How to create id with AUTO_INCREMENT on Oracle?

Question

It appears that there is no concept of AUTO_INCREMENT in Oracle, up until and including version 11g.

How can I create a column that behaves like auto increment in Or

Answer 1

Here are three flavors:

1. numeric. Simple increasing numeric value, e.g. 1,2,3,....
2. GUID. globally univeral identifier, as a RAW datatype.
3. GUID (string). Same as above, but as a string which might be easier to handle in some languages.

x is the identity column. Substitute FOO with your table name in each of the examples.

-- numerical identity, e.g. 1,2,3...
create table FOO (
    x number primary key
);
create sequence  FOO_seq;

create or replace trigger FOO_trg
before insert on FOO
for each row
begin
  select FOO_seq.nextval into :new.x from dual;
end;
/

-- GUID identity, e.g. 7CFF0C304187716EE040488AA1F9749A
-- use the commented out lines if you prefer RAW over VARCHAR2.
create table FOO (
    x varchar(32) primary key        -- string version
    -- x raw(32) primary key         -- raw version
);

create or replace trigger FOO_trg
before insert on FOO
for each row
begin
  select cast(sys_guid() as varchar2(32)) into :new.x from dual;  -- string version
  -- select sys_guid() into :new.x from dual;                     -- raw version
end;
/

update:

Oracle 12c introduces these two variants that don't depend on triggers:

create table mytable(id number default mysequence.nextval);
create table mytable(id number generated as identity);

The first one uses a sequence in the traditional way; the second manages the value internally.

Answer 2

Trigger and Sequence can be used when you want serialized number that anyone can easily read/remember/understand. But if you don't want to manage ID Column (like emp_id) by this way, and value of this column is not much considerable, you can use SYS_GUID() at Table Creation to get Auto Increment like this.

CREATE TABLE <table_name> 
(emp_id RAW(16) DEFAULT SYS_GUID() PRIMARY KEY,
name VARCHAR2(30));

Now your emp_id column will accept "globally unique identifier value". you can insert value in table by ignoring emp_id column like this.

INSERT INTO <table_name> (name) VALUES ('name value');

So, it will insert unique value to your emp_id Column.

Answer 3

it is called Identity Columns and it is available only from oracle Oracle 12c

CREATE TABLE identity_test_tab
(
   id            NUMBER GENERATED ALWAYS AS IDENTITY,
   description   VARCHAR2 (30)
);

example of insert into Identity Columns as below

INSERT INTO identity_test_tab (description) VALUES ('Just DESCRIPTION');

1 row created.

you can NOT do insert like below

INSERT INTO identity_test_tab (id, description) VALUES (NULL, 'ID=NULL and DESCRIPTION');

ERROR at line 1: ORA-32795: cannot insert into a generated always identity column

INSERT INTO identity_test_tab (id, description) VALUES (999, 'ID=999 and DESCRIPTION');

ERROR at line 1: ORA-32795: cannot insert into a generated always identity column

useful link

Answer 4

There is no such thing as "auto_increment" or "identity" columns in Oracle as of Oracle 11g. However, you can model it easily with a sequence and a trigger:

Table definition:

CREATE TABLE departments (
  ID           NUMBER(10)    NOT NULL,
  DESCRIPTION  VARCHAR2(50)  NOT NULL);

ALTER TABLE departments ADD (
  CONSTRAINT dept_pk PRIMARY KEY (ID));

CREATE SEQUENCE dept_seq START WITH 1;

Trigger definition:

CREATE OR REPLACE TRIGGER dept_bir 
BEFORE INSERT ON departments 
FOR EACH ROW

BEGIN
  SELECT dept_seq.NEXTVAL
  INTO   :new.id
  FROM   dual;
END;
/

UPDATE:

IDENTITY column is now available on Oracle 12c:

create table t1 (
    c1 NUMBER GENERATED by default on null as IDENTITY,
    c2 VARCHAR2(10)
    );

or specify starting and increment values, also preventing any insert into the identity column (GENERATED ALWAYS) (again, Oracle 12c+ only)

create table t1 (
    c1 NUMBER GENERATED ALWAYS as IDENTITY(START with 1 INCREMENT by 1),
    c2 VARCHAR2(10)
    );

Alternatively, Oracle 12 also allows to use a sequence as a default value:

CREATE SEQUENCE dept_seq START WITH 1;

CREATE TABLE departments (
  ID           NUMBER(10)    DEFAULT dept_seq.nextval NOT NULL,
  DESCRIPTION  VARCHAR2(50)  NOT NULL);

ALTER TABLE departments ADD (
  CONSTRAINT dept_pk PRIMARY KEY (ID));

Answer 5

Maybe just try this simple script:

http://www.hlavaj.sk/ai.php

Result is:

CREATE SEQUENCE TABLE_PK_SEQ; 
CREATE OR REPLACE TRIGGER TR_SEQ_TABLE BEFORE INSERT ON TABLE FOR EACH ROW 

BEGIN
SELECT TABLE_PK_SEQ.NEXTVAL
INTO :new.PK
FROM dual;
END;

Answer 6

This is how I did this on an existing table and column (named id):

UPDATE table SET id=ROWNUM;
DECLARE
  maxval NUMBER;
BEGIN
  SELECT MAX(id) INTO maxval FROM table;
  EXECUTE IMMEDIATE 'DROP SEQUENCE table_seq';
  EXECUTE IMMEDIATE 'CREATE SEQUENCE table_seq START WITH '|| TO_CHAR(TO_NUMBER(maxval)+1) ||' INCREMENT BY 1 NOMAXVALUE';
END;
CREATE TRIGGER table_trigger
  BEFORE INSERT ON table
  FOR EACH ROW
BEGIN
  :new.id := table_seq.NEXTVAL;
END;