How to check if a particular database in mysql already exists using java

Question

I am new in JDBC and I wanted to find out if there is a way to check if a particular database already exists in MySQL.

Let\'s say I wanted to create a database named

Answer 1

show databases like 'students'

If you get a row back, it exists.

Answer 2

You're doing it back to front. The correct technique is to try to create it and catch the exception. The way you want to do it is subject to timing-window problems: it wasn't there when you tested, but it was there when you tried to create it. And you still have to catch the exception anyway.

Answer 3

You can get that info from a JDBC Connection using DatabaseMetaData#getCatalogs, here is an example of getting the Catalogs, aka Database names

// Connection connection = <your java.sql.Connection>
ResultSet resultSet = connection.getMetaData().getCatalogs();

//iterate each catalog in the ResultSet
while (resultSet.next()) {
  // Get the database name, which is at position 1
  String databaseName = resultSet.getString(1);
}
resultSet.close();

Answer 4

In newer versions of MySQL (5 and above) run this query:

SELECT COUNT(*)
FROM information_schema.tables 
WHERE table_schema = '[database name]' 
AND table_name = '[table name]';

If the result is 1 it exists.

In Java JDBC that would look something like this:

// Create connection and statement
String query = "SELECT COUNT(*) FROM information_schema.tables WHERE table_schema'[database name]' AND table_name = '[table name]'";
ResultSet rs = stmt.executeQuery(query);                  
rs.next();
boolean exists = rs.getInt("COUNT(*)") > 0;
// Close connection, statement, and result set.
return exists;