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Rework REPACK's documentation on clustering

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Commit ac58465e06 moved the discussion on clustering from CLUSTER's
refpage to REPACK's, but somehow introduced a mistake regarding when
exactly can the seqscan-and-sort strategy be used with respect to btrees
(spoiler: it was 100% backwards).  Fix that, but also restructure and
reword the whole subsection more fully to try and make it more coherent.

Author: Chao Li <li.evan.chao@gmail.com>
Author: Álvaro Herrera <alvherre@kurilemu.de>
Reported-by: Antonin Houska <ah@cybertec.at>
Backpatch-through: 19
Discussion: https://postgr.es/m/69CA7636-0359-42B6-B971-16A036698187@gmail.com
This commit is contained in:
Álvaro Herrera
2026-09-10 17:56:39 +02:00
parent 683ce2329c
commit 07aef52eba
2 changed files with 58 additions and 51 deletions
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99
doc/src/sgml/ref/repack.sgml
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@@ -78,65 +78,70 @@ REPACK [ ( <replaceable class="parameter">option</replaceable> [, ...] ) ] USING
<para>
If the <literal>USING INDEX</literal> clause is specified, the rows in
the table are stored in the order that the index specifies;
<firstterm>clustering</firstterm>, because rows are physically clustered
afterwards.
If an index name is specified in the command, the order implied by that
index is used, and that index is configured as the index to cluster on.
the table are physically rearranged according to the ordering implied by
the specified index; this is known as <firstterm>clustering</firstterm>.
This can have performance implications:
in cases where you are accessing single rows randomly within a table, the
actual order of the data in the table is unimportant. However, if you tend
to access some data more than others, and there is an index that groups
them together, you will benefit from using clustering. If
you are requesting a range of indexed values from a table, or a single
indexed value that has multiple matching rows,
clustering will help because once the index identifies the
table page for the first row that matches, all other rows that match are
probably already on the same table page, and so you save disk accesses and
speed up the query.
</para>
<para>
For B-Tree indexes, the ordering used by clustering is the index's linear
sort order. Other clusterable index access methods may use a different
ordering strategy, one which may not necessarily correspond to any SQL
sort order.
If an index name is specified in the command, that index is used and
is recorded as the table's clustering index.
(This also applies to an index given to the <command>CLUSTER</command>
command.)
If no index name is specified, then the index that has
been configured as the index to cluster on is used; an
error is thrown if none has.
If no index name is specified, then the index that has been configured as
the clustering one is used; if none has been configured, an error is thrown.
An index can be set manually using <command>ALTER TABLE ... CLUSTER ON</command>,
and reset with <command>ALTER TABLE ... SET WITHOUT CLUSTER</command>.
</para>
<para>
Clustering is a one-time operation: when the table is
subsequently updated, the changes are not clustered. That is, no attempt
is made to store new or updated rows according to the clustering order.
(If one wishes, one can periodically recluster by issuing the command again.
Also, setting the table's <literal>fillfactor</literal> storage parameter
to less than 100% can aid in preserving cluster ordering during updates,
since updated rows are kept on the same page if enough space is available
there.)
</para>
<para>
When clustering on a B-Tree index, <command>REPACK</command> can rewrite
the table using either an index scan on the specified index, or a
sequential scan followed by sorting. It will attempt to choose the method
that will be faster, based on planner cost parameters and available
statistical information. When clustering on an index of an access method
other than B-Tree, <command>REPACK</command> always uses an index scan.
</para>
<para>
Because the planner records statistics about the ordering of tables, it is
advisable to specify the <literal>ANALYZE</literal> option, or to
run <link linkend="sql-analyze"><command>ANALYZE</command></link> on the
newly repacked table. Otherwise, the planner might make poor choices of
query plans.
</para>
<para>
If no table name is specified in <command>REPACK USING INDEX</command>,
all tables which have a clustering index defined and which the calling
user has privileges for are processed.
</para>
<para>
Clustering is a one-time operation: when the table is
subsequently updated, the changes are not clustered. That is, no attempt
is made to store new or updated rows according to their index order. (If
one wishes, one can periodically recluster by issuing the command again.
Also, setting the table's <literal>fillfactor</literal> storage parameter
to less than 100% can aid in preserving cluster ordering during updates,
since updated rows are kept on the same page if enough space is available
there.)
</para>
<para>
In cases where you are accessing single rows randomly within a table, the
actual order of the data in the table is unimportant. However, if you tend
to access some data more than others, and there is an index that groups
them together, you will benefit from using clustering. If
you are requesting a range of indexed values from a table, or a single
indexed value that has multiple rows that match,
clustering will help because once the index identifies the
table page for the first row that matches, all other rows that match are
probably already on the same table page, and so you save disk accesses and
speed up the query.
</para>
<para>
<command>REPACK</command> can re-sort the table using either an index scan
on the specified index (if the index is a b-tree), or a sequential scan
followed by sorting. It will attempt to choose the method that will be
faster, based on planner cost parameters and available statistical
information.
</para>
<para>
Because the planner records statistics about the ordering of tables, it is
advisable to
run <link linkend="sql-analyze"><command>ANALYZE</command></link> on the
newly repacked table. Otherwise, the planner might make poor choices of
query plans.
</para>
</refsect2>
<refsect2 id="sql-repack-notes-on-resources" xreflabel="Notes on Resources">

10
src/backend/commands/repack.c
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@@ -1429,10 +1429,12 @@ copy_table_data(Relation NewHeap, Relation OldHeap, Relation OldIndex,
/*
* Decide whether to use an indexscan or seqscan-and-optional-sort to scan
* the OldHeap. We know how to use a sort to duplicate the ordering of a
* btree index, and will use seqscan-and-sort for that case if the planner
* tells us it's cheaper. Otherwise, always indexscan if an index is
* provided, else plain seqscan.
* the OldHeap. If the index is a btree, ask the planner to choose via
* normal path cost comparison.
*
* The underlying tuplesort.c code doesn't support AMs other than btree,
* so we must always use a normal indexscan if a non-btree index is
* specified -- or an unsorted seqscan if no index is given.
*/
if (OldIndex != NULL && OldIndex->rd_rel->relam == BTREE_AM_OID)
use_sort = plan_cluster_use_sort(RelationGetRelid(OldHeap),