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HilaireFlag for France

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Changing Primary key on a big table

Hi experts, I've been using mostly SQL Server in the last 5 years, so my Oracle skills are a little outdated. I need your advice for the following :

On a datawarehouse Oracle 9i DB, a table has been wrongly designed and I'm asked to change the primary key to avoid dupes.

Let's call it STAR12, and assume the current primary key is on
(ID_MONTH int, ID_DWH int) where ID_DWH is a sequence number that resets for each new ID_MONTH

I had to alter the table to add a new field ID_GRP_RISK
And I need to
- populate the new field (I've done this part)
- delete the records where the new field is null (done it too)
- set a not null constraint on the new field
- drop the current primary key
- delete the duplicate records
- create the new primary key on (ID_MONTH, ID_GRP_RISK)

The requirements :
I've been told that applying the changes to the historical data is a requirement. Dropping the table and running the loading script to populate a brand new table for each and every month is not an option.

My current concerns :
I was wondering if it would not be better to keep the current index and just create a new unique index on (ID_MONTH, ID_GRP_RISK), and if you experts would have better ideas or advices to handle this situation.

Also I was wondering if it would not be more effective to
- create a non-unique index first, to speed up the deleting of the dupes (records that have the same ID_MONTH, ID_GRP_RISK)
- delete the dupes
- make it the primary key afterwards (is it even possible ?)

The table has about 1 million records per ID_MONTH, currently 20 months loaded.

To avoid filling the temp tablespaces and / or swapping forever, I loop on ID_Month with a cursor to put intermediary COMMITs after each month is processed.

Any ideas/sample code welcome (more efficient syntax), in particular

I will create another topic for the "delete dupes" part if need be.

Thanks for reading

Hilaire
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sathyagiri
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1.Create an non-unique index as you mentioned on the ID_MONTH and ID_GRP_RISK
1.For deleting your duplicates, think of using BULK COLLECT using FORALL.
3.Then drop the nojn-unique index and create your primary key

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ASKER

thanks for your comment sathyagiri
would you mind setting verbose mode on (no offence meant, I really appreciate your comment above ;-) ) and giving me a few tips on how to remove dupes using BULK COLLECT FORALL, so that I get the general idea ?

I'm going through the BULK COLLECT online reference just now, but I'm not familiar with it at all, so I'd be glad to get a short explaination so that Idon't miss the point.
Thanks again

Hilaire
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sathyagiri
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Sujith
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Thanks a million.
I really appreciate your help.

Regards

Hilaire
>>And I need to<<
  - populate the new field (I've done this part)
OK
  - delete the records where the new field is null (done it too)
OK
  - delete the duplicate records
Needs to be done first

delete from star12
where rowid not in
(select row_id from
 (select id_month, id_grp_risk, max(rowid) row_id
  from star12
  group by id_month, id_grp_risk));

  - create the new primary key on (ID_MONTH, ID_GRP_RISK)
Should be done next
create unique index <index_name> on star12(id_month, id_grp_risk); => use keyword local if table is partitioned

  - set a not null constraint on the new field
alter table star12 add constraint <same as index_name>
 primary key(id_month, id_grp_risk) using index;

  - drop the current primary key
alter table star12 drop constraint <old_constraint_name>;
drop index <old_index_name>;


Sorry, I shouldn't have gone to lunch leaving the question open. I see you already have the solution. Good job, guys:-)