postgresql - integer out of range

I've set up a table accordingly:

CREATE TABLE raw ( id SERIAL, regtime float NOT NULL, time float NOT NULL, source varchar(15), sourceport INTEGER, destination varchar(15), destport INTEGER, blocked boolean ); ... + index and grants 

I've successfully used this table for a while now, and all of a sudden the following insert doesn't work any longer..

INSERT INTO raw( time, regtime, blocked, destport, sourceport, source, destination ) VALUES ( 1403184512.2283964, 1403184662.118, False, 2, 3, '192.168.0.1', '192.168.0.2' ); 

The error is: ERROR: integer out of range

Not even sure where to begin debugging this.. I'm not out of disk-space and the error itself is kinda discreet.

1 Answer

SERIAL columns are stored as INTEGERs, giving them a maximum value of 2³¹-1. So after ~2 billion inserts, your new id values will no longer fit.

If you expect this many inserts over the life of your table, create it with a BIGSERIAL (internally a BIGINT, with a maximum of 2⁶³-1).

If you discover later on that a SERIAL isn't big enough, you can increase the size of an existing field with:

ALTER TABLE raw ALTER COLUMN id TYPE BIGINT; 

Note that it's BIGINT here, rather than BIGSERIAL (as serials aren't real types). And keep in mind that, if you actually have 2 billion records in your table, this might take a little while...