How can I check if a View exists in a Database?

Question

I have some SQL code that needs to be executed if a certain View exists in a database. How would I go about checking if the View exists?

EDIT: The DBMS being used is Mic

Answer 1

if it's Oracle you would use the "all_views" table.

It really depends on your dbms.

Answer 2

To expand on Kevin's answer.

    private bool CustomViewExists(string viewName)
    {
        using (SalesPad.Data.DataConnection dc = yourconnection)
        {
            System.Data.SqlClient.SqlCommand cmd = new System.Data.SqlClient.SqlCommand(String.Format(@"IF EXISTS(select * FROM sys.views where name = '{0}')
                Select 1
            else
                Select 0", viewName));
            cmd.CommandType = CommandType.Text;
            return Convert.ToBoolean(dc.ExecuteScalar(cmd));
        }
    }

Answer 3

If you want to check the validity and consistency of all the existing views you can use the following query

declare @viewName sysname
declare @cmd sysname
DECLARE check_cursor CURSOR FOR 
SELECT cast('['+SCHEMA_NAME(schema_id)+'].['+name+']' as sysname) AS viewname
FROM sys.views

OPEN check_cursor
FETCH NEXT FROM check_cursor 
INTO @viewName

WHILE @@FETCH_STATUS = 0
BEGIN

set @cmd='select * from '+@viewName
begin try
exec (@cmd)
end try
begin catch
print 'Error: The view '+@viewName+' is corrupted .'
end catch
FETCH NEXT FROM check_cursor 
INTO @viewName
END 
CLOSE check_cursor;
DEALLOCATE check_cursor;

Answer 4

FOR SQL SERVER

IF EXISTS(select * FROM sys.views where name = '')

Answer 5

There are already many ways specified above but one of my favourite is missing..

GO
IF OBJECT_ID('nView', 'V') IS NOT NULL
    DROP VIEW nView;
GO

WHERE nView is the name of view

UPDATE 2017-03-25: as @hanesjw suggested to drop a Store Procedure use P instead of V as the second argument of OBJECT_ID

GO
IF OBJECT_ID( 'nProcedure', 'P' ) IS NOT NULL 
    DROP PROCEDURE dbo.sprocName; 
GO

Answer 6

For people checking the existence to drop View use this

From SQL Server 2016 CTP3 you can use new DIE statements instead of big IF wrappers

syntax

DROP VIEW [ IF EXISTS ] [ schema_name . ] view_name [ ...,n ] [ ; ]

Query :

DROP VIEW IF EXISTS view_name

More info here