Is Select EXISTS() possible in JPQL?

Question

I'm trying to run a query that checks if some conditions are true and returns a simple boolean result as output. What makes it slightly tricky is that one of the conditions is to test for whether no results are returned for a set of criteria.

I'm currently using JPA-2.0 with hibernate as my provider, backed by MySQL. I have gotten an example query working fine in MySQL, but when trying to get it running in JPQL it flops. The MySQL query looks a bit like this:

Select exists(Select statement with criteria) 
  or not exists(Select statement with criteria);

I also got the same output using CASE, but as JPQL doesn't support that statement.

Anyways, when I try to use a similar query in JPQL I get the error:

"unexpected end of subtree"

which from my understanding means that something is missing in the query. Does anyone have any idea how to fix it?

Answer 1

You can do a boolean query using a case expression.

As of JPA 2.0 (Java EE 6) you can create a TypedQuery .

String query = "select case when (count(*) > 0)  then true else false end from ......"
TypedQuery<Boolean> booleanQuery = entityManager.createQuery(query, Boolean.class);
boolean exists = booleanQuery.getSingleResult();

In JPA 1.0 (Java EE 5) you must use an untyped query.

Query booleanQuery = entityManager.createQuery(query);
boolean exists = (Boolean) booleanQuery.getSingleResult();

Answer 2

This answer is obsolete. Please refer to correct answer from Rene Link

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No, it is not possible.

Refer to the JPQL BNF documentation from oracle.

simple_cond_expression ::= comparison_expression | between_expression | like_expression | in_expression | null_comparison_expression | empty_collection_comparison_expression | collection_member_expression | exists_expression

exists_expression ::= [NOT] EXISTS(subquery)

Answer 3

In a project with Hibernate 5.2 (which supports JPA 2.1), and Spring Data Jpa 2.0.6, I successfully used this JPQL query:

@Query("SELECT COUNT(c) > 0 FROM Contract c WHERE c.person.id = :pid")
Boolean existContractForPerson(@Param("pid") Long personId);

In the logs, I read that the produced native query is the following:

select count(contract0_.contract_id)>0 as col_0_0_ from contracts contract0_ where contract0_.fk_person_id=?

Answer 4

Alternatively you could use a select count(...) and test whether it returns 0. This should be almost as efficient without requiring to write much more code (in fact, the query itself will probably look simpler).