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## SQL Features That SQLite Does Not Implement

Rather than try to list all the features of SQL92 that SQLite does support, it is much easier to list those that it does not. Unsupported features of SQL92 are shown below.

The order of this list gives some hint as to when a feature might be added to SQLite. Those features near the top of the list are likely to be added in the near future. There are no immediate plans to add features near the bottom of the list.

FOREIGN KEY constraints |  | FOREIGN KEY constraints are parsed but are not enforced. However, the equivalent constraint enforcement can be achieved using triggers. The SQLite source tree contains source code and documentation for a C program that will read an SQLite database, analyze the foreign key constraints, and generate appropriate triggers automatically.
Complete trigger support |  | There is some support for triggers but it is not complete. Missing subfeatures include FOR EACH STATEMENT triggers (currently all triggers must be FOR EACH ROW), INSTEAD OF triggers on tables (currently INSTEAD OF triggers are only allowed on views), and recursive triggers - triggers that trigger themselves.
Complete ALTER TABLE support |  | Only the RENAME TABLE and ADD COLUMN variants of the ALTER TABLE command are supported. Other kinds of ALTER TABLE operations such as DROP COLUMN, ALTER COLUMN, ADD CONSTRAINT, and so forth are omitted.
RIGHT and FULL OUTER JOIN |  | LEFT OUTER JOIN is implemented, but not RIGHT OUTER JOIN or FULL OUTER JOIN.
Writing to VIEWs |  | VIEWs in SQLite are read-only. You may not execute a DELETE, INSERT, or UPDATE statement on a view. But you can create a trigger that fires on an attempt to DELETE, INSERT, or UPDATE a view and do what you need in the body of the trigger.
GRANT and REVOKE |  | Since SQLite reads and writes an ordinary disk file, the only access permissions that can be applied are the normal file access permissions of the underlying operating system. The GRANT and REVOKE commands commonly found on client/server RDBMSes are not implemented because they would be meaningless for an embedded database engine.

If you find other SQL92 features that SQLite does not support, please add them to the Wiki page at http://www.sqlite.org/cvstrac/wiki?p=Unsupported

This page last modified 2009/01/03 15:03:50 UTC