Our application reads a record from an Oracle 'Event' table. When the event record exists we update the 'count' field of that record. If the record doesn't exist we insert it. So we want only 1 record for a particular event in the table.
The problem with this is probably quite predictable: one application thread will read the table, see the event is not there, insert the new event and commit. But before it commits a second thread will also read the table and see the event is not there. And then both threads will insert the event and we end up with 2 records for the same event.
I guess synchronizing access to this particular method in our application will prevent this problem, but what is the best option in Oracle to prevent this? Will MERGE for example always prevent this problem?
Serialising access to the procedure that implements this functionality would be trivial to implement, using DBMS_LOCK to define and take an exclusive lock.
Serialising through SQL based methods is practically impossible, due to the read consistency model.
CREATE TABLE EVENTS (ID NUMBER PRIMARY KEY, COUNTER NUMBER NOT NULL);
MERGE INTO EVENTS
USING (SELECT ID, COUNTER FROM DUAL LEFT JOIN EVENTS ON EVENTS.ID = :EVENT_ID) SRC
ON (EVENTS.ID = SRC.ID)
WHEN MATCHED THEN UPDATE SET COUNTER = SRC.COUNTER + 1
WHEN NOT MATCHED THEN INSERT (ID, COUNTER) VALUES (:EVENT_ID, 1);
Simple SQL securing single record for each ID and consistently increasing the counter no matter what application fires it or number of concurrent thread. You don't need to code anything at all and it's very lightweight as well.
It also doesn't produce any exception related to data consistency so you don't need any special handling.
UPDATE: It actually produces unique violation exception if both threads are inserting. I thought the second merge would switch to update, but it doesn't.
UPDATE: Just tested the same case on SQL Server and when executing in parallel and the record doesn't exist one MERGE inserts and the second updates.
Related
We have simple case, We have a table with column emailId i.e. unique.....using oracle DB
Question#1
Multiple concurrent user can check if some email id is available or not. Like 2 user that same time check availability of: abc#test.com
session1: select emailid from user_table;
//If not present allow user to complete rest of the process & insert info
session2: select emailid from user_table;
Now both session will get that this email id (abc#test.com) is available & both try to insert, I know one of them will get error upon insertion BUT how we can make sure only 1 user get availability & other get not available upon select ??
Question#2
Also in case both sessions inserted the same value, then first will succeed, is there ways that 2nd session update that row instead of throwing error. Like we have another column for timestamp & want that 2nd session instead of throwing error simple update the timestamp column ?
As this is a rather abstract question, here are only some general guidelines:
To deal with concurrent insert in a table, you need an unique index, and be prepared in your code to deal with ORA-00001 error unique constraint violated. Never rely only on check before insert(unless you have somehow exclusive access to your table -- and even if so ... as of myself, I would add an unique index: doesn't cost much and make me sleep better)
Oracle has a MERGE statement that allows you update or insert based on a condition. This operation is sometimes called an upsert. By using that keywork you should be able to find more informationsSee Oracle: how to UPSERT (update or insert into a table?) for example.
Now for, some thoughts about you specific case (maybe):
The only way for the system to work as you suggested, would be to make some kind of reservation when you check for availability (i.e.: immediately insert the row, instead of just select). And then update the row when the user confirm. But that means: (1) you will have to somehow deal with never-confirmed reservations (2) that doesn't dispense you to have an unique index, and to deal with ORA-00001.
I am using Oracle
What is difference when we create ID using max(id)+1 and using sequance.nexval,where to use and when?
Like:
insert into student (id,name) values (select max(id)+1 from student, 'abc');
and
insert into student (id,name) values (SQ_STUDENT.nextval, 'abc');
SQ_STUDENT.nextval sometime gives error that duplicate record...
please help me on this doubt
With the select max(id) + 1 approach, two sessions inserting simultaneously will see the same current max ID from the table, and both insert the same new ID value. The only way to use this safely is to lock the table before starting the transaction, which is painful and serialises the transactions. (And as Stijn points out, values can be reused if the highest record is deleted). Basically, never use this approach. (There may very occasionally be a compelling reason to do so, but I'm not sure I've ever seen one).
The sequence guarantees that the two sessions will get different values, and no serialisation is needed. It will perform better and be safer, easier to code and easier to maintain.
The only way you can get duplicate errors using the sequence is if records already exist in the table with IDs above the sequence value, or if something is still inserting records without using the sequence. So if you had an existing table with manually entered IDs, say 1 to 10, and you created a sequence with a default start-with value of 1, the first insert using the sequence would try to insert an ID of 1 - which already exists. After trying that 10 times the sequence would give you 11, which would work. If you then used the max-ID approach to do the next insert that would use 12, but the sequence would still be on 11 and would also give you 12 next time you called nextval.
The sequence and table are not related. The sequence is not automatically updated if a manually-generated ID value is inserted into the table, so the two approaches don't mix. (Among other things, the same sequence can be used to generate IDs for multiple tables, as mentioned in the docs).
If you're changing from a manual approach to a sequence approach, you need to make sure the sequence is created with a start-with value that is higher than all existing IDs in the table, and that everything that does an insert uses the sequence only in the future.
Using a sequence works if you intend to have multiple users. Using a max does not.
If you do a max(id) + 1 and you allow multiple users, then multiple sessions that are both operating at the same time will regularly see the same max and, thus, will generate the same new key. Assuming you've configured your constraints correctly, that will generate an error that you'll have to handle. You'll handle it by retrying the INSERT which may fail again and again if other sessions block you before your session retries but that's a lot of extra code for every INSERT operation.
It will also serialize your code. If I insert a new row in my session and go off to lunch before I remember to commit (or my client application crashes before I can commit), every other user will be prevented from inserting a new row until I get back and commit or the DBA kills my session, forcing a reboot.
To add to the other answers, a couple of issues.
Your max(id)+1 syntax will also fail if there are no rows in the table already, so use:
Coalesce(Max(id),0) + 1
There's nothing wrong with this technique if you only have a single process that inserts into the table, as might be the case with a data warehouse load, and if max(id) is fast (which it probably is).
It also avoids the need for code to synchronise values between tables and sequences if you are moving restoring data to a test system, for example.
You can extend this method to multirow insert by using:
Coalesce(max(id),0) + rownum
I expect that might serialise a parallel insert, though.
Some techniques don't work well with these methods. They rely of course on being able to issue the select statement, so SQL*Loader might be ruled out. However SQL*Loader has support for this technique in general through the SEQUENCE parameter of the column specification: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E11882_01/server.112/e22490/ldr_field_list.htm#i1008234
Assuming MAX(ID) is actually fast enough, wouldn't it be possible to:
First get MAX(ID)+1
Then get NEXTVAL
Compare those two and increase sequence in case NEXTVAL is smaller then MAX(ID)+1
Use NEXTVAL in INSERT statement
In that case I would have a fully stable procedure and manual inserts would also be allowed without worrying about updating the sequence
I have ORM setup and working with Oracle on an existing database and have been able to get inserts to work when I access the sequence but because triggers were used in the original application the sequence skips a number.
Is there a way to get ORM to use the trigger?
Disabling the trigger is not an option since it is used by the existing app and cannot be disabled during migration.
component persistent="true" table="table_name" schema="schema_name" {
property name="table_id" column="table_id" fieldtype="id" generator="sequence" sequence="schema_name.sequence_name";
...
}
Triggers are not accessible program units. The only way to "call" a trigger is to execute the appropriate DML against the owning table.
There are two possible resolutions to your problem.
Rewrite the trigger. You say another application still needs the trigger to populate the ID, but you could change the trigger's logic with a conditional....
if :new.id is null then
:new.id := whatever_seq.nextval; --11g syntax for brevity
end if;
This will populate the ID when the other application insert into the table but won't overwrite your value.
Stop worrying. Sequences are merely generators of unique identifiers. The numbers ascend but it really doesn't matter if there are gaps. Unless you are handling billions of rows it is extremely unlikely your sequence will run out of numbers before your applications get retired.
Do you mean that the DB normally assigns an ID, using an insert trigger? That would explain why you're skipping a number. You could try generator="select" which will get hibernate to read the ID back after the insert has occurred (and the trigger has been fired). It's there to handle exactly the situation I think you're describing.
I am programming a Windows Application (in Qt 4.6) which - at some point - inserts any number of datasets between 1 and around 76000 into some oracle (10.2) table. The application has to retrieve the primary keys, or at least the primary key range, from a sequence. It will then store the IDs in a list which is used for Batch Execution of a prepared query.
(Note: Triggers shall not be used, and the sequence is used by other tasks as well)
In order to avoid calling the sequence X times, I would like to increment the sequence by X instead.
What I have found out so far, is that the following code would be possible in a procedure:
ALTER SEQUENCE my_sequence INCREMENT BY X;
SELECT my_sequence.CURVAL + 1, my_sequence.NEXTVAL
INTO v_first_number, v_last_number
FROM dual;
ALTER SEQUENCE my_sequence INCREMENT BY 1;
I have two major concerns though:
I have read that ALTER SEQUENCE produces an implicit commit. Does this mean the transaction started by the Windows Application will be commited? If so, can you somehow avoid it?
Is this concept multi-user proof? Or could the following thing happen:
Sequence is at 10,000
Session A sets increment to 2,000
Session A selects 10,001 as first and 12,000 as last
Session B sets increment to 5,000
Session A sets increment to 1
Session B selects 12,001 as first and 12,001 as last
Session B sets increment to 1
Even if the procedure would be rather quick, it is not that unlikely in my application that two different users cause the procedure to be called almost simultaneously
1) ALTER SEQUENCE is DDL so it implicitly commits before and after the statement. The database transaction started by the Windows application will be committed. If you are using a distributed transaction coordinator other than the Oracle database, hopefully the transaction coordinator will commit the entire distributed transaction but transaction coordinators will sometimes have problems with commits issued that it is not aware of.
There is nothing that you can do to prevent DDL from committing.
2) The scenario you outline with multiple users is quite possible. So it doesn't sound like this approach would behave correctly in your environment.
You could potentially use the DBMS_LOCK package to ensure that only one session is calling your procedure at any point in time and then call the sequence N times from a single SQL statement. But if other processes are also using the sequence, there is no guarantee that you'll get a contiguous set of values.
CREATE PROCEDURE some_proc( p_num_rows IN NUMBER,
p_first_val OUT NUMBER,
p_last_val OUT NUMBER )
AS
l_lockhandle VARCHAR2(128);
l_lock_return_code INTEGER;
BEGIN
dbms_lock.allocate_unique( 'SOME_PROC_LOCK',
l_lockhandle );
l_lock_return_code := dbms_lock.request( lockhandle => l_lockhandle,
lockmode => dbms_lock.x_mode,
release_on_commit => true );
if( l_lock_return_code IN (0, 4) ) -- Success or already owned
then
<<do something>>
end if;
dbms_lock.release( l_lockhandle );
END;
Altering the sequence in this scenario is really bad idea. Particularly in multiuser environment. You'll get your transaction committed and probably several "race condition" data bugs or integrity errors.
It would be appropriate if you had legacy data alredy imported and want to insert new data with ids from sequence. Then you may alter the sequence to move currval to max existing ...
It seems to me that here you want to generate Ids from the sequence. That need not to be done by
select seq.nextval into l_variable from dual;
insert into table (id, ...) values (l_variable, ....);
You can use the sequence directly in the insert:
insert into table values (id, ...) values (seq.nextval, ....);
and optionally get the assigned value back by
insert into table values (id, ...) values (seq.nextval, ....)
returning id into l_variable;
It certainly is possible even for bulk operations with execBatch. Either just creating the ids or even returning them. I am not sure about the right syntax in java but it will be something about the lines
insert into table values (id, ...) values (seq.nextval, ....)
returning id bulk collect into l_cursor;
and you'll be given a ResultSet to browse the assigned numbers.
You can't prevent the implicit commit.
Your solution is not multi user proof. It is perfectly possible that another session will have 'restored' the increment to 1, just as you described.
I would suggest you keep fetching values one by one from the sequence, store these IDs one by one on your list and have the batch execution operate on that list.
What is the reason that you want to fetch a contiguous block of values from the sequence? I would not be too worried about performance, but maybe there are other requirements that I don't know of.
In Oracle, you can use following query to get next N values from a sequence that increments by one:
select level, PDQ_ACT_COMB_SEQ.nextval as seq from dual connect by level <= 5;
I tried to put it in a sentence but it is better to give an example:
SELECT * FROM someTable WHERE id = someID;
returns no rows
...
some time passes (no inserts are done to the table and no ID updates)
...
SELECT * FROM someTable WHERE id = someID;
returns one row!
Is it possible that some DB mechanism prevents first SELECT to return row?
Oracle log has no errors.
No transactions are rolled back when two selects are executed.
You can't see uncommitted data in another session. When did the commit happen?
EDIT1: Are you the only one using this database? Or did/do you have multiple sessions?
I think in another session you or someone else has inserted this row, you do your select and you don't see this row. After that a commit happens in the other session (maybe implicit because a session is closed) and then you see this row when you select again.
I can think of other explanations, but I first want to know are you only one using this database.
With read consistency as provided by Oracle, you should not see a row appear like that. If you are running in some mode with automatic commits, so that each statement is a self-contained transaction, then read consistency is not being violated. Which program are you using to access the database? I agree with the other observations; the row should not appear if your session is not inserting it and no other session is active at the same time. I don't know of a DBMS that indulges in spontaneous data generation.
Don't you have scheduled jobs in that Oracle?