PostgreSQL 8.4.4 Documentation
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# ALTER VIEW

## Name

ALTER VIEW -- change the definition of a view

## Synopsis

    ALTER VIEW name ALTER [ COLUMN ] column SET DEFAULT expression
    ALTER VIEW name ALTER [ COLUMN ] column DROP DEFAULT
    ALTER VIEW name OWNER TO new_owner
    ALTER VIEW name RENAME TO new_name
    ALTER VIEW name SET SCHEMA new_schema

## Description

`ALTER VIEW` changes various auxiliary properties of a view. (If you want to modify the view's defining query, use `CREATE OR REPLACE VIEW`.)

You must own the view to use `ALTER VIEW`. To change a view's schema, you must also have `CREATE` privilege on the new schema. To alter the owner, you must also be a direct or indirect member of the new owning role, and that role must have `CREATE` privilege on the view's schema. (These restrictions enforce that altering the owner doesn't do anything you couldn't do by dropping and recreating the view. However, a superuser can alter ownership of any view anyway.)

## Parameters

`name`

  The name (optionally schema-qualified) of an existing view.

`SET`/`DROP DEFAULT`

  These forms set or remove the default value for a column. A default value associated with a view column is inserted into `INSERT` statements on the view before the view's `ON INSERT` rule is applied, if the `INSERT` does not specify a value for the column.

`new_owner`

  The user name of the new owner of the view.

`new_name`

  The new name for the view.

`new_schema`

  The new schema for the view.

## Notes

For historical reasons, `ALTER TABLE` can be used with views too; but the only variants of `ALTER TABLE` that are allowed with views are equivalent to the ones shown above.

## Examples

To rename the view `foo` to `bar`:

    ALTER VIEW foo RENAME TO bar;

## Compatibility

`ALTER VIEW` is a PostgreSQL extension of the SQL standard.

## See Also

CREATE VIEW, DROP VIEW

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