SELECT Object IF EXISTS Object ELSE INSERT

Hi, I tried to use the IF…ELSE and EXISTS clauses in order to construct a query that either selects an item if it exists or else inserts it. So since I can do the following:

SELECT 1 IF EXISTS (SELECT Person FILTER .name = 'Ryan Gosling') 
....... ELSE (SELECT 0);

…I tried to do

SELECT Person FILTER .name = 'Ryan Gosling' 
....... IF EXISTS (SELECT Person FILTER .name = 'Ryan Gosling') 
....... ELSE (SELECT <int64>{});

However I get the error: QueryError: operator ‘std::IF’ cannot be applied to operands of type ‘std::bool’, ‘std::bool’, ‘std::int64’

Am I making some syntax error or is this kind of selection not allowed? I assumed it would work because the documentation on IF states anytype as the left assignment, but I have not been able to figure out how to make it work with my schema types.

Thank you very much for your help.

[elprans]

To be clear SELECT Foo ?? Bar already works as a concise spelling of SELECT Foo IF EXISTS Foo ELSE Bar, it’s just that INSERT specifically doesn’t respect the flow and is always executed.

[Mulugruntz]

I’ve created a gist, if anyone needs… https://gist.github.com/Mulugruntz/97d904db4446428d0815dd626b812cbd