On 13/04/07, revansx(a)cox.net <revansx(a)cox.net> wrote:
Hi all, I'm looking at my wiki's mysql
database using phpMyAdmin and I see that the page table defines the primary key (page_id)
as an unsigned int(8). Which got me thinking, 1) what is the maximum number of wiki
articles possible and 2) what is the failure mode (i.e what happens). Does it generate an
error? Does is apologize? Also, does moving a page bring the wiki one step closer to its
limit?
http://www.mysql.org/doc/refman/5.0/en/numeric-type-overview.html
seems to indicate that the maximum possible number of pages would be 4
294 967 295, which...is a lot of pages.
I would assume the failure mode would throw up some sort of database
exception, since the column is unsigned, it would overflow back to 1.
I'm not quite sure if MySQL explicitly detects this condition in an
autonumbered column, but either way, I would anticipate a database
error.
Moving a page to a new title will typically create a new page record
unless the old page is a redirect that's being "deleted" in the
process, so yes, it would bring you closer to the limit.
Rob Church