What should a SQLite application do after a transaction error?

Check the transaction state using the mechanism provided by the SQLite API you actually use, then follow that API’s documented recovery behavior. Don’t assume every error leaves the transaction active or that SQLite has automatically rolled it back.

SQLite documents that errors such as SQLITE_FULL, SQLITE_IOERR, SQLITE_INTERRUPT, and SQLITE_NOMEM may leave a transaction active or cause the entire transaction to be rolled back, depending on the statement and when the error occurs. For SQLite’s C interface, sqlite3_get_autocommit() and sqlite3_txn_state() can determine transaction state. SQLite also says an application may issue ROLLBACK to make the post-error state consistent; if SQLite has already rolled back, that ROLLBACK fails harmlessly. [S1]

Those details concern SQLite’s documented behavior and named C interfaces. A language wrapper may expose different state checks or recovery rules, so check its documentation rather than copying C calls into another API.

Treat the save as one operation with a clear success path and an error path. Before implementation, confirm how your chosen API begins a transaction, reports a failed statement, checks whether a transaction remains active, and handles rollback when no transaction is active.

A review-level flow—not drop-in code—is:

1. Begin the transaction using the API’s documented method.
2. Attempt the record save and related-item saves.
3. If the operation succeeds, finish the transaction using the documented success procedure.
4. If an error occurs, inspect transaction state using the API’s supported mechanism.
5. Apply the documented rollback or recovery behavior, then report failure to the calling part of the app.

For example, suppose saving a local note succeeds but saving one of its tags fails. Don’t report the combined save as successful just because the first step completed. Follow the transaction-state and recovery rules for your API, and make clear that the overall save failed. This example illustrates control flow; it does not establish what a particular wrapper does.

Write down the API and version your app uses, then locate its documented transaction-state and rollback behavior. Review what happens after a failure at each save step: how does the app determine whether a transaction remains active, what recovery path does the API document, and how does the app avoid reporting the whole operation as successful after an error?

A review note could look like this:

Operation: save note and tags. API: [library and version]. State check: [documented method]. Error path: [documented rollback or recovery behavior]. Review cases: [failure at note save], [failure at tag save]. Expected app result: [success only if the full operation completes].

These are placeholders, not claims about a specific library. The SQLite transaction guidance does not establish wrapper-specific method names, exact return values, or how your application should present errors. Verify those details in the documentation for the API you use. [S1]

Use this checklist when reviewing the error path:

1. Identify the SQLite API or wrapper and the version in use.
2. Confirm its documented way to determine transaction state after an error.
3. Confirm its documented rollback behavior when an error may have ended the transaction.
4. Review every step of a multi-part save for a clear error path; don’t treat an earlier successful step as proof that the whole operation succeeded.
5. Review failures at different steps and check that the app reports success only when the whole operation completes.
6. Keep wrapper-specific assumptions out of shared recovery code unless the wrapper documents them.

For SQLite’s C interface, the documented state checks include sqlite3_get_autocommit() and sqlite3_txn_state(). SQLite says errors may leave a transaction active or roll it back, and that an attempted ROLLBACK after automatic rollback fails harmlessly. These details don’t establish the behavior of every wrapper, so check its documentation. [S1]