SQL Unique Columns.

Create Unique Column in a table

  • PRIMARY KEY constraints gives you normally the unique identifier for each row in a SQL table, and a table can only have one PRIMARY KEY.
  • Sometimes we want more unique identifiers for each row in a table, and this is what UNIQUE statement is to be used for.
  • You can have as many UNIQUE constraints per table you want. This can also be combined with a PRIMARY KEY constraint.
  • Columns included in a UNIQUE constraint can not be specified to be NULL.
  • There are mainly two ways to specify a UNIQUE constraints, when you creates a table.
    1. For a single column to be a UNIQUE you can specify UNIQUE at end of the column specification in nearly all RDBMS.
    2. For multiple columns to be UNIQUE you must use a CONSTRAINT statement at end of all columns specification.
  • Single column to be a UNIQUE constraint example:
    MySQL, Oracle, SQL server, PostgreSQL:
    CREATE TABLE customer (
      CUSTOMER_ID INT NOT NULL UNIQUE,
      FIRST_NAME VARCHAR(30) NOT NULL,
      LAST_NAME VARCHAR(20) NULL,
      EMAIL VARCHAR(30) NULL
    )

    In this case it will not be possible to register rows where some have equal value in the column CUSTOMER_ID.

    Multiple columns to be a UNIQUE constraint example:
    MySQL, Oracle, SQL server, PostgreSQL:
    CREATE TABLE customer (
      CUSTOMER_ID INT NOT NULL PRIMARY KEY,
      FIRST_NAME VARCHAR(30) NOT NULL,
      LAST_NAME VARCHAR(40) NOT NULL,
      EMAIL VARCHAR(30) NULL,
      CONSTRAINT pk_CUSTOMER UNIQUE (FIRST_NAME,LAST_NAME)
    )

    In this case it will not be possible to register rows where some have equal values in the combination of the columns FIRST_NAME and LAST_NAME.

    Nor is it possible to register rows where CUSTOMER_ID is duplicated since CUSTOMER_ID is the table's primary key.

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