How to Avoid the “Divide by Zero” Error in SQLite?

Let’s understand why the “divide by zero” error occurs. In mathematics, division by zero is undefined because it leads to infinite or undefined results. Similarly, SQLite throws an error when attempting to divide by zero to prevent unexpected or incorrect query results. Below are the methods that help us to Avoid the “Divide by Zero” Error in SQLite are as follows:

  1. Using NULLIF() Operator
  2. Using CASE Statement

Setting up the environment

To understand How to avoid the “divide by zero” error in SQLite we need a table on which we will perform various operations and queries. Here we will consider a table called w3wiki which contains user_id, name, total_score, and contest_questions as Columns.

Table – w3wiki

How to Avoid the “Divide by Zero” Error in SQLite?

In SQLite, performing division operations where the divisor is zero can lead to the infamous divide by zeroerror. This error occurs when attempting to divide a number by zero, which is mathematically undefined. Fortunately,

SQLite provides several methods to handle and prevent this error. In this article, we will explore these methods and learn how to avoid the “divide by zero” error in SQLite queries.

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How to Avoid the “Divide by Zero” Error in SQLite?

Let’s understand why the “divide by zero” error occurs. In mathematics, division by zero is undefined because it leads to infinite or undefined results. Similarly, SQLite throws an error when attempting to divide by zero to prevent unexpected or incorrect query results. Below are the methods that help us to Avoid the “Divide by Zero” Error in SQLite are as follows:...

1. Using NULLIF() Operator

In SQLite, the NULLIF() operator compares to operators passed in its parameter. It returns NULL if they are equal. We are going to use this with our divisor column. We are going to match divisor column values with zero. If they are equal, we are going to return NULL. Eventually, this will prevent us from facing divide by zero error....

2. Using CASE Statement

A CASE statement in SQLite is used to perform condition based operations. It gives us flexibility to perform some expression only when some condition is fulfilled. We will use this to perform division only when divisor column is not zero....

Conclusion

Overall, ‘dividing by zero’ is a very common error and it can be prevented very easily with some in-built functions or with the help of CASE statement. In this article, we have covered briefly on how to prevent this error with the help of “NULLIF() operator” and CASE statement. We have covered their basic concepts along with their syntax followed by an example on how we use them to prevent our “dividing by zero” error. We have explained all the mentioned methods with clear explanations along with a brief example....

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