Underlying Row ID

[culshaja]

Hi,

I have recently inherited a database that I am modifying to improve performance. To do this I need to add indexes, and I need to a a clustered key to a name field for ordering the reulsts sets in a query by. The only problem with this is that part of the application returns a query that is ordered by the way the data was entered into the table. The way they do this is to use a normal query with no order by. This works at the moment because there is no clustered index. There is no field that is timestamped or autogenerated to allow me to order by and so I was wondering if there was anyway to get access to any underlying SQL Server row id that is ordered by the order the rows are entered?

James James Culshaw
jculshaw@active-data-solutions.co.uk

http://www.active-data-solutions.co.uk

http://www.brainbench.com/transcript.jsp?pid=193305

 

[PFR]

at any time in the past, when i added an identity column, i had a notion that an underlying identity had already been present.
- So just add an identity column and order by that, so You will get the records in the order they were entered.

PFR

 

[culshaja]

I would do this normally, but the table already has a couple of tgousand rows in it and I don't want to have to modify the table to this degree. I was trying to find a simpler solutions.


James James Culshaw
jculshaw@active-data-solutions.co.uk

http://www.active-data-solutions.co.uk

http://www.brainbench.com/transcript.jsp?pid=193305