Informix Error -532

Reasons / Common Causes

-532 fires when ALTER TABLE targets a temporary table — like renaming (-508/-509) and synonym creation (-510), altering a temp table's structure isn't supported since the table only exists for the current session anyway.

1. ALTER TABLE issued against a temp table, per the official guidance — the direct, only cause.
2. A misspelled table name that happens to collide with an existing temp table's name, when a permanent table was actually intended.
3. Migration/DDL code that alters a mix of permanent and temp tables uniformly, without excluding the temp ones.

Solutions / Resolution

1. Drop the temp table and re-create it with the desired shape, per the official guidance, rather than attempting to alter it:

   DROP TABLE temp_orders;
   CREATE TEMP TABLE temp_orders (order_id INT, status CHAR(10), ship_date DATE);
   

2. Review the spelling of the table name in case a permanent table was actually intended.

Examples

The disallowed attempt

CREATE TEMP TABLE staging_orders (order_id INT, status CHAR(10));
ALTER TABLE staging_orders ADD ship_date DATE;
-- -532: staging_orders is a temporary table

Working around it

DROP TABLE staging_orders;
CREATE TEMP TABLE staging_orders (order_id INT, status CHAR(10), ship_date DATE);

Diagnostic Checks

1. Confirm whether the target table is temporary before attempting an ALTER TABLE — if it was created with CREATE TEMP TABLE in the current session, re-creating it is the only path to a different shape.

Related Errors / Related Topics

• -508 — "Cannot rename a temporary table." The same temp-table restriction applied to renaming.
• -509 — "Cannot rename a column in a temporary table." The same restriction applied to column renames.
• -510 — "Cannot create synonym for temporary table table-name." The same restriction applied to synonym creation.

Part of the same family of temp-table restrictions as -508/-509/-510 — drop and re-create rather than trying to modify a temp table in place.