In TypeORM you have the possibility to set a unique flag in the column options, or to set column(s) to unique for the entity.
When would you use which, and what's the difference there?
@Unique(["firstName"])
https://typeorm.io/#/decorator-reference/unique
@Column({ unique: true })
firstName: string;
As written in the docs @Unique can only be applied to entire entities, not to a single column. For readability, I prefer for simple constraints @Column({ unique: true }) because it sits just on top of the affected variable name.
Another advantage of the @Unique syntax is the multi-column constraint ability. You can define multiple columns as one unique constraint: @Unique(["firstName", "secondName"]). This is not possible with the @Column decorator.
Finally, you can set a name for a particular constraint, when using @Unique decorator. The following single column constraint definition is functional equal, except @Unique sets a human readable name (Attention: @Unique expects the entity variable field name, not the actual database column name):
@Unique('my_unique_constraint', ['firstName']) // make firstName unique
export class PersonEntity {
@Column({ unique: true }) // make firstName unique, too; decide which to chose
firstName: string;
...