Change column / field order in OpenOffice Base ( HSQL )

An article by Binary Tides    No Comments

Altering the sequence of fields of a table was a feature I was looking for in OpenOffice Base. It is not directly possible to drag the columns or fields and alter their sequence.

A SQL workaround can do the same thing.

If the sequence of fields is :

name , email , address , phone

and phone is to be brought before address like this :

name , email , phone , address

then the sql for this should be

1. ALTER TABLE “tablename” ADD COLUMN “phone2″ INTEGER BEFORE “address”

2. UPDATE “tablename” SET “phone2″ = “phone”

3. ALTER TABLE “tablename” DROP COLUMN “phone”

4. ALTER TABLE “tablename” ALTER COLUMN “phone2″ RENAME TO “phone”

Then View > Refresh Tables in the top menu. And open the table again for viewing.
The sequence should now be name , email , phone , address

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