How to check if a table or a column exists in a database?

Question

I am trying to make simple java code that will check if a table and/or a column exists in a MySQL DB. Should I use Java code to do the checking or make a SQL query string an

Answer 1

To check if a table exist you can use DatabaseMetaData in this way :

DatabaseMetaData md = connection.getMetaData();
ResultSet rs = md.getTables(null, null, "table_name", null);
if (rs.next()) {
  //Table Exist
}

And to check if a column exist you can use it in a similar way :

DatabaseMetaData md = connection.getMetaData();
ResultSet rs = md.getColumns(null, null, "table_name", "column_name");
 if (rs.next()) {
      //Column in table exist
    }