nico.fyi
    Published on

    How to add comment on table and column in Postgres

    Authors

    I was just wondering if it's possible to add a comment on a table and column in Postgres. After a quick talk with AI, I found out that it's possible. Here's how you can do it:

    COMMENT ON TABLE "public"."table_name" IS 'This is a comment';
    COMMENT ON COLUMN "public"."table_name"."column_name" IS 'This is a comment';
    

    When you look at the table and column using a GUI client like TablePlus, you will see the comments:

    I think it's a pretty useful feature to have since there are times when a developer uses a non-descriptive name for a table or column. I was kind of hoping that Prisma supports this, where comments in the schema file are automatically added to the migration files. The only workaround I can think of is to run Prisma's migration without executing it first and then add the comments manually.

    For example, say you just created a schema file or you make some changes to the schema file. First, create a draft migration:

    npx prisma migrate dev --create-only
    

    Then add the comments manually:

    COMMENT ON TABLE "public"."table_name" IS 'This is a comment';
    COMMENT ON COLUMN "public"."table_name"."column_name" IS 'This is a comment';
    

    Finally, apply the migration:

    npx prisma migrate dev
    

    Have you ever added a comment to a table or column in Postgres?


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