topic Re: How to default stats to zero when no rows returned in Splunk Search

How to default stats to zero when no rows returned?

schres1 — Tue, 17 May 2022 16:04:13 GMT

I have a query similar to the one below.

index = "idx" source = "mysource" |spath path=myField output=res|stats count by res
| where res="xyz"

Is there a way to get the search to return zero if no rows are returned? The reason Im asking for this is because this is the query Im using to populate values into a dashboard panel. If no rows are returned I would prefer the panel show zero instead of no results.

Re: How to default stats to zero when no rows returned

etoombs — Tue, 17 May 2022 15:48:19 GMT

There might be a more graceful way someone will provide, but I generally add something like this to the end, forcing a row with a 0 value, and then doing another quick sum before displaying it.

| append [makeresults |eval count=0] |stats sum(count) as count

Re: How to default stats to zero when no rows returned

schres1 — Tue, 17 May 2022 15:53:35 GMT

Thank you! I will give this a try!

Re: How to default stats to zero when no rows returned

ITWhisperer — Tue, 17 May 2022 15:56:09 GMT

This is another way to get count=0

| appendpipe [stats count | where count=0 | eval res="xyz"]

Having said that, there may be a better way depending on your full search.

Re: How to default stats to zero when no rows returned

verbal_666 — Thu, 24 Jul 2025 05:42:00 GMT

And what is you stats wants a _time group?

index=* source=/my.log | bin span=5m _time | stats count by _time[,source]

00:00 5
00:05 (no records, skipped)
00:10 10
00:15 20

The result will be,

00:00 5
00:10 10
00:15 20

The only way in this case is to use a timechart 👍

index=* source=/my.log | timechart span=5m count by source

00:00 5
00:05 0
00:10 10
00:15 20