At 01:31 PM 31/01/2008, you wrote:

>> alter table atable drop surname;
>> commit;
>> alter table atable add surname varchar(30);
>> commit;
>> update atable set surname = newsurname;
>> commit;
>> alter table drop newsurname,
>
>Any particular reason for not using "alter table atable alter
>newsurname to surname;"?

No reason at all - I simply forgot about it. ;-)

./hb