Re: Timestamp field

["Nelson C. Smith" <ncsmith@xxxxxxxx>]

I have way too much respect for you to dispute what you are saying, Buck,
but I was just wondering....  Why would the SQL timestamp function be any
more accurate than the RPG TIME opcode?   In the past, I've had just the
exact opposite problem.  The RPG opcode would give a good, completely
accurate timestamp and SQL would not.

All my audit files use the timestamp as the final unique key (in addition to
whatever key the masterfile used), and we've never had a duplicate key on
any of our machines (up to a 4-way), except when *LOVAL was being written
(in error).  Of course, I don't know of any applications that write or
update the very same record over and over again quick enough to cause such a
problem, so I suppose it's possible we just haven't hit one yet.  We have
had quite a lot of problems, however, using SQL to write records with a
timestamp in the key.

-----Original Message-----
From: Buck Calabro <buck.calabro@aptissoftware.com>
To: RPG400-L@midrange.com <RPG400-L@midrange.com>
Date: Thursday, January 20, 2000 4:12 PM
Subject: RE: Timestamp field


>Marc,
>I would not depend on using the timestamp as a unique key.  As you have
>found out, on a sufficiently fast enough machine you can get duplicates.
>The upshot of this is that even if it works today, when the next generation
>of CPUs come out it might fail.
>
>I would suggest adding another field (sequence number) if you have a need
to
>discriminate between each record.  If you really truly need the extra three
>digits, consider using SQL to do your insert, as in:
>insert into xxx (field, timstp) values(:field, CURRENT TIMESTAMP)
>
>Buck Calabro
>Aptis; Albany, NY


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