Is null performance issues

  • Dear All,

    I have a query which has ISNull in my where condition, I'm aware that it henders the performance because 'scan' is performed in order to retrieve the data (regardless of index being implemented); I want to find out if there is another way to have an efficient way.

    Thank you in advance!

  • We could give a more specific answer if you'd show the actual code.
    But, for example, if it's something like this:

    WHERE ISNULL(date_column, '19000101') >= '20170101'
    then you don't need the ISNULL at all:
    WHERE date_column >= '20170101'
    will produce exactly the same results.

    SQL DBA,SQL Server MVP(07, 08, 09) "It's a dog-eat-dog world, and I'm wearing Milk-Bone underwear." "Norm", on "Cheers". Also from "Cheers", from "Carla": "You need to know 3 things about Tortelli men: Tortelli men draw women like flies; Tortelli men treat women like flies; Tortelli men's brains are in their flies".

  • thank you for your reply!
    The script is something like:

    CREATE PROCEDURE employeeinfo

    AS

    emaployeeid INT = NULL

    select employeename, id FROM Employee 

    where isnull(@emaployeeid,0) = isnull(employee.cgId,0)

  • Using a function on a column generally makes the query non-SARGable. This means any indexes you have on that table/column cannot be used. If you need to check whether a column has a specific value, or has the value NULL, then you should use an OR:

    WHERE (YourColumn = @InputParameter
       OR  YourColumn IS NULL)
      AND SomeOtherColumn...;

    For your query you should be doing:
    WHERE (employee.cgId = @emaployeeid
       OR  (employee.cgId IS NULL AND @emaployeeid IS NULL))

    This, however, has a bit more of the look of a "catch-all" query, which suffer from performance issues too.

    Thom~

    Excuse my typos and sometimes awful grammar. My fingers work faster than my brain does.
    Larnu.uk

  • Do you actually have NULL employee ids?  That's rather bizarre.

    If you do, use Thom's code.  If not, all you need to write is:
    where employee.cgId = @employeeid

    If not, and you meant the code to select all employees when the @employeeid value is null or zero, then this:
    where (@employeeid IS NULL OR @employeeid = 0 OR employee.cgId = @employeeid)

    Besides being more accurate, it's much more straightforward to read and understand (at least to me).

    SQL DBA,SQL Server MVP(07, 08, 09) "It's a dog-eat-dog world, and I'm wearing Milk-Bone underwear." "Norm", on "Cheers". Also from "Cheers", from "Carla": "You need to know 3 things about Tortelli men: Tortelli men draw women like flies; Tortelli men treat women like flies; Tortelli men's brains are in their flies".

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