Row-begin column

The row-begin column represents the time when the data in the row became current. It is defined as a TIMESTAMP(12).

The database manager generates a value for this column by using a reading of the system clock. If multiple rows are inserted or updated within a single SQL transaction, the value for the row-begin column is only generated once at the time of the first data change statement and is used as the row-begin value for all data change operations in that transaction.

When an existing table is altered to add a row-begin column, the row-begin column is populated with the default value 0001-01-01-00.00.00.000000000000 for all existing rows.