Views with the check option

A view that is defined WITH CHECK OPTION enforces any rows that are modified or inserted against the SELECT statement for that view. Views with the check option are also called symmetric views. For example, a symmetric view that only returns only employees in department 10 will not allow insertion of employees in other departments. This option, therefore, ensures the integrity of the data being modified in the database, returning an error if the condition is violated during an INSERT or UPDATE operation.

If your application cannot define the required rules as table check constraints, or the rules do not apply to all uses of the data, there is another alternative to placing the rules in the application logic. You can consider creating a view of the table with the conditions on the data as part of the WHERE clause and the WITH CHECK OPTION clause specified. This view definition restricts the retrieval of data to the set that is valid for your application. Additionally, if you can update the view, the WITH CHECK OPTION clause restricts updates, inserts, and deletes to the rows applicable to your application.

The WITH CHECK OPTION must not be specified for the following views:

Views defined with the read-only option (a read-only view)
View that reference the NODENUMBER or PARTITION function, a nondeterministic function (for example, RAND), or a function with external action
Typed views

Example 1

Following is an example of a view definition using the WITH CHECK OPTION. This option is required to ensure that the condition is always checked. The view ensures that the DEPT is always 10. This will restrict the input values for the DEPT column. When a view is used to insert a new value, the WITH CHECK OPTION is always enforced:

    CREATE VIEW EMP_VIEW2
      (EMPNO, EMPNAME, DEPTNO, JOBTITLE, HIREDATE)
    AS SELECT ID, NAME, DEPT, JOB, HIREDATE FROM EMPLOYEE
      WHERE DEPT=10
    WITH CHECK OPTION;

If this view is used in an INSERT statement, the row will be rejected if the DEPTNO column is not the value 10. It is important to remember that there is no data validation during modification if the WITH CHECK OPTION is not specified.

If this view is used in a SELECT statement, the conditional (WHERE clause) would be invoked and the resulting table would only contain the matching rows of data. In other words, the WITH CHECK OPTION does not affect the result of a SELECT statement.

Example 2

With a view, you can make a subset of table data available to an application program and validate data that is to be inserted or updated. A view can have column names that are different from the names of corresponding columns in the original tables. For example:

   CREATE VIEW <name> (<column>, <column>, <column>)
      SELECT <column_name> FROM <table_name>
      WITH CHECK OPTION

Example 3

The use of views provides flexibility in the way your programs and end-user queries can look at the table data.

The following SQL statement creates a view on the EMPLOYEE table that lists all employees in Department A00 with their employee and telephone numbers:

    CREATE VIEW EMP_VIEW (DA00NAME, DA00NUM, PHONENO)
       AS SELECT LASTNAME, EMPNO, PHONENO FROM EMPLOYEE
       WHERE WORKDEPT = 'A00'
       WITH CHECK OPTION

The first line of this statement names the view and defines its columns. The name EMP_VIEW must be unique within its schema in SYSCAT.TABLES. The view name appears as a table name although it contains no data. The view will have three columns called DA00NAME, DA00NUM, and PHONENO, which correspond to the columns LASTNAME, EMPNO, and PHONENO from the EMPLOYEE table. The column names listed apply one-to-one to the select list of the SELECT statement. If column names are not specified, the view uses the same names as the columns of the result table of the SELECT statement.

The second line is a SELECT statement that describes which values are to be selected from the database. It might include the clauses ALL, DISTINCT, FROM, WHERE, GROUP BY, and HAVING. The name or names of the data objects from which to select columns for the view must follow the FROM clause.

Example 4

The WITH CHECK OPTION clause indicates that any updated or inserted row to the view must be checked against the view definition, and rejected if it does not conform. This enhances data integrity but requires additional processing. If this clause is omitted, inserts and updates are not checked against the view definition.

The following SQL statement creates the same view on the EMPLOYEE table using the SELECT AS clause:

   CREATE VIEW EMP_VIEW
      SELECT LASTNAME AS DA00NAME,
             EMPNO AS DA00NUM,
             PHONENO
      FROM EMPLOYEE
      WHERE WORKDEPT = 'A00'
      WITH CHECK OPTION

For this example, the EMPLOYEE table might have salary information in it, which should not be made available to everyone. The employee's phone number, however, should be generally accessible. In this case, a view could be created from the LASTNAME and PHONENO columns only. Access to the view could be granted to PUBLIC, while access to the entire EMPLOYEE table could be restricted to those who have the authorization to see salary information.