👀 Views: 59 💬 Answers: 1 📅 Created: 2025-06-14

mysql json error-handling SQL

I'm stuck on something that should probably be simple... I'm working on a personal project and I've searched everywhere and can't find a clear answer. I'm currently working on a MySQL 8.0 database where I'm trying to update a JSON field in a specific row. The scenario arises when I attempt to set a key in the JSON object to NULL, which results in an `behavior 1048: Column 'json_column' want to be null`. Here's the query I attempted: ```sql UPDATE my_table SET json_column = JSON_SET(json_column, '$.key', NULL) WHERE id = 1; ``` I expected this to either remove the key or set it explicitly to NULL, but it seems like MySQL is interpreting this as trying to assign a NULL to the entire JSON column. I've also tried using `JSON_REMOVE()` to delete the key, but that doesn't suit my use case as I still need the JSON structure intact. Here's the code I used for that: ```sql UPDATE my_table SET json_column = JSON_REMOVE(json_column, '$.key') WHERE id = 1; ``` This works but doesn’t achieve the functionality I need. I want the key to exist but have a NULL value. If I try to use a subquery to check for existing keys, it complicates the query significantly and still results in the same behavior. Is there a way to update a JSON field key to NULL without working with this behavior? Is this a known limitation of JSON handling in MySQL 8.0, or is there a workaround that I might be missing? My development environment is macOS. Has anyone else encountered this? Am I missing something obvious?