ASA SQL Reference
SQL Language Elements
To specify a value that is unknown or not applicable.
NULL
Anywhere.
Must be connected to the database.
None.
The NULL value is a special value which is different from any valid value for any data type. However, the NULL value is a legal value in any data type. The NULL value is used to represent missing or inapplicable information. There are two separate and distinct cases where NULL is used:
| Situation | Description |
|---|---|
| missing | The field does have a value, but that value is unknown. |
| inapplicable | The field does not apply for this particular row. |
SQL allows columns to be created with the NOT NULL restriction. This means that those particular columns cannot contain NULL.
The NULL value introduces the concept of three valued logic to SQL. The NULL value compared using any comparison operator with any value (including the NULL value) is "UNKNOWN." The only search condition that returns TRUE is the IS NULL predicate. In SQL, rows are selected only if the search condition in the WHERE clause evaluates to TRUE; rows that evaluate to UNKNOWN or FALSE are not selected.
The IS [ NOT ] truth-value clause, where truth-value is one of TRUE, FALSE or UNKNOWN can be used to select rows where the NULL value is involved. See Search conditions for a description of this clause.
In the following examples, the column Salary contains NULL.
| Condition | Truth value | Selected? |
|---|---|---|
| Salary = NULL | UNKNOWN | NO |
| Salary <> NULL | UNKNOWN | NO |
| NOT (Salary = NULL) | UNKNOWN | NO |
| NOT (Salary <> NULL) | UNKNOWN | NO |
| Salary = 1000 | UNKNOWN | NO |
| Salary IS NULL | TRUE | YES |
| Salary IS NOT NULL | FALSE | NO |
| Salary = expression IS UNKNOWN | TRUE | YES |
The same rules apply when comparing columns from two different tables. Therefore, joining two tables together will not select rows where any of the columns compared contain the NULL value.
NULL also has an interesting property when used in numeric expressions. The result of any numeric expression involving the NULL value is NULL. This means that if NULL is added to a number, the result is NULL—not a number. If you want NULL to be treated as 0, you must use the ISNULL( expression, 0 ) function (see SQL Functions).
Many common errors in formulating SQL queries are caused by the behavior of NULL. You will have to be careful to avoid these problem areas. See Search conditions for a description of the effect of three-valued logic when combining search conditions.
In set operations (UNION, INTERSECT, EXCEPT), and in the DISTINCT operation, NULL is treated differently from in search conditions. Rows that contain NULL and are otherwise identical are treated as identical for the purposes of these operations.
For example, if a column called redundant contained NULL for every row in a table T1, then the following statement would return a single row:
SELECT DISTINCT redundant FROM T1
SQL/92 Entry-level feature.
Sybase In some contexts, Adaptive Server Enterprise treats NULL as a value, whereas Adaptive Server Anywhere does not. For example, rows of a column c1 that are NULL are not included in the results of a query with the following WHERE clause in Adaptive Server Anywhere, as the condition has a value of UNKNOWN:
WHERE NOT( C1 = NULL )
In Adaptive Server Enterprise, the condition is evaluated as TRUE, and these rows are returned. You should use IS NULL rather than a comparison operator for compatibility.
Unique indexes in Adaptive Server Anywhere can hold rows that hold NULL and are otherwise identical. Adaptive Server Enterprise does not permit such entries in unique indexes.
If you use jConnect, the TDS_EMPTY_STRING_IS_NULL option controls whether empty strings are returned as NULL strings or as a string containing one blank character.
For more information, see TDS_EMPTY_STRING_IS_NULL option [database].
The following INSERT statement inserts a NULL into the date_returned column of the Borrowed_book table.
INSERT INTO Borrowed_book ( date_borrowed, date_returned, book ) VALUES ( CURRENT DATE, NULL, '1234' )