I have the table Tb
ID | Name | Desc
-------------------------
1 | Sample | sample desc
I want to create a trigger on INSERT that will change the value of the inserting Desc
, for example:
INSERT INTO Tb(Name, Desc) VALUES ('x', 'y')
Will result in
ID | Name | Desc
-------------------------
1 | Sample | sample desc
2 | x | Y edited
In the above example I got the value of the inserting Desc
changed it to uppercase and added edited
on the end.
That's what I need, get the Desc
that is being inserted and modify it.
How can I do that?
Is it better to handle it after the insert with an update? Or make a trigger with INSTEAD OF INSERT and modify it everytime the table structure changes?
Use an after insert trigger. Join from the inserted
pseudo table to Tb
on the primary key. Then update the values of desc. Something like: (But may not compile)
CREATE TRIGGER TbFixTb_Trg
ON Tb
AFTER INSERT
AS
BEGIN
UPDATE Tb
SET DESC = SomeTransformationOf(i.DESC)
FROM Tb
INNER JOIN inserted i on i.Id = Tb.Id
END
GO
This trigger happens after the insert has happened, but before insert
statement completes. So the new, incorrect values are already placed in the target table. This trigger will not need to change as columns are added, deleted, etc.
Caveat Integrity constraints are enforced before the after trigger fires. So you can't put on a check constraint to enforce the proper form of DESC. Because that would cause the statement to fail prior to the trigger having a chance to fix anything. (Please double check this paragraph before relying on it. It's been awhile since I've written a trigger.)
I'm not sure where your going to get the actual new value for desc, but I assume you are getting it from another table or some such. But you probably have a reason for wanting to do it this way so below is an example of how I would go about it.
What you want is called an INSTEAD OF INSERT trigger, it fire instead of an insert on the table with what every logic you give it.
CREATE TRIGGER trgUpdateDesc
ON Tb
INSTEAD OF INSERT
AS
BEGIN
SET NOCOUNT ON;
INSERT INTO Tb (Name, [Desc])
SELECT Name, [Desc] + 'edited'
FROM inserted
END
GO
I've hard coded the word 'edited' in there as I'm not sure where you want to get the value, but you can easily replace that with a variable or a value from another table.
Oh also be sure the put the [] around Desc, as it is a key word in sql server (stands for descending)
Hope that helps!
Edit:
If you want to make it a little more robust so that it doesn't depend on the table structure as much you could use an AFTER INSERT trigger to just updates that field like so.
CREATE TRIGGER [dbo].[trgUpdateDesc]
ON [dbo].[Tb]
AFTER INSERT
AS
BEGIN
SET NOCOUNT ON;
UPDATE Tb
SET [Desc] = UPPER(inserted.[Desc]) + ' Edited'
FROM inserted INNER JOIN Tb On inserted.id = Tb.id
END
Temp table can help to use INSTEAD OF INSERT
trigger while avoiding to explicitly listing all unrelated table columns:
CREATE TRIGGER trgUpdateDesc
ON Tb
INSTEAD OF INSERT
AS
BEGIN
SET NOCOUNT ON;
select * into #tmp from inserted;
UPDATE #tmp SET Desc = Desc + 'edited' --where ...;
insert into Tb select * from #tmp;
drop table #tmp;
END
This code will not need to be fixed when new columns are added to the table.
But beware of some additional overhead of temp tables.
Also note that SQL Server triggers fire once for bulk DML operations and must correctly handle multi-row inserts.
You may want to look at INSTEAD OF
triggers.
CREATE TRIGGER Tb_InsteadTrigger on Tb
INSTEAD OF INSERT
AS
BEGIN
...
This will allow you to manipulate the data before it goes into the table. The trigger is responsible for inserting the data to the table.