Re: Altering merge table immediately after creation throws error

[Ingo Strüwing]

Hi.

Why do you need to add the second columns in separate ALTER statements? Why not just CREATE the table with both columns from the beginning?

There have been a number of bugs around MERGE table compatibility. Bug report #457 contains a list: http://bugs.mysql.com/bug.php?id=457

The mentioned worklog has the title "MERGE engine: a check for underlying table conformance". Its resulting effect is documented in
http://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.1/en/merge-storage-engine.html
Search for the section starting with "In MySQL 5.1.15 and later, when a table that is part of a MERGE table is opened, the following checks are applied".

Unfortunately, there are new issues, which require more work: http://bugs.mysql.com/bug.php?id=26881

If you think that none of the problems match yours and the latest versions don't fix it, please report it on bugs.mysql.com.

Regards
Ingo

Ingo Strüwing, Senior Software Developer - Storage Engines
MySQL AB, www.mysql.com