Retrieving Schema Definition

Backendless provides API for data table schema introspection. The API returns information about table's columns and their data types, whether a value for a column is required or if there is a default value.

Objective-CSwift

- (void)describeWithTableName:(NSString * _Nonnull)tableName responseHandler:^(NSArray<ObjectProperty *> * _Nonnull)responseHandler errorHandler:^(Fault * _Nonnull)errorHandler;

func describe(tableName: String, responseHandler: (([ObjectProperty]) -> Void)! errorHandler: ((Fault) -> Void)!)

where:

Argument	Description
tableName	name of a data table to get the schema for.
responseHandler	a block (closure) to handle successful result of an asynchronous call.
errorHandler	a block (closure) to handle fault result of an asynchronous call.

Return value

The API returns the array of the ObjectProperty objects. The ObjectProperty protocol has the following properties:

Argument	Description
autoLoad	applies only to relations. If true, the property is set to auto-load related data for the data retrieval queries.
customRegex	a regular expression assigned to the column as a validator. The validator applies when a new object is saved in the table or an existing one is updated.
defaultValue	a default value assigned to any object saved/updated in the table where the column does not have a value.
identity	true if the column is or is a part of a primary key.
name	contains the name of a property.
relatedTable	contains the name of the related table(s).
required	A boolean value defining whether a property is optional or required for the requests which save the initial object or update an existing one.
type: DataTypeEnum	defines the column type.

Example

Suppose the Person table has the following schema - there are two developer-defined columns, age and name

The following code retrieves the schema definition for the Person table:

Objective-CSwift

[Backendless.shared.data describeWithTableName:@"Person" responseHandler:^(NSArray<ObjectProperty *> *properties) {
    for (ObjectProperty *property in properties) {
        NSLog(@"property name - %@", property.name);
        NSLog(@"  is property required - %s", property.required ? "true" : "false");
        NSLog(@"  property data type - %@", [property getTypeName]);
        NSLog(@"  default value - %@", property.defaultValue);
        NSLog(@"  is property primary key - %s", property.isPrimaryKey ? "true" : "false");
    }
} errorHandler:^(Fault *fault) {
    NSLog(@"Error: %@", fault.message);
}];

Backendless.shared.data.describe(tableName: "Person", responseHandler: { properties in
    for property in properties {
        print("property name - \(property.name)")
        print("  is property required - \(property.required)")
        print("  property data type - \(property.getTypeName())")
        print("  default value - \(property.defaultValue ?? NSNull())")
        print("  is property primary key - \(property.isPrimaryKey)")
    }
}, errorHandler: { fault in
    print("Error: \(fault.message ?? "")")
})

The code produces the following output:

property name - objectId  
   is property required - false   
   property data type - STRING_ID  
   default value - null  
   is property primary key - true  
property name - age   
   is property required - false   
   property data type - INT   
   default value - null   
   is property primary key - false   
property name - updated   
   is property required - false   
   property data type - DATETIME   
   default value - null   
   is property primary key - false   
property name - name   
   is property required - false   
   property data type - STRING   
   default value - null   
   is property primary key - false   
property name - created   
   is property required - false   
   property data type - DATETIME   
   default value - null   
   is property primary key - false   
property name - ownerId   
   is property required - false  
   property data type - STRING   
   default value - null   
   is property primary key - false