refer to SYSDATE function in a CHECK constraint--doable?

From: Pardee, Roy E <roy.e.pardee_at_lmco.com>
Date: Thu, 21 Mar 2002 12:48:24 -0800
Message-ID: <F001.00430329.20020321124824@fatcity.com>

Greetings all,

I've got a table with a date field on a 8.1.6.0 db. I'd like to constrain the values entered into this field to be less than or equal to the date on which the record was entered. I figured a table-level check constraint would serve & so I ran:

ALTER TABLE TLB_COPIES
 ADD (CONSTRAINT TLBCPY_DATE_LAST_LABEL_CK CHECK (DATE_LAST_LABEL <= SYSDATE)
 EXCEPTIONS INTO COMN_EXCEPTIONS) And Oracle complained thus:

 ADD (CONSTRAINT TLBCPY_DATE_LAST_LABEL_CK CHECK (DATE_LAST_LABEL <= SYSDATE)

                                                                     *

ERROR at line 2:
ORA-02436: date or system variable wrongly specified in CHECK constraint

I've also tried using TO_DATE(SYSDATE) after running accross that expression in some code examples in the docs (does SYSDATE not return a date type?), but get the same error.

I've searched through metalink for this error, but everything I've found deals with how you've got to to_date() a date literal (e.g., no implicit conversions) and be sure to use a full four-digit year (as of 8.x I think). But I'm not seeing anything that refers to the sysdate function--is it just not allowed? I'm pretty sure you can use it as a DEFAULT...

Thanks!

-Roy

Roy Pardee
Programmer/Analyst
SWFPAC Lockheed Martin IT
Extension 8487
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Author: Pardee, Roy E
  INET: roy.e.pardee_at_lmco.com

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