From: "Bath, David" <dave.bath@unix.net>
Reply-To: dave.bath@unix.net
To: pgsql-sql@postgresql.org
Subject: ?Equiv to oracle (ENABLE|DISABLE) (CONSTRAINT|TRIGGER) statements?
Date: Wed, 26 Oct 2005 11:13:43 +1000
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Folks,

Summary:
  Does postgresql have equivalents to the following Oracle statements?
    DISABLE CONSTRAINT ...
    ENABLE CONSTRAINT ...
    DISABLE TRIGGER ...
    ENABLE TRIGGER ...

Background:
  One of the advantages of Oracle over some competitors such as MS-SQL
  and Sybase is the ability to toggle a constraint or trigger on and
  off, without blatting it, and without the hassle of finding any
  code and any accessory information (like comments, permissions...).

  BTW, I personally put C-style comments at the front of the clause so
  I can get the why's/how's into the syscatalogs - but I wear jackboots
  where documentation is concerned :-) and get at these for autodoccing
  and/or generation of meaningful messages to users when raising
  exception messages from the server.

  This capability is especially useful when there is some disgusting
  data-munging by a DBA, not just for import/export.

  I've tried grovelling through the sql from a pg_dump invoked with
  --disable-triggers, but it has no enable/disable triggers or
  constraints, merely creating primary/foreign constraints AFTER
  issuing the COPY.

  Yep, I'd expect this ONLY to work when issued by someone with DBA
  privs (and maybe the target object owner, although I imagine reasons
  that /might/ be a bad idea for paranoid info management governance).

Thanks in advance
-- 
David T. Bath
dave.bath@unix.net