Count the number of null values into an Oracle table? - sql

Question

I need to count the number of null values of all the columns in a table in Oracle.
For instance, I execute the following statements to create a table TEST and insert data.
CREATE TABLE TEST
( A VARCHAR2(20 BYTE),
B VARCHAR2(20 BYTE),
C VARCHAR2(20 BYTE)
);
Insert into TEST (A) values ('a');
Insert into TEST (B) values ('b');
Insert into TEST (C) values ('c');
Now, I write the following code to compute the number of null values in the table TEST:
declare
cnt number :=0;
temp number :=0;
begin
for r in ( select column_name, data_type
from user_tab_columns
where table_name = upper('test')
order by column_id )
loop
if r.data_type <> 'NOT NULL' then
select count(*) into temp FROM TEST where r.column_name IS NULL;
cnt := cnt + temp;
END IF;
end loop;
dbms_output.put_line('Total: '||cnt);
end;
/
It returns 0, when the expected value is 6.
Where is the error?
Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

Counting NULLs for each column
In order to count NULL values for all columns of a table T you could run
SELECT COUNT(*) - COUNT(col1) col1_nulls
, COUNT(*) - COUNT(col2) col2_nulls
,..
, COUNT(*) - COUNT(colN) colN_nulls
, COUNT(*) total_rows
FROM T
/
Where col1, col2, .., colN should be replaced with actual names of columns of T table.
Aggregate functions -like COUNT()- ignore NULL values, so COUNT(*) - COUNT(col) will give you how many nulls for each column.
Summarize all NULLs of a table
If you want to know how many fields are NULL, I mean every NULL of every record you can
WITH d as (
SELECT COUNT(*) - COUNT(col1) col1_nulls
, COUNT(*) - COUNT(col2) col2_nulls
,..
, COUNT(*) - COUNT(colN) colN_nulls
, COUNT(*) total_rows
FROM T
) SELECT col1_nulls + col1_nulls +..+ colN_null
FROM d
/
Summarize all NULLs of a table (using Oracle dictionary tables)
Following is an improvement in which you need to now nothing but table name and it is very easy to code a function based on it
DECLARE
T VARCHAR2(64) := '<YOUR TABLE NAME>';
expr VARCHAR2(32767);
q INTEGER;
BEGIN
SELECT 'SELECT /*+FULL(T) PARALLEL(T)*/' || COUNT(*) || ' * COUNT(*) OVER () - ' || LISTAGG('COUNT(' || COLUMN_NAME || ')', ' + ') WITHIN GROUP (ORDER BY COLUMN_ID) || ' FROM ' || T
INTO expr
FROM USER_TAB_COLUMNS
WHERE TABLE_NAME = T;
-- This line is for debugging purposes only
DBMS_OUTPUT.PUT_LINE(expr);
EXECUTE IMMEDIATE expr INTO q;
DBMS_OUTPUT.PUT_LINE(q);
END;
/
Due to calculation implies a full table scan, code produced in expr variable was optimized for parallel running.
User defined function null_fields
Function version, also includes an optional parameter to be able to run on other schemas.
CREATE OR REPLACE FUNCTION null_fields(table_name IN VARCHAR2, owner IN VARCHAR2 DEFAULT USER)
RETURN INTEGER IS
T VARCHAR2(64) := UPPER(table_name);
o VARCHAR2(64) := UPPER(owner);
expr VARCHAR2(32767);
q INTEGER;
BEGIN
SELECT 'SELECT /*+FULL(T) PARALLEL(T)*/' || COUNT(*) || ' * COUNT(*) OVER () - ' || listagg('COUNT(' || column_name || ')', ' + ') WITHIN GROUP (ORDER BY column_id) || ' FROM ' || o || '.' || T || ' t'
INTO expr
FROM all_tab_columns
WHERE table_name = T;
EXECUTE IMMEDIATE expr INTO q;
RETURN q;
END;
/
-- Usage 1
SELECT null_fields('<your table name>') FROM dual
/
-- Usage 2
SELECT null_fields('<your table name>', '<table owner>') FROM dual
/

Answer 2

Thank you #Lord Peter :
The below PL/SQL script works
declare
cnt number :=0;
temp number :=0;
begin
for r in ( select column_name, nullable
from user_tab_columns
where table_name = upper('test')
order by column_id )
loop
if r.nullable = 'Y' then
EXECUTE IMMEDIATE 'SELECT count(*) FROM test where '|| r.column_name ||' IS NULL' into temp ;
cnt := cnt + temp;
END IF;
end loop;
dbms_output.put_line('Total: '||cnt);
end;
/
The table name test may be replaced the name of table of your interest.
I hope this solution is useful!

Answer 3

The dynamic SQL you execute (this is the string used in EXECUTE IMMEDIATE) should be
select sum(
decode(a,null,1,0)
+decode(b,null,1,0)
+decode(c,null,1,0)
) nullcols
from test;
Where each summand corresponds to a NOT NULL column.
Here only one table scan is necessary to get the result.

Answer 4

Use the data dictionary to find the number of NULL values almost instantly:
select sum(num_nulls) sum_num_nulls
from all_tab_columns
where owner = user
and table_name = 'TEST';
SUM_NUM_NULLS
-------------
6
The values will only be correct if optimizer statistics were gathered recently and if they were gathered with the default value for the sample size.
Those may seem like large caveats but it's worth becoming familiar with your database's statistics gathering process anyway. If your database is not automatically gathering statistics or if your database is not using the default sample size those are likely huge problems you need to be aware of.
To manually gather stats for a specific table a statement like this will work:
begin
dbms_stats.gather_table_stats(user, 'TEST');
end;
/

Answer 5

select COUNT(1) TOTAL from table where COLUMN is NULL;