[Bug] null values should be of type null and not of type string in manifest.json

[geoHeil]

Is there an existing issue for this?

• I have searched the existing issues

Current Behavior

Null values are rendered as proprietary "None" string fields in manifest.json.

https://getdbt.slack.com/archives/C01PWH4TXLY/p1677050123391359

Expected Behavior

Null values are rendered as valid JSON nulls in manifest.json

Steps To Reproduce

dbt run

for version 1.3.2 of dbt-oracle

Relevant log output using --debug flag enabled

No response

Environment

- OS: linux
- Python: 3.10
- dbt: 1.3.2

What Oracle database version are you using dbt with?

11

Additional Context

No response

[geoHeil]

This issue persists in the 1.4 RC release

[aosingh]

@geoHeil

Python None type translates to null in JSON

The issue you reported is only the case with database field because of how database is declared. We could not declare the default value to None as you can see below.

    # Specifying database is optional
    database: Optional[str]

    # OracleConnectionMethod.TNS
    tns_name: Optional[str] = None

The reason is some validation enforced by dbt. if you change database's default value to None, dbt command fails.

  File "/usr/local/Cellar/python@3.9/3.9.16/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/3.9/lib/python3.9/dataclasses.py", line 504, in _init_fn
    raise TypeError(f'non-default argument {f.name!r} '
TypeError: non-default argument 'schema' follows default argument

If default value could be declared None, manifest.json will have a valid null

[geoHeil]

Ok - let me rais an issue then in dbt-core.

[jtcohen6]

I left a comment on the dbt-core issue: dbt-labs/dbt-core#7051 (comment)

I haven't been able to look into it extensively, but following the precedent in dbt-spark, dbt-synapse, and others, I believe it should be possible for dbt-oracle to use a real Python None representation for database, rather than the string value "None".