Is there a way to access the sql that triggered a trigger from within the trigger? I've managed to get it by joining to the master..monProcessSQLText MDA table but this only works for users with the mon_role and I don't want to give that to everyone. Is there a global variable I've missed?
I'm trying to log all the updates run against a table so I can trace it back to an IP address and username.
This is with ASE 12.5.
If you are trying to
log all the updates run against a table so I can trace it back to an IP address and username
A trigger is definitely the wrong way to go about it, triggers were not designed for that, and there are other ASE facilities which were designed for that. It is not about the table, it is about security and monitoring in general.
Sybase Auditing.
It takes a bit of setting up, much less overhead than MAD tables; but most important, it was designed for auditing (MDA was not). And there is no coding requirements such as for MDA. It is highly configurable, the idea is to capture only what you need, and not more.
Monitoring.
I would not recommend MDA tables, but since you have them in place, and you have enabled monitoring, and accepted the 22% overhead for capturing SQL text... The info is very transient. In order to use them for any relevant purpose, such as yours, you need to write a capture-and-store mechanism, archiving all required info to an archive database. This has to be done on an ongoing basis, and completely independent of a trigger, etc. You can also filter on the fly to reduce the volume of data stored (warning, it is huge). purge data over 7 days old, etc. It is a little project in itself, that is why there are commercially available from 3rd parties.
Once either of these facilities are in place, then, separately, whenever you wish to inquire about who updated a table, when and from where, all you need to do is inspect the archive. nothing to do with a trigger, or difficulties getting the info from a trigger, or giving admin privileges to ordinary users.
Also, it needs to be appreciated that you do not have normal security in place, the tables are being updated directly by users; thus direct update permissions have been granted to either specific users, or worse, all users. The consequence is, there is no way of knowing who is updating the table, and who is breaking the data or referential integrity.
As far as Auditing goes, if security were in place, then the auditing burden is also substantially reduced: you need to audit stored proc executions only. Otherwise, you need to audit all updates to all tables.