MySQL: Custom row validation - mysql

Question

I have such example:
CREATE TABLE a(
id INT PRIMARY KEY AUTO_INCREMENT,
parent_id INT,
FOREIGN KEY (parent_id) REFERENCES a(id)
);
DELIMITER ;;
CREATE TRIGGER a_insert BEFORE INSERT ON a
FOR EACH ROW
BEGIN
SIGNAL SQLSTATE '01431' SET MESSAGE_TEXT = 'The foreign data source you are trying to reference does not exist.';
END;;
DELIMITER ;
INSERT INTO a(parent_id) VALUES (NULL);
INSERT INTO a(parent_id) VALUES (1);
INSERT INTO a(parent_id) VALUES (2);
INSERT INTO a(parent_id) VALUES (4);
INSERT INTO a(parent_id) VALUES (999);
SELECT * FROM a
This end up with 4 recods:
----------------
id parent_id
----------------
1 NULL
2 1
3 2
4 4
I found post online that MySQL does not support rollbacks in triggers. That is a problem because I want such hierarchy where no row points to it self and inserts like the one with ID=4 works just fine. How do I ensure there are no such records in database?

Answer 1

Well, the problem is with auto_increment, because you in BEFORE INSERT event you don't have that value assigned yet. On the other hand in AFTER INSERT event you can't do anything with it.
If you want to use auto_increment id column a possible solution is to use separate table for sequencing.
Your schema would look like
CREATE TABLE a_seq(
id INT NOT NULL AUTO_INCREMENT PRIMARY KEY
);
CREATE TABLE a(
id INT NOT NULL PRIMARY KEY DEFAULT 0,
parent_id INT,
FOREIGN KEY (parent_id) REFERENCES a(id)
);
And your trigger
DELIMITER $$
CREATE TRIGGER a_insert
BEFORE INSERT ON a
FOR EACH ROW
BEGIN
INSERT INTO a_seq VALUES(NULL);
SET NEW.id = LAST_INSERT_ID();
IF NEW.id = NEW.parent_id THEN
SET NEW.id = NULL;
END IF;
END$$
DELIMITER ;
If id=parent_id the trigger deliberately violates NOT NULL constraint assigning NULL value. Therefore this record won't be inserted.
Here is SQLFiddle demo. Uncomment last insert statement. It won't allow you to make such insert.