Question

I have to read from a ^ delimited file and then pulate a table. Table has nullable integer columns. When there is no value specified in the input file, the column should be made to null.

I need to process the input data first and then insert into the table. So I am reading them into a valueObject with integer data elements. But if I then try to create table rows from the valueObject, integers get converted into 0 values.

How do I avoid this?

Thanks

Answer 1

I think you have 2 possible ways:

1/ If you use primitive int: you can use a special code, for example, you can use -1 (in case all other values are positive), you can use Integer.MAX_INTEGER or Integer.MIN_INTEGER. Then, when you put data into the database, you can check for this special code, if the value is equal to the special code, you put the null instead.

2/ You can use an Integer object, then, if you see no value in file, you you point that object to null. Then when you write to database, it should just work