What to do when I want to use database constraints but only mark as deleted instead of deleting?

Question

I am working in a project where database items are not deleted, but only marked as deleted. Something like this:

id   name     deleted
---  -------  --------         


        

Answer 1

For example, you can add an illegal character (*) to the deleted name. But you still have problems undeleting a deleted item. So probably the better idea is to prohibit double names even if they are deleted.

You can clean the deleted records after an amount of time (or move them to a separate table).