Making use of FOR SHARE and FOR UPDATE

Sometimes, data is selected from the database, then some processing happens in the application, and finally, some changes are made back on the database side. This is a classic example of SELECT FOR UPDATE.

Here is an example that shows the way SELECT is often executed in the wrong way:

BEGIN;
SELECT * FROM  invoice WHERE  processed = false;
** application magic  will  happen here  **
UPDATE invoice SET processed = true  ...
COMMIT;

The problem here is that two people might select the same unprocessed data. Changes that are made to these processed rows will then be overwritten. In short, a race condition will occur.

To solve this problem, developers can make use of SELECT FOR UPDATE. Here’s how it can be used. The following example will show a typical scenario:

BEGIN;
SELECT * FROM invoice WHERE processed = false FOR UPDATE;
** application magic  will ...