default a column with empty string

Question

Is there a way, via a SQL statement, to ensure a column\'s default value is an empty string \'\' instead of NULL?

Answer 1

Yes - use a DEFAULT constraint:

DROP TABLE IF EXISTS `example`.`test`;
CREATE TABLE  `example`.`test` (
  `string_test` varchar(45) NOT NULL DEFAULT ''
) ENGINE=InnoDB DEFAULT CHARSET=latin1;