"Create table if not exists" - how to check the schema, too?

Question

Is there a (more or less) standard way to check not only whether a table named mytable exists, but also whether its schema is similar to what it should be? I'm experimenting with H2 database, and

CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS mytable (....)

statements apparently only check for the table´s name. I would expect to get an exception if there's a table with the given name, but different schema.

Answer 1

SELECT  *
FROM    INFORMATION_SCHEMA.TABLES
WHERE   TABLE_NAME      = 'TableName'
    AND TABLE_SCHEMA    = 'public'

Answer 2

CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS ... is not a standard SQL code.

The thing to do is to check if the table is already in the catalogue. For instance, in Java you may do something like: connection.getMetaData().getTables(connection.getCatalog(), null, null, null)

For more info see javadoc java.sql.Connection.