ALTER PROCEDURE

Last Updated March 11, 2025

Changes the definition of a procedure.

Synopsis

ALTER PROCEDURE <name> [ ( [ [<argmode>] [<argname>] <argtype> [, ...] ] ) ] 
   <action> [, ... ] [RESTRICT]

ALTER PROCEDURE <name> [ ( [ [<argmode>] [<argname>] <argtype> [, ...] ] ) ]
   RENAME TO <new_name>

ALTER PROCEDURE <name> [ ( [ [<argmode>] [<argname>] <argtype> [, ...] ] ) ]
   OWNER TO { <new_owner> | CURRENT_USER | SESSION_USER }

ALTER PROCEDURE <name> [ ( [ [<argmode>] [<argname>] <argtype> [, ...] ] ) ]
   SET SCHEMA <new_schema>

ALTER PROCEDURE <name> [ ( [ [<argmode>] [<argname>] <argtype> [, ...] ] ) ]
   DEPENDS ON EXTENSION <extension_name>

where <action> is one of:

    { [EXTERNAL] SECURITY INVOKER | [EXTERNAL] SECURITY DEFINER }
    SET <configuration_parameter> { TO | = } { <value> | DEFAULT }
    SET <configuration_parameter> FROM CURRENT
    RESET <configuration_parameter>
    RESET ALL

Description

ALTER PROCEDURE changes the definition of a procedure.

You must own the procedure to use ALTER PROCEDURE. To change a procedure'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 procedure's schema. (These restrictions enforce that altering the owner doesn't do anything you couldn't do by dropping and recreating the procedure. However, a superuser can alter ownership of any procedure anyway.)

Parameters

name: The name (optionally schema-qualified) of an existing procedure. If no argument list is specified, the name must be unique in its schema.
argmode: The mode of an argument: IN or VARIADIC. If omitted, the default is IN.
argname: The name of an argument. Note that ALTER PROCEDURE does not actually pay any attention to argument names, since only the argument data types are needed to determine the function's identity.
argtype: The data type(s) of the procedure's arguments (optionally schema-qualified), if any.
new_name: The new name of the procedure.
new_owner: The new owner of the procedure. Note that if the procedure is marked SECURITY DEFINER, it will subsequently run as the new owner.
new_schema: The new schema for the procedure.
extension_name: The name of the extension that the procedure is to depend on.
[ EXTERNAL ] SECURITY INVOKER
[ EXTERNAL ] SECURITY DEFINER: Change whether the procedure is a security definer or not. The key word EXTERNAL is ignored for SQL conformance. See CREATE PROCEDURE for more information about this capability.
configuration_parameter
value: Set or change the value of a configuration parameter when the procedure is called. If value is DEFAULT or, equivalently, RESET is used, the procedure-local setting is removed, and the procedure runs with the value present in its environment. Use RESET ALL to clear all procedure-local settings. SET FROM CURRENT saves the value of the parameter that is current when ALTER PROCEDURE is run as the value to be applied when the procedure is entered.; See SET for more information about allowed parameter names and values.
RESTRICT: Ignored for conformance with the SQL standard.

Notes

Greenplum Database has limitations on the use of functions defined as STABLE or VOLATILE. See CREATE FUNCTION for more information.

Examples

To rename the procedure insert_data with two arguments of type integer to insert_record:

ALTER PROCEDURE insert_data(integer, integer) RENAME TO insert_record;

To change the owner of the procedure insert_data with two arguments of type integer to joe:

ALTER PROCEDURE insert_data(integer, integer) OWNER TO joe;

To change the schema of the procedure insert_data with two arguments of type integer to accounting:

ALTER PROCEDURE insert_data(integer, integer) SET SCHEMA accounting;

To mark the procedure insert_data(integer, integer) as being dependent on the extension myext:

ALTER PROCEDURE insert_data(integer, integer) DEPENDS ON EXTENSION myext;

To adjust the search path that is automatically set for a procedure:

ALTER PROCEDURE check_password(text) SET search_path = admin, pg_temp;

To disable automatic setting of search_path for a procedure:

ALTER PROCEDURE check_password(text) RESET search_path;

The procedure will now execute with whatever search path is used by its caller.

Compatibility

This statement is partially compatible with the ALTER PROCEDURE statement in the SQL standard. The standard allows more properties of a procedure to be modified, but does not provide the ability to rename a procedure, make a procedure a security definer, attach configuration parameter values to a procedure, or change the owner, schema, or volatility of a procedure. The standard also requires the RESTRICT key word, which is optional in Greenplum Database.

Tanzu Greenplum 7