How to set default value while insert null value into not null column SQL Server?

Question

I have two tables t1 and t2. Both have id and name columns. The name column of t1 is defined as not null and it has the default value of 'Peter'.

I want to insert all the values from t2 into my t1 table. But I have some null values in t2 table. When I try to insert the values:

Insert into t1 
   select * 
   from t2;

It throws this error:

Msg 515, Level 16, State 2, Line 1
Cannot insert the value NULL into column 'Name', table 'T1'; column does not allow nulls.

Is there any possibilities to set the default value to the column when we try to insert the null value.

Solution 1

First Solution,

   insert into t1
    select id,isnull(name,'Peter') from t2

Second solution

ALTER TABLE T1 ALTER COLUMN name varchar(255) NULL

insert into t1
select id,name from t2

ALTER TABLE T1 ALTER COLUMN name varchar(255) NOT NULL

Solution 2

So instead of

Insert into t1 select * from t2

you can rewrite your query as

Insert into t1 
select col1,col2, ISNULL(name, 'Peter'), othercolumns from t2

Solution 3

Use COALESCE

Query

INSERT INTO t1(Id, Name)
SELECT Id, COALESCE(Name, 'Peter') FROM t2;

Or you can use a CASE expression.

Query

INSERT INTO t1(Id, Name)
SELECT Id, CASE WHEN Name IS NULL THEN 'Peter' ELSE Name END
FROM t2;

Comments

[jakubiszon]

I am afraid the third solution fails if your column type is uniqueidentifier and the default is (newid()). It actually fails for all function calls in the COLUMN_DEFAULT regardless of datatype.