Oracle constraint - compare two string like two times - oracle

Question

I would like to create table witj constrain which compare two varchar2(8 char) columns as time.
Is it possible ?
I've made somethink like this, but it doesn't work :(
CONSTRAINT "my_constraint" CHECK (to_number(to_char(to_date(window_stop, 'hh24:mi:ss'), 'sssss')) > to_number(to_char(to_date(window_start, 'hh24:mi:ss'), 'sssss'))) ENABLE
Thx for all help.
Paul.

Answer 1

Your constraint will get "ORA-02436: date or system variable wrongly specified in CHECK constraint" because if you don't provide the date elements then to_date() defaults to the first day of the current month; therefore the result of evaluating the constraint check could change after the data is inserted, which isn't allowed. It can't actually change in this specific case, but a general rule is being applied, causing the error.
You could use a nominal fixed date instead:
CONSTRAINT "my_constraint"
CHECK (
to_number(to_char(to_date('2000-01-01 ' || window_stop, 'YYYY-MM-DD hh24:mi:ss'), 'sssss'))
> to_number(to_char(to_date('2000-01-01 ' || window_start, 'YYYY-MM-DD hh24:mi:ss'), 'sssss'))
) ENABLE
db<>fiddle
There isn't much point converting to a number though, just compare the dates:
CONSTRAINT "my_constraint"
CHECK (
to_date('2000-01-01 ' || window_stop, 'YYYY-MM-DD hh24:mi:ss')
> to_date('2000-01-01 ' || window_start, 'YYYY-MM-DD hh24:mi:ss')
) ENABLE
db<>fiddle
Or - if you are confident that values are always going to be valid times and will have leading zeros - just compare the strings:
CONSTRAINT "my_constraint" CHECK (window_stop > window_start) ENABLE
db<>fiddle
You could also store the times as nominal dates, or as number of seconds past midnight, or as an interval, which would make it easier to prevent completely invalid values being used (e.g. '99:00:00'). But you may have a real date you can use instead - depends if these are tied to real dates, or e.g. shift patterns, or similar - which would allow you to handle windows crossing midnight. (What you should not do is store a related date and time as separate fields, but no indication that is what you are doing here.)

Answer 2

As I said, it is always a very bad idea to use varchar2 for date fields. Let me show you how your constraint is so easy when the fields are dates
SQL> create table t ( c1 date , c2 date ) ;
Table created.
SQL> alter session set nls_date_format='dd.mm.yyyy hh24:mi:ss' ;
Session altered.
SQL> insert into t values ( to_date('11.08.2020 14:00:00') , to_date('11.08.2020 14:10:00') ) ;
1 row created.
SQL> commit ;
Commit complete.
SQL> select * from t ;
C1 C2
------------------- -------------------
11.08.2020 14:00:00 11.08.2020 14:10:00
SQL> select ( c2 - c1 ) * 24 * 60 * 60 from t ;
(C2-C1)*24*60*60
----------------
600
Now, let's add the constraint
SQL> alter table t add constraint chk_test check ( c2 > c1 ) ;
Table altered.
SQL> insert into t values ( to_date('11.08.2020 14:11:00') , to_date('11.08.2020 14:10:00') ) ;
insert into t values ( to_date('11.08.2020 14:11:00') , to_date('11.08.2020 14:10:00') )
*
ERROR at line 1:
ORA-02290: check constraint (SYS.CHK_TEST) violated
You want to store times, which are dates, and you want to compare that the window_stop is greater than the window_start. Instead of making such complicated conversions, just store the fields as dates. Despite the fact that is the properly data type for the data you want to store, the constraint will work much more better.