Timestamp and rowversion

 

Timestamp and rowversion are the data types in SQL Server. They are synonyms, that is, the data types are the same.

In Enterprise Manager, we can only select timestamp as the column name, but in the T-SQL (such as the query analyzer), we can either use timestamp or rowversion.

So in the T-SQL, which one should we use? rowversion should be used. Because the timestamp defined by Microsoft is different from the timestamp defined in the ISO SQL-92, Microsoft also recommends using the Data Definition Language (DDL) such as create table, create procedure, or declare @ variable) statement, instead of timestamp.

Microsoft may delete timestamp in future versions, but so far, SQL Server 2008 and timestamp have not been deleted.

For more synonyms of SQL Server, see Data Type Synonyms (TRANSACT-SQL) on msdn ).