONFLICT DO NOTHING.
Referrence - https://www.calazan.com/how-to-reset-the-primary-key-sequence-in-postgresql-with-django/
I had the same problem try this:
python manage.py sqlsequencereset table_name
Eg:
python manage.py sqlsequencereset auth
you need to run this in production settings(if you have)
and you need Postgres installed to run this on the server
From http://www.postgresql.org/docs/current/interactive/datatype.html
Note: Prior to PostgreSQL 7.3, serial implied UNIQUE. This is no longer automatic. If you wish a serial column to be in a unique constraint or a primary key, it must now be specified, same as with any other data type.
In my case carate table script is:
CREATE TABLE public."Survey_symptom_binds"
(
id integer NOT NULL DEFAULT nextval('"Survey_symptom_binds_id_seq"'::regclass),
survey_id integer,
"order" smallint,
symptom_id integer,
CONSTRAINT "Survey_symptom_binds_pkey" PRIMARY KEY (id)
)
SO:
SELECT nextval('"Survey_symptom_binds_id_seq"'::regclass),
MAX(id)
FROM public."Survey_symptom_binds";
SELECT nextval('"Survey_symptom_binds_id_seq"'::regclass) less than MAX(id) !!!
Try to fix the proble:
SELECT setval('"Survey_symptom_binds_id_seq"', (SELECT MAX(id) FROM public."Survey_symptom_binds")+1);
Good Luck every one!
I had the same problem. It was because of the type of my relations. I had a table property which related to both states and cities. So, at first I had a relation from property to states as OneToOne, and the same for cities. And I had the same error "duplicate key violates unique constraint". That means that: I can only have one property related to one state and city. But that doesnt make sense, because a city can have multiple properties. So the problem is the relation. The relation should be ManyToOne. Many properties to One city
Table name started with a capital letter if tables were created by an ORM middleware (like Hibernate or Entity Framework Core etc.)
SELECT setval('"Table_name_Id_seq"', (SELECT MAX("Id") FROM "Table_name") + 1)
WHERE
NOT EXISTS (
SELECT *
FROM (SELECT CURRVAL(PG_GET_SERIAL_SEQUENCE('"Table_name"', 'Id')) AS seq, MAX("Id") AS max_id
FROM "Table_name") AS seq_table
WHERE seq > max_id
)
try that CLI
it's just a suggestion to enhance the adamo code (thanks a lot adamo)
SELECT setval('tableName_columnName_seq', (SELECT MAX(columnName) FROM tableName));
For programatically solution at Django. Based on Paolo Melchiorre's answer, I wrote a chunk as a function to be called before any .save()
from django.db import connection
def setSqlCursor(db_table):
sql = """SELECT pg_catalog.setval(pg_get_serial_sequence('"""+db_table+"""', 'id'), MAX(id)) FROM """+db_table+""";"""
with connection.cursor() as cursor:
cursor.execute(sql)
I have similar problem but I solved it by removing all the foreign key in my Postgresql

auto-increment column in PostgreSQL on the fly?

I was wondering if it is possible to add an auto-increment integer field on the fly, i.e. without defining it in a CREATE TABLE statement?
For example, I have a statement:
SELECT 1 AS id, t.type FROM t;
and I am can I change this to
SELECT some_nextval_magic AS id, t.type FROM t;
I need to create the auto-increment field on the fly in the some_nextval_magic part because the result relation is a temporary one during the construction of a bigger SQL statement. And the value of id field is not really important as long as it is unique.
I search around here, and the answers to related questions (e.g. PostgreSQL Autoincrement) mostly involving specifying SERIAL or using nextval in CREATE TABLE. But I don't necessarily want to use CREATE TABLE or VIEW (unless I have to). There are also some discussions of generate_series(), but I am not sure whether it applies here.
-- Update --
My motivation is illustrated in this GIS.SE answer regarding the PostGIS extension. The original query was:
CREATE VIEW buffer40units AS
SELECT
g.path[1] as gid,
g.geom::geometry(Polygon, 31492) as geom
FROM
(SELECT
(ST_Dump(ST_UNION(ST_Buffer(geom, 40)))).*
FROM point
) as g;
where g.path[1] as gid is an id field "required for visualization in QGIS". I believe the only requirement is that it is integer and unique across the table. I encountered some errors when running the above query when the g.path[] array is empty.
While trying to fix the array in the above query, this thought came to me:
Since the gid value does not matter anyways, is there an auto-increment function that can be used here instead?
If you wish to have an id field that assigns a unique integer to each row in the output, then use the row_number() window function:
select
row_number() over () as id,
t.type from t;
The generated id will only be unique within each execution of the query. Multiple executions will not generate new unique values for id.