Passing parameters as dict to tx.run in Neo4j

Question

I'm trying to write a generic function to take a Cypher query and a dictionary of parameters and be able to dynamically run any given query. What I have looks like this:

def _run_cypher(tx, cypher, params = {}):
    results = []
    tx.run(cypher, parameters=params)

With queries that look like this:

'CREATE INDEX ON :$label(filemd5)'

And passing params as

params = {'label': label}

I get this error:

Invalid input '$': expected whitespace or a label name (line 1, column 18 (offset: 17))
"CREATE INDEX ON :$label(filemd5)"

Either I am going wrong, or in this context you can't pass a dict of named parameters to tx.run()...can anyone set me straight? Thanks!

score 2 · Accepted Answer · answered Aug 07 '20 at 02:50

You can't use parameters as label names

https://neo4j.com/docs/cypher-manual/current/syntax/parameters/

You will need to create your own generated query with the desired label and safety checks.

However, you might want to look into the apoc addon, which may allow this.

Passing parameters as dict to tx.run in Neo4j

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