Spark sql check if file exists mode (SaveMode. tablename"). Azure Databricks Learning: UDF to Check if folder exists===============================================In bigdata world, we often come arcoss scenarios where Sep 28, 2023 · So I am trying to build a weekly Data import to Unity Catalog in Databricks. htl. ignoreMissingFiles. Mar 1, 2019 · When I try to run the command spark. listTables () returns an empty list so there is no point to refresh anything. exists(p) && hadoopfs. Jul 14, 2025 · Learn how to specify the DBFS path in Apache Spark, Bash, DBUtils, Python, and Scala. Jan 7, 2020 · I am curious to know, how can i implement sql like exists clause in spark Dataframe way. databaseExists is a method provided by the Spark Catalog API. json API Reference Spark SQL CatalogCatalog # Jul 23, 2025 · Hadoop Distributed File System (HDFS) is a distributed file system that provides high-throughput access to application data. There is an option in Scala spark. sql Mar 5, 2018 · On EMR Spark, writing an RDD [String] to S3 via a dataframe. If you use the code below directly Oct 4, 2018 · org. Catalog. -- Throws exception DROP TABLE employeetable; Error: org. ]table Jun 20, 2020 · In this blog post I will focus on 2 properties that you can use to manage issues with the input datasets, namely spark. The problem is I do not know the exact path of the file, so I have to use wild characters. FILE_NOT_EXIST File does not exist. Jun 16, 2022 · AnalysisException: Path does not exist: /dir1/dir2/2022-06-16-04-23-*. parquet has anything in it before I try to read in a dataframe. The following are the files present in my storage. For CREATE TABLE AS SELECT with LOCATION, Spark throws analysis exceptions if the given location exists as a non-empty directory. Spark is not something brand new and exclusively related to Microsoft Fabric – on the Dec 5, 2022 · ADD COLUMN IF NOT EXISTS does not recognize "IF NOT EXIST". setCurrentDatabase("d Jun 19, 2023 · I have statement in t-sql. The exists method provides a way to create a boolean column that checks for the presence of related records in a subquery. , Python, Spark SQL, is associated with a default location on either the Local File System of the Driver Node or DBFS. sql("""DROP TABLE IF EXISTS db_name. toDF () . Aug 19, 2025 · You can check if a column contains a specific value from another column using the contains function provided by the pyspark. default. I am Trying to use it in PySprak -spark Feb 23, 2021 · spark. Query HIVE Table in Pyspark Apache Hive is a data warehousing system Apr 17, 2024 · The idea is to rewrite the file so that the data in these duplicate columns are put into 1 column of array type. Parameters tableNamestr name of the table to check existence If no database is specified, first try to treat tableName as a multi-layer-namespace identifier, then try to Oct 10, 2023 · Learn the syntax of the exists function of the SQL language in Databricks SQL and Databricks Runtime. I wrote this code which works for 1 file But I don't know how to use it for my table. Nov 22, 2019 · Unfortunately, there is no DDL named "IF EXISTS" supported in Databricks. It is recommended to judge whether the target file exists in python in advance instead of handing it over to spark. format("delta"). write method. e. mode("append"). Anyone know how to make the where clause conditional so that no filter is applied if table does not exist without running a separate SQL query? May 12, 2024 · Using PySpark StructType & StructField with DataFrame Defining Nested StructType or struct Adding & Changing columns of the DataFrame Using SQL ArrayType and MapType Creating StructType or struct from Json file Creating StructType object from DDL string Check if a field exists in a StructType 1. filter(p => testDirExists(p)) val Feb 14, 2023 · Doing a distributed file-system scan in Python is, unfortunately, not so straightforward. If the table to drop does not exist, an exception is thrown. Let's say you have a list of patterns that you want to check for in your directory and you want to know if any such files exist for each pattern. Exists — Correlated Predicate Subquery Expression Exists is a SubqueryExpression and a predicate expression (i. pyspark. write. fs. In some cases you can use a notebook to mix Scala cells with Python cells, but (assuming you are not a savage) you will not put that in production. This is how you would do it in Scala (you can do similar for python as well). Mar 7, 2023 · To continue your stream, you can set the Spark SQL configuration spark. tables where table=‘current_table’) If my current_table does not exist, just select * from preceeding_table. coalesce (16) . spark. if not spark. Nov 22, 2019 · spark. You can query a file with a specified format directly with SQL. select Example JSON schema: Mar 1, 2017 · I want to aggreagate data on column 'b','c','d' and 'f' which is not present in the given json file but could be present in the other files. get(spark. sql("""Create TABLE IF NOT EXISTS db_name. builder Sep 25, 2018 · 3 I am connecting with Hive using Spark 2. I tried to set the spark. By examining the schema, you can verify the presence of a column by checking for its name. tableExists # Catalog. It works. ignoreMissingFiles or the data source option ignoreMissingFiles to ignore missing files while reading data from files. 6 behavior regarding string literal parsing. sql("drop table if exists your_unmanaged_table") The tmp/unmanaged_data folder will still contain the data files, even though the table has been dropped. Error Conditions This is a list of error states and conditions that may be returned by Spark SQL. Finally, we are writing the filtered data to a data lake attached to the Synapse Workspace using the df_filtered. It is possible the underlying files have been updated. As we cannot read this file with spark we might need to do it with simple python. Jun 23, 2022 · S3 doesn't actually have folders. For example, if the config is enabled, the pattern to match "\abc" should be "\abc". Every exists type solution I have found expects an explicit filename, vs verifying some results from a wildcard path. In this blog post, we’ll explore into what DBFS is, how it works, and provide examples to illustrate its usage. Sep 19, 2024 · The `fsPathExists` function checks if a given path exists in a distributed file system, within a Spark application and helps to verify the presence of a file or directory before proceeding with Check if a table with the specified name exists in Spark. . exists # DataFrame. Jun 11, 2020 · Hi, How to find if file exists in a path in the data lake? Regards Rajaniesh I'd like to check if abfss://path/to/raw/files/*. Overwrite) . Before creating or refreshing the table, check if it already exists in the catalog. If the directory is empty, you can complete the flow in the Databricks notebook. sql("show tables"). DataFrame. [ May 1, 2023 · we are reading the log files from the specified folder path in the container of the storage account using the spark. ignoreMissingFiles to true. You can explicitly invalidate the cache in Spark by running ' REFRESH TABLE tableName' command in SQL or by recreating the Dataset/DataFrame involved. Ignore Missing Files Spark allows you to use the configuration spark. Mar 5, 2018 · On EMR Spark, writing an RDD [String] to S3 via a dataframe. I have following working code below just to read the file into dataframe. I understand it fails the first time it detects a change, but why does it looks for deleted files the second time autoloader runs ? What are the impact ? Do I lose data ? Thanks ! Hive Tables Specifying storage format for Hive tables Interacting with Different Versions of Hive Metastore Spark SQL also supports reading and writing data stored in Apache Hive. escapedStringLiterals' is enabled, it falls back to Spark 1. Running SQL with PySpark # PySpark offers two main ways to perform SQL operations: Using spark. getFileStatus(p). Nov 6, 2017 · I can check whether the exact file exists or not using its exact path, but I have to use wild cards like here "s3://s3bucket/2017/10/31/ */ *" which it doesn't support. Currently, my code for reading the data looks like this: Dec 1, 2023 · In most cases, you set the Spark config (AWS | Azure) at the cluster level. tableExists("schemaname. Check to make sure the table has been dropped: spark. It is at sc. ignoreCorruptFiles and spark. defaultParallelism. I have add that lakehouse to the notebook in which i am trying to do it. catalog. Nov 17, 2021 · Here, missing file really means the deleted file under directory after you construct the DataFrame. "Although Apache Spark SQL currently does not support IN or EXISTS subqueries, you can efficiently implement the semantics by rewriting queries to use LEFT SEMI JOIN. Hive Tables Specifying storage format for Hive tables Interacting with Different Versions of Hive Metastore Spark SQL also supports reading and writing data stored in Apache Hive. databaseExists(dbName) [source] # Check if the database with the specified name exists. Oct 6, 2023 · Specifying File Paths In Databricks, the code being executed, e. If you use the code below directly pyspark. ls command to check if the file exists in the mounted directory. At the same time, we will take a look at alternative methods to this procedure. Checking if values exist using a AND query To check if all the given values exist in a PySpark Column: May 30, 2024 · Python provides multiple ways to check if a file exists and determine its status, including using built-in functions and modules such as os. json Apr 17, 2024 · The idea is to rewrite the file so that the data in these duplicate columns are put into 1 column of array type. isDirectory } val filteredPaths = paths. Jul 25, 2019 · Very many thanks to @zerogjoe for his elegant answer, which works perfectly for Databricks formatted file paths. This question, however, is about how to Jun 19, 2023 · what is the equivalent of "IF EXISTS" in databricks? I would like to first check something later after that use the insert into statement. parser. Introduction In some cases, database administrators may need to verify whether a particular file exists in a particular folder through SQL Server. It works well once I set ignoreMissingFiles to True. Oct 9, 2019 · I want to check if a table schemaname. The spark. FileSystem import org. The Spark Catalog is a metadata repository that stores information about tables, databases, and functions. Aug 2, 2017 · I have set up a spark cluster and all the nodes have access to network shared storage where they can access a file to read. cacheMetadata to 'false' but it didn't help. Here is a minimal working example to reproduce my problem and the exact order of operations I am performing. SO as column 'f' is not present we can take empty string for that column. Jul 11, 2022 · As per the spark documentation, when we are reading the json file and not providing the schema it will first look into the data and identify the schema. Here, missing file really means the deleted file under directory after you construct the DataFrame. databaseExists # Catalog. If Hive dependencies can be found on the classpath, Spark will load them automatically using CSV format, you will get the "org. This works for notebooks as well as spark/pyspark batch jobs. txt opens right up, so it's definitely there? Oct 16, 2025 · Pyspark SQL provides methods to read Parquet files into a DataFrame and write a DataFrame to Parquet files, parquet () function from DataFrameReader and DataFrameWriter are used to read from and write/create a Parquet file, respectively. Nov 25, 2016 · Json file consists of lots of json records and I want the record to be updated in parquet if it already exists. functions module. Is there a way to do that using Spark JDBC? Because I tried using if exists construct from Ms sql server, but it does not work for querying with Spark. You have to use command called "Drop Table": Drop a table and delete the directory associated with the table from the file system if this is not an EXTERNAL table. What is DBFS? An exception is file source such as parquet, json. frame (get (df_name)) How can this be done in p Aug 6, 2024 · What is the equivalent of the below sql server syntax in databricks sql? there are cases where i need to execute a block of sql code on certain conditions. So once you read the json, rows with no specific fields in json file data, must have a null value for those fields. Jan 14, 2022 · Select * From preceeding_table Where dt > (Select max(dt) from current_table) and EXISTS (Select * from information_schema. For example, if a given table is a Delta table you may need to read it differently than if it were a Parquet table. This bug can be reproduced on master and all other Spark 2 branches. You can create a zero-byte object at /folder/, and the S3 console will pretend it's a folder, but it isn't really one. dbo. And if the table exists, append data. parallelism. Oct 8, 2020 · You can check whether the table exists in the information_schema of the catalog. It allows you to check whether a database with a given name exists in your SparkSession's catalog. May 23, 2022 · For example, if you are processing logs, you may want to read files from a specific month. To make this a little more robust and allow for filesystem api paths (that can be used with os, glob etc and start with "/dbfs") I've added a few lines of code. functions. Spark provides several functions to check if a value exists in a list, primarily isin and array_contains, along with SQL expressions and custom approaches. In this article, we will explore the xp_fileexist extended stored procedure usage and other details. Mar 10, 2016 · When I create a DataFrame from a JSON file in Spark SQL, how can I tell if a given column exists before calling . parquet To handle this error, I tried adding the following to my spark configuration: pyspark. Jun 28, 2021 · PySpark - Search Table in Database, Check if Table Exists in Database using PySpark Catalog API, List All Tables in a Database, Python UDF Nov 21, 2023 · AnalysisException: [PATH_NOT_FOUND] Path does not exist: /mnt/delta-sharing/temp/df. Refer to PySpark: Create a Spark Session for more details. _jsparkSession. Jan 19, 2024 · This post shows you how to check that a table exists in Databricks SQL. IF EXISTS (SELECT dateadd(day,+1,CAST(SnapshotDate as date)) FROM CONFIG. databaseExists does. check=false" parameter in your spark job and give a try? Regards, Chethan YM Oct 16, 2025 · Pyspark SQL provides methods to read Parquet files into a DataFrame and write a DataFrame to Parquet files, parquet () function from DataFrameReader and DataFrameWriter are used to read from and write/create a Parquet file, respectively. sql () is it does not provide the number of affected columns (insert/update/delete) after the execution of dml statement. files. versionadded:: 3. On Azure Synapse, mssparkutils is perfect for this. table_name""") spark. tableExists(tableName, dbName=None) [source] # Check if the table or view with the specified name exists. AnalysisException: No such struct field ResponseType How can I get around this issue without forcing a schema at the time of read? is it possible to make it return a NULL under that column when it is not available? how do I detect if a spark dataframe has a column Does mention how to detect if a column is available in a dataframe. One such file system that has gained popularity in the Apache Spark ecosystem is DBFS, which stands for Databricks File System. hadoopConfiguration) def testDirExist(path: String): Boolean = { val p = new Path(path) hadoopfs. Apr 9, 2019 · If you want to check whether the file exists or not, you'll need to bypass Spark's FS abstraction, and access the storage system directly (Whether is s3, posix, or something else). An exception is file source such as parquet, json. Jul 30, 2009 · When SQL config 'spark. It was working a few days The function input_file_name in the package org. data. In case you missed it, Spark is the compute engine for processing the data in the Fabric lakehouse (opposite to Polaris engine which handles SQL workloads of the Fabric warehouse). First you will need a spark session. Feb 10, 2021 · Spark function offers a very quick way to check if a record exists inside a dataframe. which checks the date and if its true then it will continue execution (insert into). tableExists is a method provided by the Spark Catalog API. Oct 9, 2024 · Hi, I have been trying to access the lakehouse tables in one workspace from a Notebook that is in other woekspace. functions creates a string column for the file name of the current Spark tasks. Apr 23, 2019 · I would like to create some mechanism to check first whether the table exists and only then read the data. 0 Feb 7, 2017 · I am a newbie to Spark. When set to true, the Spark jobs will continue to run when encountering missing files and the contents that have been read will still be returned. Includes code examples and explanations. However, since Hive has a large number of dependencies, these dependencies are not included in the default Spark distribution. After that you apply the logic with the "if" - if the result_df is not empty - do something, drop the table, etc, otherwise do something else. Understanding pyspark. Jun 3, 2021 · @Gordon Linoff My understanding is that spark sql only accepts subquery in where clause, so I cannot do "case when exists (subquery)" here Mar 27, 2024 · In this Spark article, you have learned how to check if the column exists/present in DataFrame columns, if it present in nested struct columns, by case insensitive and finally check if it exists with the same Data type. x and I am running following Spark Query: spark. option ("compression", "gzip") . Aug 25, 2019 · I am trying to check if a table exists in hive metastore if not, create the table. AnalysisException: Path does not exist" whether the file is a local file or on hdfs. Nov 2, 2023 · This tutorial explains how to check if a specific value exists in a column in a PySpark DataFrame, including an example. we assign the label to the column returned by the SQL expression using the alias clause AS. path. Mar 16, 2023 · You may not always know the type of table you need to read. Aug 30, 2019 · I just tried that and I got the same error: org. Parquet files maintain the schema along with the data, hence it is used to process a structured file. apache. Checked this StackOverflow question: Spark : Read file only if the path exists , but its not related to my use-case. Mar 30, 2023 · Working with File System from PySpark Motivation Any of us is working with File System in our work. The file is located in: /home/hadoop/. The script that I'm using is this one: spark = SparkSession \\ . AND NOT can be rewritten using EXCEPT. Jun 6, 2022 · Trying to check if a column exist in a dataframe or not if not then i have to give NULL if yes then i need to give the column itself by using UDF Feb 15, 2022 · To summarize your problem: The spark-job is failing because the folder you are pointing to does not exist. Mar 1, 2024 · Learn the syntax of the exists function of the SQL language in Databricks SQL and Databricks Runtime. This catalog is crucial for organizing and managing structured data within Spark, making it an essential component for data engineers and data teams. Typically json or yaml files are used. Jan 10, 2022 · I want to check whether a file exists in an s3 path and then read it as a spark dataframe. Currently, my code for reading the data looks like this: Feb 11, 2025 · 02-11-2025 04:58 AM This can happen if the table was not properly dropped or if there is a naming conflict. Can you check in the Data/DBFS page if the file is there (or via dbutils. tableExists(tableName: str, dbName: Optional[str] = None) → bool ¶ Check if the table or view with the specified name exists. However , same functionality not available through pySpark . sql, but the problem with spark. if file already exists, it writes in the end). table(table_name) except AnalysisException: return False return True Aug 11, 2025 · Learn how to use the CREATE TABLE \\[USING] syntax of the SQL language in Databricks SQL and Databricks Runtime. Feb 6, 2019 · The exists operator doesn't exist in Spark but there are 2 join operators that can replace it : left_anti and left_semi. table_name""") if the table doesn't exist then the first query gives exception of Table Does not exist. csv file to be in hdfs path /tmp/data/ but to me it seems you have the file riskfactor1. Chapter 6: Old SQL, New Tricks - Running SQL on PySpark # Introduction # This section explains how to use the Spark SQL API in PySpark and compare it with the DataFrame API. Almost every pipeline or application has some kind of file-based configuration. Oct 26, 2021 · 10-26-2021 01:55 AM This means the path to the file you typed is not valid, the file is not there. Nov 16, 2021 · Hi, I've Synapse Notebook, using which I need to check if a folder exists? If its not need to create the folder using the ADLS Gen1 APIs. rddString . Understanding their syntax and parameters is key to applying them effectively. Dec 11, 2019 · Spark expects the riskfactor1. AnalysisException: Table or view not found: employeetable; (state=,code=0) -- Assumes a table named `employeetable` does not exist,Try with IF EXISTS -- this time it will not throw exception DROP TABLE IF EXISTS employeetable; -- Completely purge the table skipping trash. It also covers how to switch between the two APIs seamlessly, along with some practical tips and tricks. sql ("DROP TABLE IF EXISTS table_to_drop") and the table does not exist, I get the following - 28269 exists This section demonstrates how any is used to determine if one or more elements in an array meets a certain predicate condition and then shows how the PySpark exists method behaves in a similar manner. For now, I simply delete the output folder's items, and write the dataframe. Path val hadoopfs: FileSystem = FileSystem. exists() [source] # Return a Column object for an EXISTS Subquery. So, running this job for the same file duplicates the records. The below screenshot has the block of code how i am trying to do it. Or serialize some artifacts, like matplotlib plot, into Jul 25, 2019 · I Have a while loop there i have to check a file exists or not if exists read the file in a data frame else go to another file File Description You can query a file with a specified format directly with SQL. csv on your local filesystem /tmp/data I have run the below from a sandbox Check if the table or view with the specified name exists in the specified database. How do I add a column to an existing delta table with SQL if the column does not already exist? Jan 3, 2022 · This code snippet checks for table existence really fast: def table_exists(spark: SparkSession, table_name: str) -> bool: # a more logical way would be to use spark catalog, however it's really slow from pyspark. Currently I'm using following logic to do so, need better way of doing it, any suggestions? 1# GetList… Jan 17, 2023 · 0 My requirement is to check if the specific file pattern exists in the data lake storage directory and if the file exists then read the file into pyspark dataframe if not exit the notebook execution. hadoop. Else, if the table is available, then append the data into the table. This can be done using SQL Server’s built-in procedure known as master. insertInto("events") So, every time it will check if the table is available or not, else it will create the table and move to next step. read method. IF EXISTS If the table does not exist, nothing happens. I am running this in a python jupyter notebook. the result data type is always boolean). Jun 6, 2025 · You can use Python's glob module to check whether there are any files matching your pattern. sql. " OR can always be rewritten using UNION. exists(col, f) [source] # Returns whether a predicate holds for one or more elements in the array. xp_fileexist. Also for data pipelines, it is sometimes important to be able to write results or state them in a human-readable format. EXISTS & IN can always be rewritten using JOIN or LEFT SEMI JOIN. write . However, there may be instances when you need to check (or set) the values of specific Spark configuration properties in a notebook. For example, you have a DataFrame named df with two columns, column1 and column2, and you want to check if the values in column2 are contained in the values of column1 and filter it. exists # pyspark. Syntax EXISTS & IN can always be rewritten using JOIN or LEFT SEMI JOIN. Dec 17, 2023 · If the file is not available in the blob storage, you can use the dbutils. For example, we need this function to check whether the backup file May 28, 2024 · You can check if a column exists in a PySpark DataFrame using the schema attribute, which contains the DataFrame’s schema information. txt; It's so strange because when I copy the path into my file directory, input. tablename exists in Hive using pysparkSQL. I use python. StructType – Defines the structure of the DataFrame PySpark provides StructType class from Dec 20, 2012 · trying to check whether the file I want to read exists or not. databaseExists Before we dive into the example, let's take a moment to understand what pyspark. Because of this feature, how we specify a file path depends on the code we're running and the file system we're accessing. We are then filtering the data based on a condition and grouping and counting the results. Mar 31, 2023 · Hi, Can you use "spark. 4. sql("create table IF NOT EXISTS table_name using delta select * from df_table where 1=2") df. One can do dir(sc) in PySpark to see what's available in sc. Sep 20, 2012 · Frequently, when working with SQL, we need to know if a file exists in a local directory or not. Jun 5, 2020 · Is there a way to check if a dataframe exists in pySpark? I know in native python, to check if dataframe exists: exists (df_name) && is. import org. I know this can be achieved with spark. sql() # The spark. Learn how to check if a column exists in PySpark with this comprehensive guide. I have tried Append mode but it seems to be working on file level rather than record level (i. ls)? Nov 9, 2023 · This tutorial explains how to create a column in a PySpark DataFrame only if it doesn't already exist, including an example. There is no problem overwriting the table in case it exists: %sql Use catalog some_catalog dfTarget [docs] def listCatalogs(self, pattern: Optional[str] = None) -> List[CatalogMetadata]: """Returns a list of catalogs in this session. Jun 1, 2015 · Landed here trying to find out the value for spark. If you don’t specify the LOCATION, Spark will create a default table location for you. DROP TABLE [IF EXISTS] [db_name. snappy. utils import AnalysisException try: spark. exists(), Feb 16, 2024 · In the world of big data processing, efficient and scalable file systems play a crucial role. In this article, we will learn how to create and query a HIVE table using Apache Spark, which is an open-source distributed computing system that is used to process large amounts of data in Python. I'm trying to read a local csv file within an EMR cluster. AnalysisException: Path does not exist: file:/C:/Users/brmurtau/mySparkApp/input. check=false" parameter in your spark job and give a try? Regards, Chethan YM Aug 12, 2023 · Here, note the following: we are checking whether the value B or C exists in the vals column. sparkContext. . But why the original method with 'overwrite' mode fails?? Thanks. Instead of enumerating each file and folder to find the desired files, you can use a glob pattern to match multiple files with a single expression. I have a snippet of the code below: spark. By default the spark parquet source is using "partition inferring" which means it requires the file path to be partition in Key=Value pairs and the loads happens at the root. Specifies a file path with a given format. If you want for example to insert a dataframe df in a hive table target, you can do : Jul 31, 2012 · I've table like this created in my db server, I've stored file paths in it filepath column, now I've to check using sql whether the file exists in my machine, if it exists I need to add temporary column in my table showing yes if exists and no it doesn't exists. May 23, 2025 · DBR_FILE_NOT_EXIST <hint> FAILED_CONVERT_PARQUET_COLUMN Possible cause: Parquet column cannot be converted. This can either be a temporary view or a table/view. The result of this query (see below result_df) would be either an empty table (if such a table doesn't exist), or a table with a row. show() +---------+---------+-----------+ |namespace|tableName|isTemporary| +---------+---------+-----------+ Nov 2, 2023 · Before we dive deeper into the Tables vs Files folders, let’s take a step back and explain two main table types in Spark. g. tableExists ¶ Catalog. c… pyspark. ugjqqe kwv ybuu lqla hkprpl tcma fidl pydj tcfj inyl koki plmd opw jjytlx acupbr