Negation in a graph database is tricky and expensive. Every query would have to load ALL relevant nodes to check each for a null value, before excluding those you wish to ignore.
All of the following are functionally equivalent to deleting a property:
- Setting a property to
null: a.date = null
- Remove/delete a property:
REMOVE a.date
All of the following are functionally equivalent to checking that a property is not set:
- Checking that a property is equal to
null: WHERE a.date = null
- Checking that a property does not exist:
WHERE NOT EXISTS(a.date)
- Checking that a property
is null: WHERE a.date IS NULL
That shows that what you're asking for is possible, but not a good thing to plan to build. If your data had a million nodes, with all but one set with a deleted_at date, every query would have to load all one million nodes, check that the date was set to remove the node from the running list, to return the single node you cared about.
What you probably should do
Add two properties:
-
is_active bool
-
deleted_at dateTime
Always set the is_active when you create your nodes. Set it to false, and the deleted_at date when you delete. Then the million-node example isn't a problem.
