Re: RE : full featured alter table?

Sven Köhler <skoehler@upb.de>

From: Sven Köhler <skoehler@upb.de>
To: pgsql-general@postgresql.org
Date: 2003-06-17T11:40:40Z
Lists: pgsql-general
> Sorry, but I don't fully agree with you. If I have to add a new column
> in a table, this column will appear in the end of the table. What we are
> talking about (as I understand) is to have the possibility to order the
> columns table (via ALTER TABLE ...POSITION..). SELECT * FROM <table>
> would use that order to display the columns.

yes. it is a feature that not many DBMS support (i know only of MySQL 
which supports inserting a column at a defined splace - and don't blame 
me - i don't like MySQL either) - it is a feature that's missing in many 
DBMS too.

> We are not talking of changing columns order for each kind of SQL query.
> In that case, I agree that views are usefull and when we want to
> display several tables in one "pseudo-table" (a view) and to have less
> big queries.

I don't know about PostGreSQL, but views can be slower than normal 
queries - especially when you don't do a "select * form view" but add a 
some where-clauses, joins etc.