Re: Disabling triggers / constraints

Christopher Kings-Lynne wrote:

>> Yes, agreed. I think we decided that super-user-only could disable
>> trigger on a global basis. I prevent folks from mucking with the system
>> tables to do it.
>
>
> It should be a per-table thing:
>
> ALTER TABLE blah [ DISABLE | ENABLE ] [ALL | FOREIGN KEY ] TRIGGERS;

Doing it with "alter table" seems to imply that the change is permanent
(eg, the table loses checking), whereas that is most certainly not what
is wanted. With a SET variable it lasts only for the session, and
doesn't have to be reset manually.

Assuming one wants the setting to last, as far as I can think of, an
alter table would also mean either a) doing the aforementioned juggling
with setting number of triggers to 0 and recounting when enabling or b)
adding a new field to tables on the catalog. Solution a) I think is a
nasty hack, and doesn't reflect the fact that the table *does* have
triggers (which just happen to be disabled), whereas solution a)
probably implies adding a field to tables in the catalog - and it's
probably too much trouble?
On the other hand, "alter table" has the advantage of being far more
intuitive. Any other comments on this?