Create a method for the schema attribute `@updatedAt` to have a default value of `null`

Problem

We would like a way to have a column in a table with the attribute @udpatedAt to have a default of null for data clarity.

Example schema.prisma:

model User {
  id            Int       @id @default(autoincrement())
  email         String    @unique
  name          String
  createdAt     DateTime  @default(now())
  updatedAt     DateTime? @updatedAt
}

Suggested solution

Allow the schema attribute @updatedAt to be used with @default(null).

Suggested example schema.prisma:

model User {
  id            Int       @id @default(autoincrement())
  email         String    @unique
  name          String
  createdAt     DateTime  @default(now())
  updatedAt     DateTime? @updatedAt @default(null)
}

Alternatives

Change the default value of @updatedAt to be null and allow @default(now) to be used. This suggestion could potentially be a breaking change for projects so I think the first suggestion is ideal.

Additional context

We’re aiming to make columns not dependant on others as much as possible and want a way to tell if a column has been updated without comparing the createdAt and updatedAt columns. @austincrim also mentioned there may be bugs down the road in this discussion: https://github.com/prisma/prisma/discussions/11559.

[francismanansala]

@janpio Thanks for looking into this feature request. The feature my team is wanting is when the record is first created with the value for updatedAt column is NULL, and then on any updates to the record updatedAt to be now()

[janpio]

Not yet, or there would already have been a feature request for this. Generally I think it is a valid use case though - it is just a slightly different behavior than what we implemented.

The quick fix would be to add an optional paramter to the @updatedAt attribute, e.g. @updatedAt(nullDefault) or something like that - but the @updatedAt feature has some other problems as well - see https://github.com/prisma/prisma/issues?q=is%3Aopen+label%3A"topic%3A+updatedAt"+sort%3Aupdated-desc - so I don’t think we will just want to quickly add this but consider the bigger feature.