Unique constraint on multiple columns

Question

I am using an oracle table and have created a unique constraint over four columns. Can these columns within the constraint have NULL in them?

Answer 1

Two nulls are considered not equal in Oracle, so these columns can have nulls in them.

Answer 2

Yes, Oracle allows UNIQUE constraints to contain columns with NULL contents, but PRIMARY KEY constraints cannot contain columns containing NULL values. (Edited: was "... nullable columns...", but my example below shows that not to be true. Columns in a PK can be defined as nullable, but cannot contain NULL.)

You cannot have a UNIQUE constraint and a PRIMARY KEY constraint with the same columns.

SQL> create table stest (col1 integer not null, col2 integer null);

Table created.

SQL> alter table stest add constraint stest_uq unique (col1, col2);

Table altered.

SQL> insert into stest values (1, 3);

1 row created.

SQL> insert into stest values (1, null);

1 row created.

SQL> insert into stest values (1, null);
insert into stest values (1, null)
*
ERROR at line 1:
ORA-00001: unique constraint (SUSAN_INT.STEST_UQ) violated

SQL> insert into stest values (2, null);

1 row created.

SQL> commit;

Commit complete.

SQL> select * from stest;

      COL1       COL2
---------- ----------
         1          3
         1
         2

SQL> alter table stest add constraint stest_pk PRIMARY KEY (col1, col2);
alter table stest add constraint stest_pk PRIMARY KEY (col1, col2)
                                                             *
ERROR at line 1:
ORA-01449: column contains NULL values; cannot alter to NOT NULL

SQL> truncate table stest;

Table truncated.

SQL> alter table stest add constraint stest_pk PRIMARY KEY (col1, col2);
alter table stest add constraint stest_pk PRIMARY KEY (col1, col2)
                                          *
ERROR at line 1:
ORA-02261: such unique or primary key already exists in the table

SQL> alter table stest drop constraint stest_uq;

Table altered.

SQL> alter table stest add constraint stest_pk PRIMARY KEY (col1, col2);

Table altered.

Answer 3

Hi Nicks,

you can have NULLs in your columns unless the columns are specified NOT NULL. You will be able to store only one instance of NULLs however (no two sets of same columns will be allowed unless all columns are NULL) :

SQL> CREATE TABLE t (id1 NUMBER, id2 NUMBER);

Table created
SQL> ALTER TABLE t ADD CONSTRAINT u_t UNIQUE (id1, id2);

Table altered
SQL> INSERT INTO t VALUES (1, NULL);

1 row inserted
SQL> INSERT INTO t VALUES (1, NULL);

INSERT INTO t VALUES (1, NULL)

ORA-00001: unique constraint (VNZ.U_T) violated

SQL> /* you can insert two sets of NULL, NULL however */
SQL> INSERT INTO t VALUES (NULL, NULL);

1 row inserted
SQL> INSERT INTO t VALUES (NULL, NULL);

1 row inserted