Object Naming Rules
The rules for naming database objects (such as tables, columns, views, and database procedures) are as follows:
• Names can contain only alphanumeric characters and must begin with an alphabetic character or an underscore (_). Database names must begin with an alphabetic character, and cannot begin with an underscore.
• Case significance (upper or lower) is determined by the settings for the database in which the object is created (Ingres or ANSI/ISO Entry SQL-92-compliant) and differs for
regular and delimited identifiers (see
Regular and Delimited Identifiers).
• Names can contain (but cannot begin with) the following special characters: 0 through 9, #, @, and $. Names specified as delimited identifiers (in double quotes) can contain additional special characters.
• Database objects cannot begin with the letters, ii. This name is reserved for use by the DBMS Server.
• The maximum length of names for the following objects is 256 bytes:
– Table
– Column
– Partition
– Procedure
– Procedure parameter
– Rule
– Sequence
– Synonym
– Object
– Constraint
In an installation that uses the UTF8 or any other multi-byte character set, the maximum length of a name may be less than 256 bytes because some glyphs use multiple bytes.
• The maximum length of names for the following objects is 32 bytes:
– Database
– Owner
– User
– Group
– Profile
– Role
– Schema
– Location
– Event
– Alarm
– Node
– Objects managed by the Ingres interfaces such as Query-By-Forms, Report-By-Forms, Vision, and Visual Forms Editor (for example: Forms, JoinDefs, QBFnames, Graphs, Reports)
Database names must be unique to 24 bytes (or the maximum file name length imposed by your operating system, if less than 24).
• The maximum length of a name for a collation sequence is 64 bytes.
• Avoid assigning reserved words as object names. A list of reserved words can be found in the appendix “Keywords.”
• For ANSI/ISO Entry SQL-92 compliant databases, the maximum length of an object name is 18 bytes.