how change the column of a table of enum type?

What do you mean by change the column? Do you want to change the data type to something else? String maybe?

Also, don't forget to install the doctrine/dbal package for column manipulation.

i need insert new options in the enum.

$table->enum('ref', ['single', 'monthly', 'biannual']);

i insert two new options: 'amount', 'other'

$table->enum('ref', ['single', 'monthly', 'biannual', 'amount', 'other'])->change();

the error:

[Doctrine\DBAL\DBALException]
Unknown column type "enum" requested. Any Doctrine type that you use has to
be registered with \Doctrine\DBAL\Types\Type::addType(). You can get a list
of all the known types with \Doctrine\DBAL\Types\Type::getTypesMap(). If thi
s error occurs during database introspection then you might have forgot to r
egister all database types for a Doctrine Type. Use AbstractPlatform#registe
rDoctrineTypeMapping() or have your custom types implement Type#getMappedDat
abaseTypes(). If the type name is empty you might have a problem with the ca
che or forgot some mapping information.

Did you try without change()? Just create a new migration and add the old items + the new items.

public function up()
{
    Schema::table('table_name', function(Blueprint $table)
    {
        $table->enum('ref',['single', 'monthly', 'biannual', 'amount', 'other']);   
    });
}

http://laravel.com/docs/5.1/migrations#modifying-columns

Note: Renaming columns in a table with a enum column is not currently supported.

That's why I don't use enum type...

I cannot lose the data in database.

You just make a new enum column with the allowed values and then update the rows, and then drop the old enum column.

Create a new enum column with additional types, copy everything from the first column, drop it, and rename the new column.

jekinney, Now it's too late. I already used it. hehe

PostgreSQL 9.1 introduced ability to ALTER Enum types:

ALTER TYPE enum_type ADD VALUE 'new_value' BEFORE 'old_value';
ALTER TYPE enum_type ADD VALUE 'new_value' AFTER 'old_value';

So you should be able to do something like this:

DB:statement("ALTER TYPE ref ADD VALUE 'amount' AFTER 'biannual'");
DB:statement("ALTER TYPE ref ADD VALUE 'other' AFTER 'amount'");

Thanks guys.

I've been analyzing the enum in laravel and realised that he is a limited varchar by a constrain, so I can change the constrain without losing data from my database.

The answer to my problem is:

DB::statement("ALTER TABLE purchases DROP CONSTRAINT purchases_ref_check");
$types = ['single', 'monthly', 'biannual', 'amount', 'other'];
$result = join( ', ', array_map(function( $value ){ return sprintf("'%s'::character varying", $value); }, $types) );
DB::statement("ALTER TABLE purchases add CONSTRAINT purchases_ref_check CHECK (ref::text = ANY (ARRAY[$result]::text[]))");

This is a solution:

   $all=DB::table('table')->get();

    Schema::table('table', function (Blueprint $table) {
        $table->dropColumn('columnName');
    });

    Schema::table('table', function (Blueprint $table) {
        $table->enum('columnName',['item1','item2','item3','item3']);
    });

    foreach($all as $item)
    {
        DB::table('table')->where('id',$item->id)->update(['columnName'=>$item->columnName]);
    }

I think there is a better and more simple solution:

DB::statement("ALTER TABLE `table` CHANGE `column` `column` ENUM('item1', 'item2') default NULL;");

This change the existing enum, and leave the data as-is.

Only the following column types can be "changed": bigInteger, binary, boolean, date, dateTime, dateTimeTz, decimal, integer, json, longText, mediumText, smallInteger, string, text, time, unsignedBigInteger, unsignedInteger and unsignedSmallInteger. https://laravel.com/docs/5.8/migrations#modifying-columns

I stumbled over this problem with my Postgres and my solution is:

$values = DocumentType::values();

            // Convert the values to a string for the SQL statement
            $valuesList = implode("', '", $values);

            // Remove the existing constraint
            DB::statement('ALTER TABLE documents DROP CONSTRAINT IF EXISTS documents_type_check;');

            // Add the new constraint with the additional value
            DB::statement("ALTER TABLE documents ADD CONSTRAINT documents_type_check CHECK ((type)::text = ANY (ARRAY['$valuesList']::text[]));");

For me It's working