In PostgreSQL 8 is it possible to add ON DELETE CASCADES
to the both foreign keys in the following table without dropping the latter?
# \d scores
Table "public.scores"
Column | Type | Modifiers
---------+-----------------------+-----------
id | character varying(32) |
gid | integer |
money | integer | not null
quit | boolean |
last_ip | inet |
Foreign-key constraints:
"scores_gid_fkey" FOREIGN KEY (gid) REFERENCES games(gid)
"scores_id_fkey" FOREIGN KEY (id) REFERENCES users(id)
Both referenced tables are below - here:
# \d games
Table "public.games"
Column | Type | Modifiers
----------+-----------------------------+----------------------------------------------------------
gid | integer | not null default nextval('games_gid_seq'::regclass)
rounds | integer | not null
finished | timestamp without time zone | default now()
Indexes:
"games_pkey" PRIMARY KEY, btree (gid)
Referenced by:
TABLE "scores" CONSTRAINT "scores_gid_fkey" FOREIGN KEY (gid) REFERENCES games(gid)
And here:
# \d users
Table "public.users"
Column | Type | Modifiers
------------+-----------------------------+---------------
id | character varying(32) | not null
first_name | character varying(64) |
last_name | character varying(64) |
female | boolean |
avatar | character varying(128) |
city | character varying(64) |
login | timestamp without time zone | default now()
last_ip | inet |
logout | timestamp without time zone |
vip | timestamp without time zone |
mail | character varying(254) |
Indexes:
"users_pkey" PRIMARY KEY, btree (id)
Referenced by:
TABLE "cards" CONSTRAINT "cards_id_fkey" FOREIGN KEY (id) REFERENCES users(id)
TABLE "catch" CONSTRAINT "catch_id_fkey" FOREIGN KEY (id) REFERENCES users(id)
TABLE "chat" CONSTRAINT "chat_id_fkey" FOREIGN KEY (id) REFERENCES users(id)
TABLE "game" CONSTRAINT "game_id_fkey" FOREIGN KEY (id) REFERENCES users(id)
TABLE "hand" CONSTRAINT "hand_id_fkey" FOREIGN KEY (id) REFERENCES users(id)
TABLE "luck" CONSTRAINT "luck_id_fkey" FOREIGN KEY (id) REFERENCES users(id)
TABLE "match" CONSTRAINT "match_id_fkey" FOREIGN KEY (id) REFERENCES users(id)
TABLE "misere" CONSTRAINT "misere_id_fkey" FOREIGN KEY (id) REFERENCES users(id)
TABLE "money" CONSTRAINT "money_id_fkey" FOREIGN KEY (id) REFERENCES users(id)
TABLE "pass" CONSTRAINT "pass_id_fkey" FOREIGN KEY (id) REFERENCES users(id)
TABLE "payment" CONSTRAINT "payment_id_fkey" FOREIGN KEY (id) REFERENCES users(id)
TABLE "rep" CONSTRAINT "rep_author_fkey" FOREIGN KEY (author) REFERENCES users(id)
TABLE "rep" CONSTRAINT "rep_id_fkey" FOREIGN KEY (id) REFERENCES users(id)
TABLE "scores" CONSTRAINT "scores_id_fkey" FOREIGN KEY (id) REFERENCES users(id)
TABLE "status" CONSTRAINT "status_id_fkey" FOREIGN KEY (id) REFERENCES users(id)
And also I wonder if it makes sense to add 2 index'es to the former table?
UPDATE: Thank you, and also I've got the advice at the mailing list, that I could manage it in 1 statement and thus without explicitly starting a transaction:
ALTER TABLE public.scores
DROP CONSTRAINT scores_gid_fkey,
ADD CONSTRAINT scores_gid_fkey
FOREIGN KEY (gid)
REFERENCES games(gid)
ON DELETE CASCADE;
I'm pretty sure you can't simply add on delete cascade
to an existing foreign key constraint. You have to drop the constraint first, then add the correct version. In standard SQL, I believe the easiest way to do this is to
on delete cascade
, and finallyRepeat for each foreign key you want to change.
But PostgreSQL has a non-standard extension that lets you use multiple constraint clauses in a single SQL statement. For example
alter table public.scores
drop constraint scores_gid_fkey,
add constraint scores_gid_fkey
foreign key (gid)
references games(gid)
on delete cascade;
If you don't know the name of the foreign key constraint you want to drop, you can either look it up in pgAdminIII (just click the table name and look at the DDL, or expand the hierarchy until you see "Constraints"), or you can query the information schema.
select *
from information_schema.key_column_usage
where position_in_unique_constraint is not null