Why doesn't SQL Server support unsigned datatype?

Question

I am specifically thinking about unsigned int.

Here is a practical example: what do you do when your identity column maxes out? It's possible to either go BigInt (8 bytes storage instead of 4) or to refactor the application to support negative integers, and even to create your own rules as indicated in this answer; neither of those options are optimal.

UInt would be an ideal solution, but SQL Server does not offer it (where MySQL does).

I understand that unsigned datatypes are not part of the SQL standard (SQL-2003) but still seems like a waste to me.

What is the reason of not including these (in SQL Server or in the standard)?

Answer 1

If I had to guess, I would say that they are trying to avoid a proliferation of types. Generally speaking there isn't anything that an unsigned integer can do that a signed integer can't do. As for the case when you need a number between 2147483648 and 4294967296 you probably should go to an 8 byte integer since the number will also eventually exceed 4294967296.

Answer 2

For that purpose you could use -2,147,483,648 as the seed value.

Identity(-2147483648, 1)

Answer 3

I found a similar question on Microsoft Office Dev Center.

The reply from Jim Hogg (Program Manager) has some pro's and con's for adding unsigned int's. The major con is the rules to implement implicit type conversions become a nightmare to get right.

The request was closed as "Won't Fix".

Answer 4

They don't support the SIGNED and UNSIGNED keyword because they're not standard. In SQL standard, all numeric types are signed.

UNSIGNED (and SIGNED, which is the default) are MySQL extensions that can be useful to store higher unsigned numbers in the same amount of bytes, and disallow negative numbers.

Answer 5

Take 32 bit(8 byte) int for example. The range of 32 bit int is from -2^31 to 2^31-1. It takes 31 bit to record the value you assigned and only 1 bit to record the sign of value.

So the answer to your question is "Unnecessary". Even though every value you assigned is positive, it waste only 1 bit per value. Creating a new datatype for saving only 1 bit per value is not a good way to optimize storage space.