Stephan Szabo <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> Is there anything we have right now that will handle this kind of thing
> without requiring either updating all the counts after a deletion in a
> statement trigger or once per row updating all the counts for records with
> the same "a" (doing something like make a sequence and using it in a
> subselect matching keys)?

The best thing I can think of is your first idea, ie, renumbering all
the rows in a statement-level AFTER DELETE trigger.  Something like
(untested)

        DECLARE
                rec record;
                n integer := 1;
        BEGIN
                FOR rec IN
                        SELECT * FROM table
                        WHERE <<grouping cols = rec's grouping cols>>
                        ORDER BY sort_order
                LOOP
                        IF rec.sort_order != n THEN
                                UPDATE table SET sort_order = n
                                WHERE <<primary key = rec's primary key>>;
                        END IF;
                        n := n + 1;
                END LOOP;
        END;

Ugly as this is, it's at least linear in the number of rows to be
changed; the originally proposed trigger was O(N^2) in the number of
rows affected, and would surely be intolerably slow for multiple deletes
in a reasonably sized table.  Given an index on the grouping columns
plus sort_order, it could even be reasonably fast (don't forget to make
the ORDER BY match the index).

                        regards, tom lane

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