If you set up a table’s column to be a computed column whose Formula calls a Function, it becomes a pain to change that underlying Function. With every change, you have to find every single column whose Formula that references the Function, remove the reference, save the Table, alter the Function, add everything back, and save again. Even small changes are nightmares.
Can you tell SQL Server that you don’t care that the Function is being referenced by Formulas and to just go ahead and change the underlying Function?
Additional Details: The computed column is not persisted or referenced by a FK constraint because it is non-deterministic. The function takes into consideration the current time. It’s dealing with the question of whether a record is expired or not.
No, as far as I know, you cannot do this – you’ll have to first remove all computed columns referencing a function, alter the function, and then recreate the computed columns.
Maybe MS will give us a ‘CREATE OR ALTER FUNCTION’ command in SQL Server 2010/2011? 🙂
Marc