Controlling DDL Sequences¶

The sqlalchemy.schema package contains SQL expression constructs that provide DDL expressions. For example, to produce a CREATE TABLE statement:

from sqlalchemy.schema import CreateTable
sqlengine.execute(CreateTable(mytable))
CREATE TABLE mytable (
    col1 INTEGER,
    col2 INTEGER,
    col3 INTEGER,
    col4 INTEGER,
    col5 INTEGER,
    col6 INTEGER
)

Above, the CreateTable construct works like any other expression construct (such as select(), table.insert(), etc.). A full reference of available constructs is in DDL Expression Constructs API.

The DDL constructs all extend a common base class which provides the capability to be associated with an individual Table or MetaData object, to be invoked upon create/drop events. Consider the example of a table which contains a CHECK constraint:

users = Table('users', metadata,
               Column('user_id', Integer, primary_key=True),
               Column('user_name', String(40), nullable=False),
               CheckConstraint('length(user_name) >= 8',name="cst_user_name_length")
               )

sqlusers.create(engine)
CREATE TABLE users (
    user_id SERIAL NOT NULL,
    user_name VARCHAR(40) NOT NULL,
    PRIMARY KEY (user_id),
    CONSTRAINT cst_user_name_length  CHECK (length(user_name) >= 8)
)

The above table contains a column “user_name” which is subject to a CHECK constraint that validates that the length of the string is at least eight characters. When a create() is issued for this table, DDL for the CheckConstraint will also be issued inline within the table definition.

The CheckConstraint construct can also be constructed externally and associated with the Table afterwards:

constraint = CheckConstraint('length(user_name) >= 8',name="cst_user_name_length")
users.append_constraint(constraint)

So far, the effect is the same. However, if we create DDL elements corresponding to the creation and removal of this constraint, and associate them with the Table as events, these new events will take over the job of issuing DDL for the constraint. Additionally, the constraint will be added via ALTER:

from sqlalchemy import event

event.listen(
    users,
    "after_create",
    AddConstraint(constraint)
)
event.listen(
    users,
    "before_drop",
    DropConstraint(constraint)
)

sqlusers.create(engine)
CREATE TABLE users (
    user_id SERIAL NOT NULL,
    user_name VARCHAR(40) NOT NULL,
    PRIMARY KEY (user_id)
)

ALTER TABLE users ADD CONSTRAINT cst_user_name_length  CHECK (length(user_name) >= 8)
sqlusers.drop(engine)
ALTER TABLE users DROP CONSTRAINT cst_user_name_length
DROP TABLE user

The real usefulness of the above becomes clearer once we illustrate the DDLElement.execute_if() method. This method returns a modified form of the DDL callable which will filter on criteria before responding to a received event. It accepts a parameter dialect, which is the string name of a dialect or a tuple of such, which will limit the execution of the item to just those dialects. It also accepts a callable_ parameter which may reference a Python callable which will be invoked upon event reception, returning True or False indicating if the event should proceed.

If our CheckConstraint was only supported by Postgresql and not other databases, we could limit its usage to just that dialect:

event.listen(
    users,
    'after_create',
    AddConstraint(constraint).execute_if(dialect='postgresql')
)
event.listen(
    users,
    'before_drop',
    DropConstraint(constraint).execute_if(dialect='postgresql')
)

Or to any set of dialects:

event.listen(
    users,
    "after_create",
    AddConstraint(constraint).execute_if(dialect=('postgresql', 'mysql'))
)
event.listen(
    users,
    "before_drop",
    DropConstraint(constraint).execute_if(dialect=('postgresql', 'mysql'))
)

When using a callable, the callable is passed the ddl element, the Table or MetaData object whose “create” or “drop” event is in progress, and the Connection object being used for the operation, as well as additional information as keyword arguments. The callable can perform checks, such as whether or not a given item already exists. Below we define should_create() and should_drop() callables that check for the presence of our named constraint:

def should_create(ddl, target, connection, **kw):
    row = connection.execute("select conname from pg_constraint where conname='%s'" % ddl.element.name).scalar()
    return not bool(row)

def should_drop(ddl, target, connection, **kw):
    return not should_create(ddl, target, connection, **kw)

event.listen(
    users,
    "after_create",
    AddConstraint(constraint).execute_if(callable_=should_create)
)
event.listen(
    users,
    "before_drop",
    DropConstraint(constraint).execute_if(callable_=should_drop)
)

sqlusers.create(engine)
CREATE TABLE users (
    user_id SERIAL NOT NULL,
    user_name VARCHAR(40) NOT NULL,
    PRIMARY KEY (user_id)
)

select conname from pg_constraint where conname='cst_user_name_length'
ALTER TABLE users ADD CONSTRAINT cst_user_name_length  CHECK (length(user_name) >= 8)
sqlusers.drop(engine)
select conname from pg_constraint where conname='cst_user_name_length'
ALTER TABLE users DROP CONSTRAINT cst_user_name_length
DROP TABLE user

Custom DDL¶

Custom DDL phrases are most easily achieved using the DDL construct. This construct works like all the other DDL elements except it accepts a string which is the text to be emitted:

event.listen(
    metadata,
    "after_create",
    DDL("ALTER TABLE users ADD CONSTRAINT "
        "cst_user_name_length "
        " CHECK (length(user_name) >= 8)")
)

A more comprehensive method of creating libraries of DDL constructs is to use custom compilation - see Custom SQL Constructs and Compilation Extension for details.

DDL Expression Constructs API¶

class sqlalchemy.schema.DDLElement¶

Bases: sqlalchemy.sql.expression.Executable, sqlalchemy.schema._DDLCompiles

Base class for DDL expression constructs.

This class is the base for the general purpose DDL class, as well as the various create/drop clause constructs such as CreateTable, DropTable, AddConstraint, etc.

DDLElement integrates closely with SQLAlchemy events, introduced in Events. An instance of one is itself an event receiving callable:

event.listen(
    users,
    'after_create',
    AddConstraint(constraint).execute_if(dialect='postgresql')
)

See also

DDL

DDLEvents

Events

Controlling DDL Sequences

__call__(target, bind, **kw)¶

Execute the DDL as a ddl_listener.

against(target)¶

Return a copy of this DDL against a specific schema item.

bind¶

callable_ = None¶

dialect = None¶

execute(bind=None, target=None)¶

Execute this DDL immediately.

Executes the DDL statement in isolation using the supplied Connectable or Connectable assigned to the .bind property, if not supplied. If the DDL has a conditional on criteria, it will be invoked with None as the event.

Parameters:	bind¶ – Optional, an Engine or Connection. If not supplied, a valid Connectable must be present in the .bind property. target¶ – Optional, defaults to None. The target SchemaItem for the execute call. Will be passed to the on callable if any, and may also provide string expansion data for the statement. See execute_at for more information.

execute_at(event_name, target)¶

Link execution of this DDL to the DDL lifecycle of a SchemaItem.

Deprecated since version 0.7: See DDLEvents, as well as DDLElement.execute_if().

Links this DDLElement to a Table or MetaData instance, executing it when that schema item is created or dropped. The DDL statement will be executed using the same Connection and transactional context as the Table create/drop itself. The .bind property of this statement is ignored.

Parameters:	event¶ – One of the events defined in the schema item’s .ddl_events; e.g. ‘before-create’, ‘after-create’, ‘before-drop’ or ‘after-drop’ target¶ – The Table or MetaData instance for which this DDLElement will be associated with.

A DDLElement instance can be linked to any number of schema items.

execute_at builds on the append_ddl_listener interface of MetaData and Table objects.

Caveat: Creating or dropping a Table in isolation will also trigger any DDL set to execute_at that Table’s MetaData. This may change in a future release.

execute_if(dialect=None, callable_=None, state=None)¶

Return a callable that will execute this DDLElement conditionally.

Used to provide a wrapper for event listening:

event.listen(
            metadata,
            'before_create',
            DDL("my_ddl").execute_if(dialect='postgresql')
        )

Parameters:

dialect¶ – May be a string, tuple or a callable predicate. If a string, it will be compared to the name of the executing database dialect: DDL('something').execute_if(dialect='postgresql') If a tuple, specifies multiple dialect names: DDL('something').execute_if(dialect=('postgresql', 'mysql')) callable_¶ – A callable, which will be invoked with four positional arguments as well as optional keyword arguments: ddl: This DDL element. target: The Table or MetaData object which is the target of this event. May be None if the DDL is executed explicitly. bind: The Connection being used for DDL execution tables: Optional keyword argument - a list of Table objects which are to be created/ dropped within a MetaData.create_all() or drop_all() method call. state: Optional keyword argument - will be the state argument passed to this function. checkfirst: Keyword argument, will be True if the ‘checkfirst’ flag was set during the call to create(), create_all(), drop(), drop_all(). If the callable returns a true value, the DDL statement will be executed. state¶ – any value which will be passed to the callable_ as the state keyword argument.

See also

DDLEvents

Events

on = None¶

target = None¶

class sqlalchemy.schema.DDL(statement, on=None, context=None, bind=None)¶

Bases: sqlalchemy.schema.DDLElement

A literal DDL statement.

Specifies literal SQL DDL to be executed by the database. DDL objects function as DDL event listeners, and can be subscribed to those events listed in DDLEvents, using either Table or MetaData objects as targets. Basic templating support allows a single DDL instance to handle repetitive tasks for multiple tables.

Examples:

from sqlalchemy import event, DDL

tbl = Table('users', metadata, Column('uid', Integer))
event.listen(tbl, 'before_create', DDL('DROP TRIGGER users_trigger'))

spow = DDL('ALTER TABLE %(table)s SET secretpowers TRUE')
event.listen(tbl, 'after_create', spow.execute_if(dialect='somedb'))

drop_spow = DDL('ALTER TABLE users SET secretpowers FALSE')
connection.execute(drop_spow)

When operating on Table events, the following statement string substitions are available:

%(table)s  - the Table name, with any required quoting applied
%(schema)s - the schema name, with any required quoting applied
%(fullname)s - the Table name including schema, quoted if needed

The DDL’s “context”, if any, will be combined with the standard substitutions noted above. Keys present in the context will override the standard substitutions.

__init__(statement, on=None, context=None, bind=None)¶

Create a DDL statement.

Parameters:

statement¶ – A string or unicode string to be executed. Statements will be processed with Python’s string formatting operator. See the context argument and the execute_at method. A literal ‘%’ in a statement must be escaped as ‘%%’. SQL bind parameters are not available in DDL statements. on¶ – Deprecated since version 0.7: See DDLElement.execute_if(). Optional filtering criteria. May be a string, tuple or a callable predicate. If a string, it will be compared to the name of the executing database dialect: DDL('something', on='postgresql') If a tuple, specifies multiple dialect names: DDL('something', on=('postgresql', 'mysql')) If a callable, it will be invoked with four positional arguments as well as optional keyword arguments: ddl: This DDL element. event: The name of the event that has triggered this DDL, such as ‘after-create’ Will be None if the DDL is executed explicitly. target: The Table or MetaData object which is the target of this event. May be None if the DDL is executed explicitly. connection: The Connection being used for DDL execution tables: Optional keyword argument - a list of Table objects which are to be created/ dropped within a MetaData.create_all() or drop_all() method call. If the callable returns a true value, the DDL statement will be executed. context¶ – Optional dictionary, defaults to None. These values will be available for use in string substitutions on the DDL statement. bind¶ – Optional. A Connectable, used by default when execute() is invoked without a bind argument.

See also

DDLEvents

sqlalchemy.event

class sqlalchemy.schema.CreateTable(element, on=None, bind=None)¶

Bases: sqlalchemy.schema._CreateDropBase

Represent a CREATE TABLE statement.

__init__(element, on=None, bind=None)¶

Create a CreateTable construct.

Parameters:	element¶ – a Table that’s the subject of the CREATE on¶ – See the description for ‘on’ in DDL. bind¶ – See the description for ‘bind’ in DDL.

class sqlalchemy.schema.DropTable(element, on=None, bind=None)¶

Bases: sqlalchemy.schema._CreateDropBase

Represent a DROP TABLE statement.

class sqlalchemy.schema.CreateColumn(element)¶

Bases: sqlalchemy.schema._DDLCompiles

Represent a Column as rendered in a CREATE TABLE statement, via the CreateTable construct.

This is provided to support custom column DDL within the generation of CREATE TABLE statements, by using the compiler extension documented in Custom SQL Constructs and Compilation Extension to extend CreateColumn.

Typical integration is to examine the incoming Column object, and to redirect compilation if a particular flag or condition is found:

from sqlalchemy import schema
from sqlalchemy.ext.compiler import compiles

@compiles(schema.CreateColumn)
def compile(element, compiler, **kw):
    column = element.element

    if "special" not in column.info:
        return compiler.visit_create_column(element, **kw)

    text = "%s SPECIAL DIRECTIVE %s" % (
            column.name,
            compiler.type_compiler.process(column.type)
        )
    default = compiler.get_column_default_string(column)
    if default is not None:
        text += " DEFAULT " + default

    if not column.nullable:
        text += " NOT NULL"

    if column.constraints:
        text += " ".join(
                    compiler.process(const)
                    for const in column.constraints)
    return text

The above construct can be applied to a Table as follows:

from sqlalchemy import Table, Metadata, Column, Integer, String
from sqlalchemy import schema

metadata = MetaData()

table = Table('mytable', MetaData(),
        Column('x', Integer, info={"special":True}, primary_key=True),
        Column('y', String(50)),
        Column('z', String(20), info={"special":True})
    )

metadata.create_all(conn)

Above, the directives we’ve added to the Column.info collection will be detected by our custom compilation scheme:

CREATE TABLE mytable (
        x SPECIAL DIRECTIVE INTEGER NOT NULL,
        y VARCHAR(50),
        z SPECIAL DIRECTIVE VARCHAR(20),
    PRIMARY KEY (x)
)

The CreateColumn construct can also be used to skip certain columns when producing a CREATE TABLE. This is accomplished by creating a compilation rule that conditionally returns None. This is essentially how to produce the same effect as using the system=True argument on Column, which marks a column as an implicitly-present “system” column.

For example, suppose we wish to produce a Table which skips rendering of the Postgresql xmin column against the Postgresql backend, but on other backends does render it, in anticipation of a triggered rule. A conditional compilation rule could skip this name only on Postgresql:

from sqlalchemy.schema import CreateColumn

@compiles(CreateColumn, "postgresql")
def skip_xmin(element, compiler, **kw):
    if element.element.name == 'xmin':
        return None
    else:
        return compiler.visit_create_column(element, **kw)


my_table = Table('mytable', metadata,
            Column('id', Integer, primary_key=True),
            Column('xmin', Integer)
        )

Above, a CreateTable construct will generate a CREATE TABLE which only includes the id column in the string; the xmin column will be omitted, but only against the Postgresql backend.

New in version 0.8.3: The CreateColumn construct supports skipping of columns by returning None from a custom compilation rule.

New in version 0.8: The CreateColumn construct was added to support custom column creation styles.

class sqlalchemy.schema.CreateSequence(element, on=None, bind=None)¶

Bases: sqlalchemy.schema._CreateDropBase

Represent a CREATE SEQUENCE statement.

class sqlalchemy.schema.DropSequence(element, on=None, bind=None)¶

Bases: sqlalchemy.schema._CreateDropBase

Represent a DROP SEQUENCE statement.

class sqlalchemy.schema.CreateIndex(element, on=None, bind=None)¶

Bases: sqlalchemy.schema._CreateDropBase

Represent a CREATE INDEX statement.

class sqlalchemy.schema.DropIndex(element, on=None, bind=None)¶

Bases: sqlalchemy.schema._CreateDropBase

Represent a DROP INDEX statement.

class sqlalchemy.schema.AddConstraint(element, *args, **kw)¶

Bases: sqlalchemy.schema._CreateDropBase

Represent an ALTER TABLE ADD CONSTRAINT statement.

class sqlalchemy.schema.DropConstraint(element, cascade=False, **kw)¶

Bases: sqlalchemy.schema._CreateDropBase

Represent an ALTER TABLE DROP CONSTRAINT statement.

class sqlalchemy.schema.CreateSchema(name, quote=None, **kw)¶

Bases: sqlalchemy.schema._CreateDropBase

Represent a CREATE SCHEMA statement.

New in version 0.7.4.

The argument here is the string name of the schema.

__init__(name, quote=None, **kw)¶

Create a new CreateSchema construct.

class sqlalchemy.schema.DropSchema(name, quote=None, cascade=False, **kw)¶

Bases: sqlalchemy.schema._CreateDropBase

Represent a DROP SCHEMA statement.

The argument here is the string name of the schema.

New in version 0.7.4.

__init__(name, quote=None, cascade=False, **kw)¶

Create a new DropSchema construct.