Number of characters of Short Descriptions addon

In the Short Descriptions mod here:

http://www.zen-cart.com/index.php?main_page=product_contrib_info&products_id=271

the SQL patch instructs to add the following lines to the database:

INSERT INTO configuration (configuration_title, configuration_key, configuration_value, configuration_description, configuration_group_id, sort_order, last_modified, date_added, use_function, set_function) VALUES ('Display Product Short Descriptions', 'PRODUCT_LIST_SHORT_DESC', '3', 'Set to 0 to disable, set to 1-99 to enable.', 8, 11, now(), now(), NULL, NULL);

ALTER TABLE products_description ADD products_short_desc VARCHAR( 255 ) DEFAULT NULL AFTER products_description;
ALTER TABLE categories_description ADD categories_description_sub TEXT NOT NULL;

INSERT INTO configuration (configuration_title, configuration_key, configuration_value, configuration_description, configuration_group_id, sort_order, last_modified, date_added, use_function, set_function) VALUES ('Product Info - Display Product Short Descriptions', 'PRODUCT_INFO_SHORT_DESC', '1', 'Show Product''s short Description<br />0= off<br />1= on', 18, 30, now(), now(), NULL, 'zen_cfg_select_drop_down(array(array(''id''=>''0'', ''text''=>''Off''), array(''id''=>''1'', ''text''=>''On'')),');

So now my questions is, how can I change the number of characters from 255 to for example 30000? I guess I need to reload the line:

ALTER TABLE products_description ADD products_short_desc VARCHAR( 255 ) DEFAULT NULL AFTER products_description;
ALTER TABLE categories_description ADD categories_description_sub TEXT NOT NULL;

but can I simply change it to:

ALTER TABLE products_description ADD products_short_desc VARCHAR( 30000 ) DEFAULT NULL AFTER products_description;
ALTER TABLE categories_description ADD categories_description_sub TEXT NOT NULL;

and submit it via Admin -> Tools -> Install SQL Patches ?

Um, last time I checked, "30,000" characters was NOT a "short description".

If you insist it is, you'll have to change VARCHAR(255) to TEXT

Hehe yes you are probably right, 30000 characters is not a short text.

I changed:

ALTER TABLE products_description ADD products_short_desc VARCHAR( 255 ) DEFAULT NULL AFTER products_description;

to

ALTER TABLE products_description ADD products_short_desc TEXT DEFAULT NULL AFTER products_description;

and used the SQL Query Executor to send it to the database, but got the error:

ERROR: Cannot ADD column products_short_desc because it already exists

Is there a way to replace or update the current statement without deleting the existing characters I already have in the database (I already have a lot of less than 255 character descriptions that I would like to avoid deleting)?
Could I use the REPLACE or UPDATE statement?

My SQL knowledge is pretty bad so any help is much appreciated.

change ADD to CHANGE COLUMN and repeat the column name.

Or, within phpMyAdmin just edit the table structure and change the column type directly.

Thanks a lot! I changed the values in phpMyAdmin and now all of my 30000 character "short" description shows up. :bigups: