How do I explicitly insert nulls into a parametized query?

Question

I'm using Delphi 7 and Firebird 1.5.

I have a query that I create at runtime where some of the values might be null. I can't work out how to get Firebird to accept explicit nulls for values that I need to leave as null. At this stage I'm building the SQL so that I don't include parameters that are null but this is tedious and error-prone.

var
  Qry: TSQLQuery;
begin
  SetConnection(Query); // sets the TSQLConnection property to a live database connection
  Query.SQL.Text := 'INSERT INTO SomeTable (ThisColumn) VALUES (:ThisValue)';
  Query.ParamByName('ThisValue').IsNull := true; // read only, true by default
  Query.ParamByName('ThisValue').Clear; // does not fix the problem
  Query.ParamByName('ThisValue').IsNull = true; // still true
  Query.ParamByName('ThisValue').Bound := true; // does not fix the problem
  Query.ExecSQL;

Currently an EDatabaseError "No value for parameter 'ThisValue'"' is raised in DB.pas so I suspect this is by design rather than a firebird problem.

Can I set parameters to NULL? If so, how?

(edit: sorry for not being explicit about trying .Clear before. I left it out in favour of mentioning IsNull. Have added declaration and more code)

Sorry, one more thing: there is no "NOT NULL" constraint on the table. I don't think it's getting that far, but thought I should say.

Complete console app that displays the problem at my end:

program InsertNull;

{$APPTYPE CONSOLE}

uses
  DB,
  SQLExpr,
  Variants,
  SysUtils;

var
  SQLConnection1: TSQLConnection;
  Query: TSQLQuery;
begin
  SQLConnection1 := TSQLConnection.Create(nil);

  with SQLConnection1 do
  begin
    Name := 'SQLConnection1';
    DriverName := 'Interbase';
    GetDriverFunc := 'getSQLDriverINTERBASE';
    LibraryName := 'dbexpint.dll';
    LoginPrompt := False;
    Params.clear;
    Params.Add('Database=D:\Database\ZMDDEV12\clinplus');
    Params.Add('RoleName=RoleName');

    //REDACTED Params.Add('User_Name=');
    //REDACTED Params.Add('Password=');

    Params.Add('ServerCharSet=');
    Params.Add('SQLDialect=1');
    Params.Add('BlobSize=-1');
    Params.Add('CommitRetain=False');
    Params.Add('WaitOnLocks=True');
    Params.Add('ErrorResourceFile=');
    Params.Add('LocaleCode=0000');
    Params.Add('Interbase TransIsolation=ReadCommited');
    Params.Add('Trim Char=False');
    VendorLib := 'gds32.dll';
    Connected := True;
  end;
  SQLConnection1.Connected;
  Query := TSQLQuery.Create(nil);
  Query.SQLConnection := SQLConnection1;
  Query.Sql.Text := 'INSERT INTO crs_edocument (EDOC_ID, LINKAGE_TYPE) VALUES (999327, :ThisValue)';
  //Query.ParamByName('ThisValue').IsNull := true; // read only, true by default
//  Query.ParamByName('ThisValue').Value := NULL;
  Query.ParamByName('ThisValue').clear; // does not fix the problem
  Query.ParamByName('ThisValue').Bound := True; // does not fix the problem
//  Query.ParamByName('ThisValue').IsNull; // still true
  Query.ExecSQL;
end.

How do I explicitly insert nulls into a parametized query?

5 Answers