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From owner-pgsql-hackers@hub.org Mon Mar 22 18:43:41 1999
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          Mon, 22 Mar 1999 18:27:15 -0500 (EST)
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Message-ID: <sqxh7H_00gNtAmTJ5Q@andrew.cmu.edu>
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Date: Mon, 22 Mar 1999 18:27:15 -0500 (EST)
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From: Erik Riedel <riedel+@CMU.EDU>
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To: pgsql-hackers@postgreSQL.org
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Subject: [HACKERS] optimizer and type question
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Sender: owner-pgsql-hackers@postgreSQL.org
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Precedence: bulk
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Status: RO
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[last week aggregation, this week, the optimizer]
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I have a somewhat general optimizer question/problem that I would like
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to get some input on - i.e. I'd like to know what is "supposed" to
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work here and what I should be expecting.  Sadly, I think the patch
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for this is more involved than my last message.
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Using my favorite table these days:
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Table    = lineitem
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+------------------------+----------------------------------+-------+
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|              Field     |              Type                | Length|
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+------------------------+----------------------------------+-------+
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| l_orderkey             | int4 not null                    |     4 |
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| l_partkey              | int4 not null                    |     4 |
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| l_suppkey              | int4 not null                    |     4 |
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| l_linenumber           | int4 not null                    |     4 |
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| l_quantity             | float4 not null                  |     4 |
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| l_extendedprice        | float4 not null                  |     4 |
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| l_discount             | float4 not null                  |     4 |
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| l_tax                  | float4 not null                  |     4 |
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| l_returnflag           | char() not null                  |     1 |
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| l_linestatus           | char() not null                  |     1 |
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| l_shipdate             | date                             |     4 |
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| l_commitdate           | date                             |     4 |
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| l_receiptdate          | date                             |     4 |
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| l_shipinstruct         | char() not null                  |    25 |
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| l_shipmode             | char() not null                  |    10 |
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| l_comment              | char() not null                  |    44 |
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+------------------------+----------------------------------+-------+
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Index:    lineitem_index_
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and the query:
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--
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-- Query 1
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--
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explain select l_returnflag, l_linestatus, sum(l_quantity) as sum_qty, 
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sum(l_extendedprice) as sum_base_price, 
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sum(l_extendedprice*(1-l_discount)) as sum_disc_price, 
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sum(l_extendedprice*(1-l_discount)*(1+l_tax)) as sum_charge, 
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avg(l_quantity) as avg_qty, avg(l_extendedprice) as avg_price, 
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avg(l_discount) as avg_disc, count(*) as count_order 
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from lineitem 
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where l_shipdate <= '1998-09-02'::date 
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group by l_returnflag, l_linestatus 
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order by l_returnflag, l_linestatus;
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note that I have eliminated the date calculation in my query of last
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week and manually replaced it with a constant (since this wasn't
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happening automatically - but let's not worry about that for now).
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And this is only an explain, we care about the optimizer.  So we get:
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Sort  (cost=34467.88 size=0 width=0)
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 ->  Aggregate  (cost=34467.88 size=0 width=0)
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   ->  Group  (cost=34467.88 size=0 width=0)
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     ->  Sort  (cost=34467.88 size=0 width=0)
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       ->  Seq Scan on lineitem  (cost=34467.88 size=200191 width=44)
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so let's think about the selectivity that is being chosen for the
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seq scan (the where l_shipdate <= '1998-09-02').
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Turns out the optimizer is choosing "33%", even though the real answer
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is somewhere in 90+% (that's how the query is designed).  So, why does
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it do that?
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Turns out that selectivity in this case is determined via
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plancat::restriction_selectivity() which calls into functionOID = 103
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(intltsel) for operatorOID = 1096 (date "<=") on relation OID = 18663
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(my lineitem).
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This all follows because of the description of 1096 (date "<=") in
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pg_operator.  Looking at local1_template1.bki.source near line 1754
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shows:
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insert OID = 1096 ( "<=" PGUID 0 <...> date_le intltsel intltjoinsel )
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where we see that indeed, it thinks "intltsel" is the right function
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to use for "oprrest" in the case of dates.
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Question 1 - is intltsel the right thing for selectivity on dates?
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Hope someone is still with me.
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So now we're running selfuncs::intltsel() where we make a further call
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to selfuncs::gethilokey().  The job of gethilokey is to determine the
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min and max values of a particular attribute in the table, which will
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then be used with the constant in my where clause to estimate the
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selectivity.  It is going to search the pg_statistic relation with
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three key values:
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Anum_pg_statistic_starelid     18663  (lineitem)
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Anum_pg_statistic_staattnum       11  (l_shipdate)
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Anum_pg_statistic_staop         1096  (date "<=")
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this finds no tuples in pg_statistic.  Why is that?  The only nearby
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tuple in pg_statistic is:
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starelid|staattnum|staop|stalokey        |stahikey       
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--------+---------+-----+----------------+----------------
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   18663|       11|    0|01-02-1992      |12-01-1998
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and the reason the query doesn't match anything?  Because 1096 != 0.
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But why is it 0 in pg_statistic?  Statistics are determined near line
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1844 in vacuum.c (assuming a 'vacuum analyze' run at some point)
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             i = 0;
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             values[i++] = (Datum) relid;            /* 1 */
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             values[i++] = (Datum) attp->attnum; /* 2 */
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====>        values[i++] = (Datum) InvalidOid;       /* 3 */
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             fmgr_info(stats->outfunc, &out_function);
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             out_string = <...min...>
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             values[i++] = (Datum) fmgr(F_TEXTIN, out_string);
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             pfree(out_string);
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             out_string = <...max...>
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             values[i++] = (Datum) fmgr(F_TEXTIN, out_string);
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             pfree(out_string);
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             stup = heap_formtuple(sd->rd_att, values, nulls);
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the "offending" line is setting the staop to InvalidOid (i.e. 0).
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Question 2 - is this right?  Is the intent for 0 to serve as a
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"wildcard", or should it be inserting an entry for each operation
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individually?
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In the case of "wildcard" then gethilokey() should allow a match for 
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Anum_pg_statistic_staop         0
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instead of requiring the more restrictive 1096.  In the current code,
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what happens next is gethilokey() returns "not found" and intltsel()
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returns the default 1/3 which I see in the resultant query plan (size
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= 200191 is 1/3 of the number of lineitem tuples).
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Question 3 - is there any inherent reason it couldn't get this right?
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The statistic is in the table 1992 to 1998, so the '1998-09-02' date
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should be 90-some% selectivity, a much better guess than 33%.
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Doesn't make a difference for this particular query, of course,
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because the seq scan must proceed anyhow, but it could easily affect
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other queries where selectivities matter (and it affects the
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modifications I am trying to test in the optimizer to be "smarter"
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about selectivities - my overall context is to understand/improve the
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behavior that the underlying storage system sees from queries like this).
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OK, so let's say we treat 0 as a "wildcard" and stop checking for
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1096.  Not we let gethilokey() return the two dates from the statistic
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table.  The immediate next thing that intltsel() does, near lines 122
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in selfuncs.c is call atol() on the strings from gethilokey().  And
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guess what it comes up with?
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low = 1
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high = 12
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because it calls atol() on '01-02-1992' and '12-01-1998'.  This
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clearly isn't right, it should get some large integer that includes
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the year and day in the result.  Then it should compare reasonably
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						|
with my constant from the where clause and give a decent selectivity
 | 
						|
value.  This leads to a re-visit of Question 1.
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Question 4 - should date "<=" use a dateltsel() function instead of
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intltsel() as oprrest?
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If anyone is still with me, could you tell me if this makes sense, or
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if there is some other location where the appropriate type conversion
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could take place so that intltsel() gets something reasonable when it
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does the atol() calls?
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Could someone also give me a sense for how far out-of-whack the whole
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current selectivity-handling structure is?  It seems that most of the
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operators in pg_operator actually use intltsel() and would have
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type-specific problems like that described.  Or is the problem in the
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way attribute values are stored in pg_statistic by vacuum analyze?  Or
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is there another layer where type conversion belongs?
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Phew.  Enough typing, hope someone can follow this and address at
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						|
least some of the questions.
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Thanks.
 | 
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 | 
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Erik Riedel
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Carnegie Mellon University
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www.cs.cmu.edu/~riedel
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From owner-pgsql-hackers@hub.org Mon Mar 22 20:31:11 1999
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	Mon, 22 Mar 1999 20:12:43 -0500 (EST)
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To: Erik Riedel <riedel+@CMU.EDU>
 | 
						|
cc: pgsql-hackers@postgreSQL.org
 | 
						|
Subject: Re: [HACKERS] optimizer and type question 
 | 
						|
In-reply-to: Your message of Mon, 22 Mar 1999 18:27:15 -0500 (EST) 
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             <sqxh7H_00gNtAmTJ5Q@andrew.cmu.edu> 
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Date: Mon, 22 Mar 1999 20:12:43 -0500
 | 
						|
Message-ID: <23292.922151563@sss.pgh.pa.us>
 | 
						|
From: Tom Lane <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us>
 | 
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Sender: owner-pgsql-hackers@postgreSQL.org
 | 
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Precedence: bulk
 | 
						|
Status: ROr
 | 
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 | 
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Erik Riedel <riedel+@CMU.EDU> writes:
 | 
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> [ optimizer doesn't find relevant pg_statistic entry ]
 | 
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 | 
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It's clearly a bug that the selectivity code is not finding this tuple.
 | 
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If your analysis is correct, then selectivity estimation has *never*
 | 
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worked properly, or at least not in recent memory :-(.  Yipes.
 | 
						|
Bruce and I found a bunch of other problems in the optimizer recently,
 | 
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so it doesn't faze me to assume that this is broken too.
 | 
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 | 
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> the "offending" line is setting the staop to InvalidOid (i.e. 0).
 | 
						|
> Question 2 - is this right?  Is the intent for 0 to serve as a
 | 
						|
> "wildcard",
 | 
						|
 | 
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My thought is that what the staop column ought to be is the OID of the
 | 
						|
comparison function that was used to determine the sort order of the
 | 
						|
column.  Without a sort op the lowest and highest keys in the column are
 | 
						|
not well defined, so it makes no sense to assert "these are the lowest
 | 
						|
and highest values" without providing the sort op that determined that.
 | 
						|
(For sufficiently complex data types one could reasonably have multiple
 | 
						|
ordering operators.  A crude example is sorting on "circumference" and
 | 
						|
"area" for polygons.)  But typically the sort op will be the "<"
 | 
						|
operator for the column data type.
 | 
						|
 | 
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So, the vacuum code is definitely broken --- it's not storing the sort
 | 
						|
op that it used.  The code in gethilokey might be broken too, depending
 | 
						|
on how it is producing the operator it's trying to match against the
 | 
						|
tuple.  For example, if the actual operator in the query is any of
 | 
						|
< <= > >= on int4, then int4lt ought to be used to probe the pg_statistic
 | 
						|
table.  I'm not sure if we have adequate info in pg_operator or pg_type
 | 
						|
to let the optimizer code determine the right thing to probe with :-(
 | 
						|
 | 
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> The immediate next thing that intltsel() does, near lines 122
 | 
						|
> in selfuncs.c is call atol() on the strings from gethilokey().  And
 | 
						|
> guess what it comes up with?
 | 
						|
> low = 1
 | 
						|
> high = 12
 | 
						|
> because it calls atol() on '01-02-1992' and '12-01-1998'.  This
 | 
						|
> clearly isn't right, it should get some large integer that includes
 | 
						|
> the year and day in the result.  Then it should compare reasonably
 | 
						|
> with my constant from the where clause and give a decent selectivity
 | 
						|
> value.  This leads to a re-visit of Question 1.
 | 
						|
> Question 4 - should date "<=" use a dateltsel() function instead of
 | 
						|
> intltsel() as oprrest?
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
This is clearly busted as well.  I'm not sure that creating dateltsel()
 | 
						|
is the right fix, however, because if you go down that path then every
 | 
						|
single datatype needs its own selectivity function; that's more than we
 | 
						|
need.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
What we really want here is to be able to map datatype values into
 | 
						|
some sort of numeric range so that we can compute what fraction of the
 | 
						|
low-key-to-high-key range is on each side of the probe value (the
 | 
						|
constant taken from the query).  This general concept will apply to
 | 
						|
many scalar types, so what we want is a type-specific mapping function
 | 
						|
and a less-specific fraction-computing-function.  Offhand I'd say that
 | 
						|
we want intltsel() and floatltsel(), plus conversion routines that can
 | 
						|
produce either int4 or float8 from a data type as seems appropriate.
 | 
						|
Anything that couldn't map to one or the other would have to supply its
 | 
						|
own selectivity function.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
> Or is the problem in the
 | 
						|
> way attribute values are stored in pg_statistic by vacuum analyze?
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
Looks like it converts the low and high values to text and stores them
 | 
						|
that way.  Ugly as can be :-( but I'm not sure there is a good
 | 
						|
alternative.  We have no "wild card" column type AFAIK, which is what
 | 
						|
these columns of pg_statistic would have to be to allow storage of
 | 
						|
unconverted min and max values.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
I think you've found a can of worms here.  Congratulations ;-)
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
			regards, tom lane
 | 
						|
 | 
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 | 
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From owner-pgsql-hackers@hub.org Mon Mar 22 23:31:00 1999
 | 
						|
Received: from renoir.op.net (root@renoir.op.net [209.152.193.4])
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	by candle.pha.pa.us (8.9.0/8.9.0) with ESMTP id XAA03384
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Message-ID: <4qxlJ0200anI01hK40@andrew.cmu.edu>
 | 
						|
Date: Mon, 22 Mar 1999 23:14:55 -0500 (EST)
 | 
						|
From: Erik Riedel <riedel+@CMU.EDU>
 | 
						|
To: Tom Lane <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us>
 | 
						|
Subject: Re: [HACKERS] optimizer and type question
 | 
						|
Cc: pgsql-hackers@postgreSQL.org
 | 
						|
In-Reply-To: <23292.922151563@sss.pgh.pa.us>
 | 
						|
References: <23292.922151563@sss.pgh.pa.us>
 | 
						|
Sender: owner-pgsql-hackers@postgreSQL.org
 | 
						|
Precedence: bulk
 | 
						|
Status: ROr
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
OK, building on your high-level explanation, I am attaching a patch that
 | 
						|
attempts to do something "better" than the current code.  Note that I
 | 
						|
have only tested this with the date type and my particular query.  I
 | 
						|
haven't run it through the regression, so consider it "proof of concept"
 | 
						|
at best.  Although hopefully it will serve my purposes.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
> My thought is that what the staop column ought to be is the OID of the
 | 
						|
> comparison function that was used to determine the sort order of the
 | 
						|
> column.  Without a sort op the lowest and highest keys in the column are
 | 
						|
> not well defined, so it makes no sense to assert "these are the lowest
 | 
						|
> and highest values" without providing the sort op that determined that.
 | 
						|
>
 | 
						|
> (For sufficiently complex data types one could reasonably have multiple
 | 
						|
> ordering operators.  A crude example is sorting on "circumference" and
 | 
						|
> "area" for polygons.)  But typically the sort op will be the "<"
 | 
						|
> operator for the column data type.
 | 
						|
>  
 | 
						|
I changed vacuum.c to do exactly that.  oid of the lt sort op.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
> So, the vacuum code is definitely broken --- it's not storing the sort
 | 
						|
> op that it used.  The code in gethilokey might be broken too, depending
 | 
						|
> on how it is producing the operator it's trying to match against the
 | 
						|
> tuple.  For example, if the actual operator in the query is any of
 | 
						|
> < <= > >= on int4, then int4lt ought to be used to probe the pg_statistic
 | 
						|
> table.  I'm not sure if we have adequate info in pg_operator or pg_type
 | 
						|
> to let the optimizer code determine the right thing to probe with :-(
 | 
						|
>  
 | 
						|
This indeed seems like a bigger problem.  I thought about somehow using
 | 
						|
type-matching from the sort op and the actual operator in the query - if
 | 
						|
both the left and right type match, then consider them the same for
 | 
						|
purposes of this probe.  That seemed complicated, so I punted in my
 | 
						|
example - it just does the search with relid and attnum and assumes that
 | 
						|
only returns one tuple.  This works in my case (maybe in all cases,
 | 
						|
because of the way vacuum is currently written - ?).
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
> What we really want here is to be able to map datatype values into
 | 
						|
> some sort of numeric range so that we can compute what fraction of the
 | 
						|
> low-key-to-high-key range is on each side of the probe value (the
 | 
						|
> constant taken from the query).  This general concept will apply to
 | 
						|
> many scalar types, so what we want is a type-specific mapping function
 | 
						|
> and a less-specific fraction-computing-function.  Offhand I'd say that
 | 
						|
> we want intltsel() and floatltsel(), plus conversion routines that can
 | 
						|
> produce either int4 or float8 from a data type as seems appropriate.
 | 
						|
> Anything that couldn't map to one or the other would have to supply its
 | 
						|
> own selectivity function.
 | 
						|
>  
 | 
						|
This is what my example then does.  Uses the stored sort op to get the
 | 
						|
type and then uses typinput to convert from the string to an int4.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
Then puts the int4 back into string format because that's what everyone
 | 
						|
was expecting.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
It seems to work for my particular query.  I now get:
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
(selfuncs) gethilokey() obj 18663 attr 11 opid 1096 (ignored)
 | 
						|
(selfuncs) gethilokey() found op 1087 in pg_proc
 | 
						|
(selfuncs) gethilokey() found type 1082 in pg_type
 | 
						|
(selfuncs) gethilokey() going to use 1084 to convert type 1082
 | 
						|
(selfuncs) gethilokey() have low -2921 high -396
 | 
						|
(selfuncs) intltsel() high -396 low -2921 val -486
 | 
						|
(plancat) restriction_selectivity() for func 103 op 1096 rel 18663 attr
 | 
						|
11 const -486 flag 3 returns 0.964356
 | 
						|
NOTICE:  QUERY PLAN:
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
Sort  (cost=34467.88 size=0 width=0)
 | 
						|
 ->  Aggregate  (cost=34467.88 size=0 width=0)
 | 
						|
  ->  Group  (cost=34467.88 size=0 width=0)
 | 
						|
   ->  Sort  (cost=34467.88 size=0 width=0)
 | 
						|
    ->  Seq Scan on lineitem  (cost=34467.88 size=579166 width=44)
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
including my printfs, which exist in the patch as well.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
Selectivity is now the expected 96% and the size estimate for the seq
 | 
						|
scan is much closer to correct.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
Again, not tested with anything besides date, so caveat not-tested.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
Hope this helps.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
Erik
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
----------------------[optimizer_fix.sh]------------------------
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
#! /bin/sh
 | 
						|
# This is a shell archive, meaning:
 | 
						|
# 1. Remove everything above the #! /bin/sh line.
 | 
						|
# 2. Save the resulting text in a file.
 | 
						|
# 3. Execute the file with /bin/sh (not csh) to create:
 | 
						|
#	selfuncs.c.diff
 | 
						|
#	vacuum.c.diff
 | 
						|
# This archive created: Mon Mar 22 22:58:14 1999
 | 
						|
export PATH; PATH=/bin:/usr/bin:$PATH
 | 
						|
if test -f 'selfuncs.c.diff'
 | 
						|
then
 | 
						|
	echo shar: "will not over-write existing file 'selfuncs.c.diff'"
 | 
						|
else
 | 
						|
cat << \SHAR_EOF > 'selfuncs.c.diff'
 | 
						|
***
 | 
						|
/afs/ece.cmu.edu/project/lcs/lcs-004/er1p/postgres/611/src/backend/utils/adt
 | 
						|
/selfuncs.c	Thu Mar 11 23:59:35 1999
 | 
						|
---
 | 
						|
/afs/ece.cmu.edu/project/lcs/lcs-004/er1p/postgres/615/src/backend/utils/adt
 | 
						|
/selfuncs.c	Mon Mar 22 22:57:25 1999
 | 
						|
***************
 | 
						|
*** 32,37 ****
 | 
						|
--- 32,40 ----
 | 
						|
  #include "utils/lsyscache.h"	/* for get_oprrest() */
 | 
						|
  #include "catalog/pg_statistic.h"
 | 
						|
  
 | 
						|
+ #include "catalog/pg_proc.h"    /* for Form_pg_proc */
 | 
						|
+ #include "catalog/pg_type.h"    /* for Form_pg_type */
 | 
						|
+ 
 | 
						|
  /* N is not a valid var/constant or relation id */
 | 
						|
  #define NONVALUE(N)		((N) == -1)
 | 
						|
  
 | 
						|
***************
 | 
						|
*** 103,110 ****
 | 
						|
  				bottom;
 | 
						|
  
 | 
						|
  	result = (float64) palloc(sizeof(float64data));
 | 
						|
! 	if (NONVALUE(attno) || NONVALUE(relid))
 | 
						|
  		*result = 1.0 / 3;
 | 
						|
  	else
 | 
						|
  	{
 | 
						|
  		/* XXX			val = atol(value); */
 | 
						|
--- 106,114 ----
 | 
						|
  				bottom;
 | 
						|
  
 | 
						|
  	result = (float64) palloc(sizeof(float64data));
 | 
						|
! 	if (NONVALUE(attno) || NONVALUE(relid)) {
 | 
						|
  		*result = 1.0 / 3;
 | 
						|
+ 	}
 | 
						|
  	else
 | 
						|
  	{
 | 
						|
  		/* XXX			val = atol(value); */
 | 
						|
***************
 | 
						|
*** 117,130 ****
 | 
						|
  		}
 | 
						|
  		high = atol(highchar);
 | 
						|
  		low = atol(lowchar);
 | 
						|
  		if ((flag & SEL_RIGHT && val < low) ||
 | 
						|
  			(!(flag & SEL_RIGHT) && val > high))
 | 
						|
  		{
 | 
						|
  			float32data nvals;
 | 
						|
  
 | 
						|
  			nvals = getattdisbursion(relid, (int) attno);
 | 
						|
! 			if (nvals == 0)
 | 
						|
  				*result = 1.0 / 3.0;
 | 
						|
  			else
 | 
						|
  			{
 | 
						|
  				*result = 3.0 * (float64data) nvals;
 | 
						|
--- 121,136 ----
 | 
						|
  		}
 | 
						|
  		high = atol(highchar);
 | 
						|
  		low = atol(lowchar);
 | 
						|
+ 		printf("(selfuncs) intltsel() high %d low %d val %d\n",high,low,val);
 | 
						|
  		if ((flag & SEL_RIGHT && val < low) ||
 | 
						|
  			(!(flag & SEL_RIGHT) && val > high))
 | 
						|
  		{
 | 
						|
  			float32data nvals;
 | 
						|
  
 | 
						|
  			nvals = getattdisbursion(relid, (int) attno);
 | 
						|
! 			if (nvals == 0) {
 | 
						|
  				*result = 1.0 / 3.0;
 | 
						|
+ 			}
 | 
						|
  			else
 | 
						|
  			{
 | 
						|
  				*result = 3.0 * (float64data) nvals;
 | 
						|
***************
 | 
						|
*** 336,341 ****
 | 
						|
--- 342,353 ----
 | 
						|
  {
 | 
						|
  	Relation	rel;
 | 
						|
  	HeapScanDesc scan;
 | 
						|
+ 	/* this assumes there is only one row in the statistics table for any
 | 
						|
particular */
 | 
						|
+ 	/* relid, attnum pair - could be more complicated if staop is also
 | 
						|
used.         */
 | 
						|
+ 	/* at the moment, if there are multiple rows, this code ends up
 | 
						|
picking the      */
 | 
						|
+ 	/* "first" one                                                       
 | 
						|
   - er1p  */
 | 
						|
+ 	/* the actual "ignoring" is done in the call to heap_beginscan()
 | 
						|
below, where    */
 | 
						|
+ 	/* we only mention 2 of the 3 keys in this array                     
 | 
						|
   - er1p  */
 | 
						|
  	static ScanKeyData key[3] = {
 | 
						|
  		{0, Anum_pg_statistic_starelid, F_OIDEQ, {0, 0, F_OIDEQ}},
 | 
						|
  		{0, Anum_pg_statistic_staattnum, F_INT2EQ, {0, 0, F_INT2EQ}},
 | 
						|
***************
 | 
						|
*** 344,355 ****
 | 
						|
  	bool		isnull;
 | 
						|
  	HeapTuple	tuple;
 | 
						|
  
 | 
						|
  	rel = heap_openr(StatisticRelationName);
 | 
						|
  
 | 
						|
  	key[0].sk_argument = ObjectIdGetDatum(relid);
 | 
						|
  	key[1].sk_argument = Int16GetDatum((int16) attnum);
 | 
						|
  	key[2].sk_argument = ObjectIdGetDatum(opid);
 | 
						|
! 	scan = heap_beginscan(rel, 0, SnapshotNow, 3, key);
 | 
						|
  	tuple = heap_getnext(scan, 0);
 | 
						|
  	if (!HeapTupleIsValid(tuple))
 | 
						|
  	{
 | 
						|
--- 356,377 ----
 | 
						|
  	bool		isnull;
 | 
						|
  	HeapTuple	tuple;
 | 
						|
  
 | 
						|
+ 	HeapTuple tup;
 | 
						|
+ 	Form_pg_proc proc;
 | 
						|
+ 	Form_pg_type typ;
 | 
						|
+ 	Oid which_op;
 | 
						|
+ 	Oid which_type;
 | 
						|
+ 	int32 low_value;
 | 
						|
+ 	int32 high_value;
 | 
						|
+ 
 | 
						|
  	rel = heap_openr(StatisticRelationName);
 | 
						|
  
 | 
						|
  	key[0].sk_argument = ObjectIdGetDatum(relid);
 | 
						|
  	key[1].sk_argument = Int16GetDatum((int16) attnum);
 | 
						|
  	key[2].sk_argument = ObjectIdGetDatum(opid);
 | 
						|
! 	printf("(selfuncs) gethilokey() obj %d attr %d opid %d (ignored)\n",
 | 
						|
! 	       key[0].sk_argument,key[1].sk_argument,key[2].sk_argument);
 | 
						|
! 	scan = heap_beginscan(rel, 0, SnapshotNow, 2, key);
 | 
						|
  	tuple = heap_getnext(scan, 0);
 | 
						|
  	if (!HeapTupleIsValid(tuple))
 | 
						|
  	{
 | 
						|
***************
 | 
						|
*** 376,383 ****
 | 
						|
--- 398,461 ----
 | 
						|
  								&isnull));
 | 
						|
  	if (isnull)
 | 
						|
  		elog(DEBUG, "gethilokey: low key is null");
 | 
						|
+ 
 | 
						|
  	heap_endscan(scan);
 | 
						|
  	heap_close(rel);
 | 
						|
+ 
 | 
						|
+ 	/* now we deal with type conversion issues                           
 | 
						|
         */
 | 
						|
+ 	/* when intltsel() calls this routine (who knows what other callers
 | 
						|
might do)  */
 | 
						|
+ 	/* it assumes that it can call atol() on the strings and then use
 | 
						|
integer      */
 | 
						|
+ 	/* comparison from there.  what we are going to do here, then, is try
 | 
						|
to use   */
 | 
						|
+ 	/* the type information from Anum_pg_statistic_staop to convert the
 | 
						|
high       */
 | 
						|
+ 	/* and low values                                                   
 | 
						|
- er1p    */
 | 
						|
+ 
 | 
						|
+ 	/* WARNING: this code has only been tested with the date type and has
 | 
						|
NOT      */
 | 
						|
+ 	/* been regression tested.  consider it "sample" code of what might
 | 
						|
be the     */
 | 
						|
+ 	/* right kind of thing to do                                        
 | 
						|
- er1p    */
 | 
						|
+ 
 | 
						|
+ 	/* get the 'op' from pg_statistic and look it up in pg_proc */
 | 
						|
+ 	which_op = heap_getattr(tuple,
 | 
						|
+ 				Anum_pg_statistic_staop,
 | 
						|
+ 				RelationGetDescr(rel),
 | 
						|
+ 				&isnull);
 | 
						|
+ 	if (InvalidOid == which_op) {
 | 
						|
+ 	  /* ignore all this stuff, try conversion only if we have a valid staop */
 | 
						|
+ 	  /* note that there is an accompanying change to 'vacuum analyze' that  */
 | 
						|
+ 	  /* gets this set to something useful.                                  */
 | 
						|
+ 	} else {
 | 
						|
+ 	  /* staop looks valid, so let's see what we can do about conversion */
 | 
						|
+ 	  tup = SearchSysCacheTuple(PROOID, ObjectIdGetDatum(which_op), 0, 0, 0);
 | 
						|
+ 	  if (!HeapTupleIsValid(tup)) {
 | 
						|
+ 	    elog(ERROR, "selfuncs: unable to find op in pg_proc %d", which_op);
 | 
						|
+ 	  }
 | 
						|
+ 	  printf("(selfuncs) gethilokey() found op %d in pg_proc\n",which_op);
 | 
						|
+ 	  
 | 
						|
+ 	  /* use that to determine the type of stahikey and stalokey via pg_type */
 | 
						|
+ 	  proc = (Form_pg_proc) GETSTRUCT(tup);
 | 
						|
+ 	  which_type = proc->proargtypes[0]; /* XXX - use left and right
 | 
						|
separately? */
 | 
						|
+ 	  tup = SearchSysCacheTuple(TYPOID, ObjectIdGetDatum(which_type), 0, 0, 0);
 | 
						|
+ 	  if (!HeapTupleIsValid(tup)) {
 | 
						|
+ 	    elog(ERROR, "selfuncs: unable to find type in pg_type %d", which_type);
 | 
						|
+ 	  }
 | 
						|
+ 	  printf("(selfuncs) gethilokey() found type %d in pg_type\n",which_type);
 | 
						|
+ 	  
 | 
						|
+ 	  /* and use that type to get the conversion function to int4 */
 | 
						|
+ 	  typ = (Form_pg_type) GETSTRUCT(tup);
 | 
						|
+ 	  printf("(selfuncs) gethilokey() going to use %d to convert type
 | 
						|
%d\n",typ->typinput,which_type);
 | 
						|
+ 	  
 | 
						|
+ 	  /* and convert the low and high strings */
 | 
						|
+ 	  low_value = (int32) fmgr(typ->typinput, *low, -1);
 | 
						|
+ 	  high_value = (int32) fmgr(typ->typinput, *high, -1);
 | 
						|
+ 	  printf("(selfuncs) gethilokey() have low %d high
 | 
						|
%d\n",low_value,high_value);
 | 
						|
+ 	  
 | 
						|
+ 	  /* now we have int4's, which we put back into strings because
 | 
						|
that's what out  */
 | 
						|
+ 	  /* callers (intltsel() at least) expect                            
 | 
						|
    - er1p */
 | 
						|
+ 	  pfree(*low); pfree(*high); /* let's not leak the old strings */
 | 
						|
+ 	  *low = int4out(low_value);
 | 
						|
+ 	  *high = int4out(high_value);
 | 
						|
+ 
 | 
						|
+ 	  /* XXX - this probably leaks the two tups we got from
 | 
						|
SearchSysCacheTuple() - er1p */
 | 
						|
+ 	}
 | 
						|
  }
 | 
						|
  
 | 
						|
  float64
 | 
						|
SHAR_EOF
 | 
						|
fi
 | 
						|
if test -f 'vacuum.c.diff'
 | 
						|
then
 | 
						|
	echo shar: "will not over-write existing file 'vacuum.c.diff'"
 | 
						|
else
 | 
						|
cat << \SHAR_EOF > 'vacuum.c.diff'
 | 
						|
***
 | 
						|
/afs/ece.cmu.edu/project/lcs/lcs-004/er1p/postgres/611/src/backend/commands/
 | 
						|
vacuum.c	Thu Mar 11 23:59:09 1999
 | 
						|
---
 | 
						|
/afs/ece.cmu.edu/project/lcs/lcs-004/er1p/postgres/615/src/backend/commands/
 | 
						|
vacuum.c	Mon Mar 22 21:23:15 1999
 | 
						|
***************
 | 
						|
*** 1842,1848 ****
 | 
						|
  					i = 0;
 | 
						|
  					values[i++] = (Datum) relid;		/* 1 */
 | 
						|
  					values[i++] = (Datum) attp->attnum; /* 2 */
 | 
						|
! 					values[i++] = (Datum) InvalidOid;	/* 3 */
 | 
						|
  					fmgr_info(stats->outfunc, &out_function);
 | 
						|
  					out_string = (*fmgr_faddr(&out_function)) (stats->min,
 | 
						|
stats->attr->atttypid);
 | 
						|
  					values[i++] = (Datum) fmgr(F_TEXTIN, out_string);
 | 
						|
--- 1842,1848 ----
 | 
						|
  					i = 0;
 | 
						|
  					values[i++] = (Datum) relid;		/* 1 */
 | 
						|
  					values[i++] = (Datum) attp->attnum; /* 2 */
 | 
						|
! 					values[i++] = (Datum) stats->f_cmplt.fn_oid;	/* 3 */ /* get the
 | 
						|
'<' oid, instead of 'invalid' - er1p */
 | 
						|
  					fmgr_info(stats->outfunc, &out_function);
 | 
						|
  					out_string = (*fmgr_faddr(&out_function)) (stats->min,
 | 
						|
stats->attr->atttypid);
 | 
						|
  					values[i++] = (Datum) fmgr(F_TEXTIN, out_string);
 | 
						|
SHAR_EOF
 | 
						|
fi
 | 
						|
exit 0
 | 
						|
#	End of shell archive
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
From owner-pgsql-hackers@hub.org Tue Mar 23 12:31:05 1999
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Received: from renoir.op.net (root@renoir.op.net [209.152.193.4])
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	Tue, 23 Mar 1999 12:01:57 -0500 (EST)
 | 
						|
To: Erik Riedel <riedel+@CMU.EDU>
 | 
						|
cc: pgsql-hackers@postgreSQL.org
 | 
						|
Subject: Re: [HACKERS] optimizer and type question 
 | 
						|
In-reply-to: Your message of Mon, 22 Mar 1999 23:14:55 -0500 (EST) 
 | 
						|
             <4qxlJ0200anI01hK40@andrew.cmu.edu> 
 | 
						|
Date: Tue, 23 Mar 1999 12:01:57 -0500
 | 
						|
Message-ID: <24453.922208517@sss.pgh.pa.us>
 | 
						|
From: Tom Lane <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us>
 | 
						|
Sender: owner-pgsql-hackers@postgreSQL.org
 | 
						|
Precedence: bulk
 | 
						|
Status: RO
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
Erik Riedel <riedel+@CMU.EDU> writes:
 | 
						|
> OK, building on your high-level explanation, I am attaching a patch that
 | 
						|
> attempts to do something "better" than the current code.  Note that I
 | 
						|
> have only tested this with the date type and my particular query.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
Glad to see you working on this.  I don't like the details of your
 | 
						|
patch too much though ;-).  Here are some suggestions for making it
 | 
						|
better.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
1. I think just removing staop from the lookup in gethilokey is OK for
 | 
						|
now, though I'm dubious about Bruce's thought that we could delete that
 | 
						|
field entirely.  As you observe, vacuum will not currently put more
 | 
						|
than one tuple for a column into pg_statistic, so we can just do the
 | 
						|
lookup with relid and attno and leave it at that.  But I think we ought
 | 
						|
to leave the field there, with the idea that vacuum might someday
 | 
						|
compute more than one statistic for a data column.  Fixing vacuum to
 | 
						|
put its sort op into the field is a good idea in the meantime.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
2. The type conversion you're doing in gethilokey is a mess; I think
 | 
						|
what you ought to make it do is simply the inbound conversion of the
 | 
						|
string from pg_statistic into the internal representation for the
 | 
						|
column's datatype, and return that value as a Datum.  It also needs
 | 
						|
a cleaner success/failure return convention --- this business with
 | 
						|
"n" return is ridiculously type-specific.  Also, the best and easiest
 | 
						|
way to find the type to convert to is to look up the column type in
 | 
						|
the info for the given relid, not search pg_proc with the staop value.
 | 
						|
(I'm not sure that will even work, since there are pg_proc entries
 | 
						|
with wildcard argument types.)
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
3. The atol() calls currently found in intltsel are a type-specific
 | 
						|
cheat on what is conceptually a two-step process:
 | 
						|
  * Convert the string stored in pg_statistic back to the internal
 | 
						|
    form for the column data type.
 | 
						|
  * Generate a numeric representation of the data value that can be
 | 
						|
    used as an estimate of the range of values in the table.
 | 
						|
The second step is trivial for integers, which may obscure the fact
 | 
						|
that there are two steps involved, but nonetheless there are.  If
 | 
						|
you think about applying selectivity logic to strings, say, it
 | 
						|
becomes clear that the second step is a necessary component of the
 | 
						|
process.  Furthermore, the second step must also be applied to the
 | 
						|
probe value that's being passed into the selectivity operator.
 | 
						|
(The probe value is already in internal form, of course; but it is
 | 
						|
not necessarily in a useful numeric form.)
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
We can do the first of these steps by applying the appropriate "XXXin"
 | 
						|
conversion function for the column data type, as you have done.  The
 | 
						|
interesting question is how to do the second one.  A really clean
 | 
						|
solution would require adding a column to pg_type that points to a
 | 
						|
function that will do the appropriate conversion.  I'd be inclined to
 | 
						|
make all of these functions return "double" (float8) and just have one
 | 
						|
top-level selectivity routine for all data types that can use
 | 
						|
range-based selectivity logic.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
We could probably hack something together that would not use an explicit
 | 
						|
conversion function for each data type, but instead would rely on
 | 
						|
type-specific assumptions inside the selectivity routines.  We'd need many
 | 
						|
more selectivity routines though (at least one for each of int, float4,
 | 
						|
float8, and text data types) so I'm not sure we'd really save any work
 | 
						|
compared to doing it right.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
BTW, now that I look at this issue it's real clear that the selectivity
 | 
						|
entries in pg_operator are horribly broken.  The intltsel/intgtsel
 | 
						|
selectivity routines are currently applied to 32 distinct data types:
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
regression=> select distinct typname,oprleft from pg_operator, pg_type
 | 
						|
regression-> where pg_type.oid = oprleft
 | 
						|
regression-> and oprrest in (103,104);
 | 
						|
typname  |oprleft
 | 
						|
---------+-------
 | 
						|
_aclitem |   1034
 | 
						|
abstime  |    702
 | 
						|
bool     |     16
 | 
						|
box      |    603
 | 
						|
bpchar   |   1042
 | 
						|
char     |     18
 | 
						|
cidr     |    650
 | 
						|
circle   |    718
 | 
						|
date     |   1082
 | 
						|
datetime |   1184
 | 
						|
float4   |    700
 | 
						|
float8   |    701
 | 
						|
inet     |    869
 | 
						|
int2     |     21
 | 
						|
int4     |     23
 | 
						|
int8     |     20
 | 
						|
line     |    628
 | 
						|
lseg     |    601
 | 
						|
macaddr  |    829
 | 
						|
money    |    790
 | 
						|
name     |     19
 | 
						|
numeric  |   1700
 | 
						|
oid      |     26
 | 
						|
oid8     |     30
 | 
						|
path     |    602
 | 
						|
point    |    600
 | 
						|
polygon  |    604
 | 
						|
text     |     25
 | 
						|
time     |   1083
 | 
						|
timespan |   1186
 | 
						|
timestamp|   1296
 | 
						|
varchar  |   1043
 | 
						|
(32 rows)
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
many of which are very obviously not compatible with integer for *any*
 | 
						|
purpose.  It looks to me like a lot of data types were added to
 | 
						|
pg_operator just by copy-and-paste, without paying attention to whether
 | 
						|
the selectivity routines were actually correct for the data type.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
As the code stands today, the bogus entries don't matter because
 | 
						|
gethilokey always fails, so we always get 1/3 as the selectivity
 | 
						|
estimate for any comparison operator (except = and != of course).
 | 
						|
I had actually noticed that fact and assumed that it was supposed
 | 
						|
to work that way :-(.  But, clearly, there is code in here that
 | 
						|
is *trying* to be smarter.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
As soon as we fix gethilokey so that it can succeed, we will start
 | 
						|
getting essentially-random selectivity estimates for those data types
 | 
						|
that aren't actually binary-compatible with integer.  That will not do;
 | 
						|
we have to do something about the issue.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
			regards, tom lane
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
From tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us Tue Mar 23 12:31:02 1999
 | 
						|
Received: from renoir.op.net (root@renoir.op.net [209.152.193.4])
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						|
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 | 
						|
	for <maillist@candle.pha.pa.us>; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 12:31:01 -0500 (EST)
 | 
						|
Received: from sss.sss.pgh.pa.us (sss.pgh.pa.us [206.210.65.6]) by renoir.op.net (o1/$ Revision: 1.18 $) with ESMTP id MAA09042 for <maillist@candle.pha.pa.us>; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 12:10:55 -0500 (EST)
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						|
	Tue, 23 Mar 1999 12:09:52 -0500 (EST)
 | 
						|
To: Bruce Momjian <maillist@candle.pha.pa.us>
 | 
						|
cc: riedel+@CMU.EDU, pgsql-hackers@postgreSQL.org
 | 
						|
Subject: Re: [HACKERS] optimizer and type question 
 | 
						|
In-reply-to: Your message of Mon, 22 Mar 1999 21:25:45 -0500 (EST) 
 | 
						|
             <199903230225.VAA01641@candle.pha.pa.us> 
 | 
						|
Date: Tue, 23 Mar 1999 12:09:52 -0500
 | 
						|
Message-ID: <24471.922208992@sss.pgh.pa.us>
 | 
						|
From: Tom Lane <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us>
 | 
						|
Status: RO
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
Bruce Momjian <maillist@candle.pha.pa.us> writes:
 | 
						|
> What we really need is some way to determine how far the requested value
 | 
						|
> is from the min/max values.  With int, we just do (val-min)/(max-min). 
 | 
						|
> That works, but how do we do that for types that don't support division.
 | 
						|
> Strings come to mind in this case.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
What I'm envisioning is that we still apply the (val-min)/(max-min)
 | 
						|
logic, but apply it to numeric values that are produced in a
 | 
						|
type-dependent way.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
For ints and floats the conversion is trivial, of course.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
For strings, the first thing that comes to mind is to return 0 for a
 | 
						|
null string and the value of the first byte for a non-null string.
 | 
						|
This would give you one-part-in-256 selectivity which is plenty good
 | 
						|
enough for what the selectivity code needs to do.  (Actually, it's
 | 
						|
only that good if the strings' first bytes are pretty well spread out.
 | 
						|
If you have a table containing English words, for example, you might
 | 
						|
only get about one part in 26 this way, since the first bytes will
 | 
						|
probably only run from A to Z.  Might be better to use the first two
 | 
						|
characters of the string to compute the selectivity representation.)
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
In general, you can apply this logic as long as you can come up with
 | 
						|
some numerical approximation to the data type's sorting order.  It
 | 
						|
doesn't have to be exact.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
			regards, tom lane
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
From owner-pgsql-hackers@hub.org Tue Mar 23 12:31:03 1999
 | 
						|
Received: from renoir.op.net (root@renoir.op.net [209.152.193.4])
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	for <maillist@candle.pha.pa.us>; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 12:31:02 -0500 (EST)
 | 
						|
Received: from hub.org (majordom@hub.org [209.47.145.100]) by renoir.op.net (o1/$ Revision: 1.18 $) with ESMTP id MAA09987 for <maillist@candle.pha.pa.us>; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 12:21:34 -0500 (EST)
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 | 
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 | 
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 | 
						|
	Tue, 23 Mar 1999 12:09:52 -0500 (EST)
 | 
						|
To: Bruce Momjian <maillist@candle.pha.pa.us>
 | 
						|
cc: riedel+@CMU.EDU, pgsql-hackers@postgreSQL.org
 | 
						|
Subject: Re: [HACKERS] optimizer and type question 
 | 
						|
In-reply-to: Your message of Mon, 22 Mar 1999 21:25:45 -0500 (EST) 
 | 
						|
             <199903230225.VAA01641@candle.pha.pa.us> 
 | 
						|
Date: Tue, 23 Mar 1999 12:09:52 -0500
 | 
						|
Message-ID: <24471.922208992@sss.pgh.pa.us>
 | 
						|
From: Tom Lane <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us>
 | 
						|
Sender: owner-pgsql-hackers@postgreSQL.org
 | 
						|
Precedence: bulk
 | 
						|
Status: RO
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
Bruce Momjian <maillist@candle.pha.pa.us> writes:
 | 
						|
> What we really need is some way to determine how far the requested value
 | 
						|
> is from the min/max values.  With int, we just do (val-min)/(max-min). 
 | 
						|
> That works, but how do we do that for types that don't support division.
 | 
						|
> Strings come to mind in this case.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
What I'm envisioning is that we still apply the (val-min)/(max-min)
 | 
						|
logic, but apply it to numeric values that are produced in a
 | 
						|
type-dependent way.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
For ints and floats the conversion is trivial, of course.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
For strings, the first thing that comes to mind is to return 0 for a
 | 
						|
null string and the value of the first byte for a non-null string.
 | 
						|
This would give you one-part-in-256 selectivity which is plenty good
 | 
						|
enough for what the selectivity code needs to do.  (Actually, it's
 | 
						|
only that good if the strings' first bytes are pretty well spread out.
 | 
						|
If you have a table containing English words, for example, you might
 | 
						|
only get about one part in 26 this way, since the first bytes will
 | 
						|
probably only run from A to Z.  Might be better to use the first two
 | 
						|
characters of the string to compute the selectivity representation.)
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
In general, you can apply this logic as long as you can come up with
 | 
						|
some numerical approximation to the data type's sorting order.  It
 | 
						|
doesn't have to be exact.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
			regards, tom lane
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
From owner-pgsql-hackers@hub.org Thu Jul  1 20:39:19 1999
 | 
						|
Received: from hub.org (hub.org [209.167.229.1])
 | 
						|
	by candle.pha.pa.us (8.9.0/8.9.0) with ESMTP id UAA15403
 | 
						|
	for <maillist@candle.pha.pa.us>; Thu, 1 Jul 1999 20:39:18 -0400 (EDT)
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						|
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 | 
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 | 
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 | 
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 | 
						|
   id JAA00279 for <pgsql-hackers@postgreSQL.org>; Fri, 02 Jul 1999 09:11:58 +0900
 | 
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From: "Hiroshi Inoue" <Inoue@tpf.co.jp>
 | 
						|
To: "pgsql-hackers" <pgsql-hackers@postgreSQL.org>
 | 
						|
Subject: [HACKERS] Optimization FAQ ?
 | 
						|
Date: Fri, 2 Jul 1999 09:14:10 +0900
 | 
						|
Message-ID: <000401bec41f$ce81dcc0$2801007e@cadzone.tpf.co.jp>
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Sender: owner-pgsql-hackers@postgreSQL.org
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Precedence: bulk
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Status: RO
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 | 
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Hello all,
 | 
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 | 
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I got the following result.
 | 
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It's FAQ ?
 | 
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 | 
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drop table int2t;
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create table int2t (id int2 primary key);
 | 
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explain select * from int2t where id=1;
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  NOTICE:  QUERY PLAN:
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 | 
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  Seq Scan on int2t  (cost=43.00 rows=2 width=2) 
 | 
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 | 
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explain select * from int2t where id=1::int2;
 | 
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  NOTICE:  QUERY PLAN:
 | 
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 | 
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  Index Scan using int2t_pkey on int2t  (cost=2.05 rows=2 width=2) 
 | 
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 | 
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explain select * from int2t where id='1';
 | 
						|
  NOTICE:  QUERY PLAN:
 | 
						|
 | 
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  Index Scan using int2t_pkey on int2t  (cost=2.05 rows=2 width=2) 
 | 
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 | 
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Right behavior ?
 | 
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 | 
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Regards.
 | 
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 | 
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Hiroshi Inoue
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Inoue@tpf.co.jp
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 | 
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From owner-pgsql-hackers@hub.org Thu Jan 20 18:45:32 2000
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To: pgsql-hackers@postgreSQL.org
 | 
						|
Subject: [HACKERS] Some notes on optimizer cost estimates
 | 
						|
Date: Thu, 20 Jan 2000 19:31:32 -0500
 | 
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Message-ID: <25387.948414692@sss.pgh.pa.us>
 | 
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From: Tom Lane <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us>
 | 
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Sender: owner-pgsql-hackers@postgreSQL.org
 | 
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Status: OR
 | 
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 | 
						|
I have been spending some time measuring actual runtimes for various
 | 
						|
sequential-scan and index-scan query plans, and have learned that the
 | 
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current Postgres optimizer's cost estimation equations are not very
 | 
						|
close to reality at all.
 | 
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 | 
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Presently we estimate the cost of a sequential scan as
 | 
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 | 
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	Nblocks + CPU_PAGE_WEIGHT * Ntuples
 | 
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--- that is, the unit of cost is the time to read one disk page,
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and we have a "fudge factor" that relates CPU time per tuple to
 | 
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disk time per page.  (The default CPU_PAGE_WEIGHT is 0.033, which
 | 
						|
is probably too high for modern hardware --- 0.01 seems like it
 | 
						|
might be a better default, at least for simple queries.)  OK,
 | 
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it's a simplistic model, but not too unreasonable so far.
 | 
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 | 
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The cost of an index scan is measured in these same terms as
 | 
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 | 
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	Nblocks + CPU_PAGE_WEIGHT * Ntuples +
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	  CPU_INDEX_PAGE_WEIGHT * Nindextuples
 | 
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 | 
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Here Ntuples is the number of tuples selected by the index qual
 | 
						|
condition (typically, it's less than the total table size used in
 | 
						|
sequential-scan estimation).  CPU_INDEX_PAGE_WEIGHT essentially
 | 
						|
estimates the cost of scanning an index tuple; by default it's 0.017 or
 | 
						|
half CPU_PAGE_WEIGHT.  Nblocks is estimated as the index size plus an
 | 
						|
appropriate fraction of the main table size.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
There are two big problems with this:
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
1. Since main-table tuples are visited in index order, we'll be hopping
 | 
						|
around from page to page in the table.  The current cost estimation
 | 
						|
method essentially assumes that the buffer cache plus OS disk cache will
 | 
						|
be 100% efficient --- we will never have to read the same page of the
 | 
						|
main table twice in a scan, due to having discarded it between
 | 
						|
references.  This of course is unreasonably optimistic.  Worst case
 | 
						|
is that we'd fetch a main-table page for each selected tuple, but in
 | 
						|
most cases that'd be unreasonably pessimistic.
 | 
						|
 | 
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2. The cost of a disk page fetch is estimated at 1.0 unit for both
 | 
						|
sequential and index scans.  In reality, sequential access is *much*
 | 
						|
cheaper than the quasi-random accesses performed by an index scan.
 | 
						|
This is partly a matter of physical disk seeks, and partly a matter
 | 
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of benefitting (or not) from any read-ahead logic the OS may employ.
 | 
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 | 
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As best I can measure on my hardware, the cost of a nonsequential
 | 
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disk read should be estimated at 4 to 5 times the cost of a sequential
 | 
						|
one --- I'm getting numbers like 2.2 msec per disk page for sequential
 | 
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scans, and as much as 11 msec per page for index scans.  I don't
 | 
						|
know, however, if this ratio is similar enough on other platforms
 | 
						|
to be useful for cost estimating.  We could make it a parameter like
 | 
						|
we do for CPU_PAGE_WEIGHT ... but you know and I know that no one
 | 
						|
ever bothers to adjust those numbers in the field ...
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
The other effect that needs to be modeled, and currently is not, is the
 | 
						|
"hit rate" of buffer cache.  Presumably, this is 100% for tables smaller
 | 
						|
than the cache and drops off as the table size increases --- but I have
 | 
						|
no particular thoughts on the form of the dependency.  Does anyone have
 | 
						|
ideas here?  The problem is complicated by the fact that we don't really
 | 
						|
know how big the cache is; we know the number of buffers Postgres has,
 | 
						|
but we have no idea how big a disk cache the kernel is keeping.  As near
 | 
						|
as I can tell, finding a hit in the kernel disk cache is not a lot more
 | 
						|
expensive than having the page sitting in Postgres' own buffers ---
 | 
						|
certainly it's much much cheaper than a disk read.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
BTW, if you want to do some measurements of your own, try turning on
 | 
						|
PGOPTIONS="-d 2 -te".  This will dump a lot of interesting numbers
 | 
						|
into the postmaster log, if your platform supports getrusage().
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
			regards, tom lane
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
************
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
From owner-pgsql-hackers@hub.org Thu Jan 20 20:26:33 2000
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Message-Id: <200001210219.SAA22377@xp10-06.dialup.commserv.ucsb.edu>
 | 
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To: pgsql-hackers@postgreSQL.org
 | 
						|
Reply-to: xun@cs.ucsb.edu
 | 
						|
Subject: Re. [HACKERS] Some notes on optimizer cost estimates
 | 
						|
Date: Thu, 20 Jan 2000 18:19:40 -0800
 | 
						|
From: Xun Cheng <xun@cs.ucsb.edu>
 | 
						|
Sender: owner-pgsql-hackers@postgreSQL.org
 | 
						|
Status: OR
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
I'm very glad you bring up this cost estimate issue.
 | 
						|
Recent work in database research have argued a more
 | 
						|
detailed disk access cost model should be used for
 | 
						|
large queries especially joins.
 | 
						|
Traditional cost estimate only considers the number of
 | 
						|
disk pages accessed. However a more detailed model
 | 
						|
would consider three parameters: avg. seek, avg. latency
 | 
						|
and avg. page transfer. For old disk, typical values are
 | 
						|
SEEK=9.5 milliseconds, LATENCY=8.3 ms, TRANSFER=2.6ms.
 | 
						|
A sequential continuous reading of a table (assuming
 | 
						|
1000 continuous pages) would cost
 | 
						|
(SEEK+LATENCY+1000*TRANFER=2617.8ms); while quasi-randomly
 | 
						|
reading 200 times with 2 continuous pages/time would
 | 
						|
cost (SEEK+200*LATENCY+400*TRANSFER=2700ms).
 | 
						|
Someone from IBM lab re-studied the traditional
 | 
						|
ad hoc join algorithms (nested, sort-merge, hash) using the detailed cost model
 | 
						|
and found some interesting results.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
>I have been spending some time measuring actual runtimes for various
 | 
						|
>sequential-scan and index-scan query plans, and have learned that the
 | 
						|
>current Postgres optimizer's cost estimation equations are not very
 | 
						|
>close to reality at all.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
One interesting question I'd like to ask is if this non-closeness
 | 
						|
really affects the optimal choice of postgresql's query optimizer.
 | 
						|
And to what degree the effects might be? My point is that
 | 
						|
if the optimizer estimated the cost for sequential-scan is 10 and
 | 
						|
the cost for index-scan is 20 while the actual costs are 10 vs. 40,
 | 
						|
it should be ok because the optimizer would still choose sequential-scan
 | 
						|
as it should.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
>1. Since main-table tuples are visited in index order, we'll be hopping
 | 
						|
>around from page to page in the table.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
I'm not sure about the implementation in postgresql. One thing you might
 | 
						|
be able to do is to first collect all must-read page addresses from 
 | 
						|
the index scan and then order them before the actual ordered page fetching.
 | 
						|
It would at least avoid the same page being read twice (not entirely
 | 
						|
true depending on the context (like in join) and algo.)
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
>The current cost estimation
 | 
						|
>method essentially assumes that the buffer cache plus OS disk cache will
 | 
						|
>be 100% efficient --- we will never have to read the same page of the
 | 
						|
>main table twice in a scan, due to having discarded it between
 | 
						|
>references.  This of course is unreasonably optimistic.  Worst case
 | 
						|
>is that we'd fetch a main-table page for each selected tuple, but in
 | 
						|
>most cases that'd be unreasonably pessimistic.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
This is actually the motivation that I asked before if postgresql
 | 
						|
has a raw disk facility. That way we have much control on this cache
 | 
						|
issue. Of course only if we can provide some algo. better than OS
 | 
						|
cache algo. (depending on the context, like large joins), a raw disk
 | 
						|
facility will be worthwhile (besides the recoverability).
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
Actually I have another question for you guys which is somehow related
 | 
						|
to this cost estimation issue. You know the difference between OLTP
 | 
						|
and OLAP. My question is how you target postgresql on both kinds
 | 
						|
of applications or just OLTP. From what I know OLTP and OLAP would
 | 
						|
have a big difference in query characteristics and thus 
 | 
						|
optimization difference. If postgresql is only targeted on
 | 
						|
OLTP, the above cost estimation issue might not be that
 | 
						|
important. However for OLAP, large tables and large queries are
 | 
						|
common and optimization would be difficult.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
xun
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
************
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
From owner-pgsql-hackers@hub.org Thu Jan 20 20:41:44 2000
 | 
						|
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 | 
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	(envelope-from owner-pgsql-hackers)
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 | 
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	Thu, 20 Jan 2000 21:30:41 -0500 (EST)
 | 
						|
To: "Hiroshi Inoue" <Inoue@tpf.co.jp>
 | 
						|
cc: pgsql-hackers@postgreSQL.org
 | 
						|
Subject: Re: [HACKERS] Some notes on optimizer cost estimates 
 | 
						|
In-reply-to: <000b01bf63b1$093cbd40$2801007e@tpf.co.jp> 
 | 
						|
References: <000b01bf63b1$093cbd40$2801007e@tpf.co.jp>
 | 
						|
Comments: In-reply-to "Hiroshi Inoue" <Inoue@tpf.co.jp>
 | 
						|
	message dated "Fri, 21 Jan 2000 10:44:20 +0900"
 | 
						|
Date: Thu, 20 Jan 2000 21:30:41 -0500
 | 
						|
Message-ID: <26758.948421841@sss.pgh.pa.us>
 | 
						|
From: Tom Lane <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us>
 | 
						|
Sender: owner-pgsql-hackers@postgreSQL.org
 | 
						|
Status: ORr
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
"Hiroshi Inoue" <Inoue@tpf.co.jp> writes:
 | 
						|
> I've wondered why we cound't analyze database without vacuum.
 | 
						|
> We couldn't run vacuum light-heartedly because it acquires an
 | 
						|
> exclusive lock for the target table. 
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
There is probably no real good reason, except backwards compatibility,
 | 
						|
why the ANALYZE function (obtaining pg_statistic data) is part of
 | 
						|
VACUUM at all --- it could just as easily be a separate command that
 | 
						|
would only use read access on the database.  Bruce is thinking about
 | 
						|
restructuring VACUUM, so maybe now is a good time to think about
 | 
						|
splitting out the ANALYZE code too.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
> In addition,vacuum error occurs with analyze option in most
 | 
						|
> cases AFAIK. 
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
Still, with current sources?  What's the error message?  I fixed
 | 
						|
a problem with pg_statistic tuples getting too big...
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
			regards, tom lane
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
************
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
From tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us Thu Jan 20 21:10:28 2000
 | 
						|
Received: from sss2.sss.pgh.pa.us (sss.pgh.pa.us [209.114.166.2])
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						|
	by candle.pha.pa.us (8.9.0/8.9.0) with ESMTP id WAA08412
 | 
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	for <pgman@candle.pha.pa.us>; Thu, 20 Jan 2000 22:10:26 -0500 (EST)
 | 
						|
Received: from sss2.sss.pgh.pa.us (tgl@localhost [127.0.0.1])
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	Thu, 20 Jan 2000 22:10:28 -0500 (EST)
 | 
						|
To: Bruce Momjian <pgman@candle.pha.pa.us>
 | 
						|
cc: Hiroshi Inoue <Inoue@tpf.co.jp>, pgsql-hackers@postgresql.org
 | 
						|
Subject: Re: [HACKERS] Some notes on optimizer cost estimates 
 | 
						|
In-reply-to: <200001210248.VAA07186@candle.pha.pa.us> 
 | 
						|
References: <200001210248.VAA07186@candle.pha.pa.us>
 | 
						|
Comments: In-reply-to Bruce Momjian <pgman@candle.pha.pa.us>
 | 
						|
	message dated "Thu, 20 Jan 2000 21:48:57 -0500"
 | 
						|
Date: Thu, 20 Jan 2000 22:10:28 -0500
 | 
						|
Message-ID: <27077.948424228@sss.pgh.pa.us>
 | 
						|
From: Tom Lane <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us>
 | 
						|
Status: OR
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
Bruce Momjian <pgman@candle.pha.pa.us> writes:
 | 
						|
> It is nice that ANALYZE is done during vacuum.  I can't imagine why you
 | 
						|
> would want to do an analyze without adding a vacuum to it.  I guess
 | 
						|
> that's why I made them the same command.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
Well, the main bad thing about ANALYZE being part of VACUUM is that
 | 
						|
it adds to the length of time that VACUUM is holding an exclusive
 | 
						|
lock on the table.  I think it'd make more sense for it to be a
 | 
						|
separate command.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
I have also been thinking about how to make ANALYZE produce a more
 | 
						|
reliable estimate of the most common value.  The three-element list
 | 
						|
that it keeps now is a good low-cost hack, but it really doesn't
 | 
						|
produce a trustworthy answer unless the MCV is pretty darn C (since
 | 
						|
it will never pick up on the MCV at all until there are at least
 | 
						|
two occurrences in three adjacent tuples).  The only idea I've come
 | 
						|
up with is to use a larger list, which would be slower and take
 | 
						|
more memory.  I think that'd be OK in a separate command, but I
 | 
						|
hesitate to do it inside VACUUM --- VACUUM has its own considerable
 | 
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memory requirements, and there's still the issue of not holding down
 | 
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an exclusive lock longer than you have to.
 | 
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 | 
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			regards, tom lane
 | 
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 | 
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From Inoue@tpf.co.jp Thu Jan 20 21:08:32 2000
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From: "Hiroshi Inoue" <Inoue@tpf.co.jp>
 | 
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To: "Bruce Momjian" <pgman@candle.pha.pa.us>, "Tom Lane" <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us>
 | 
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Cc: <pgsql-hackers@postgreSQL.org>
 | 
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Subject: RE: [HACKERS] Some notes on optimizer cost estimates
 | 
						|
Date: Fri, 21 Jan 2000 12:14:10 +0900
 | 
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Message-ID: <001301bf63bd$95cbe680$2801007e@tpf.co.jp>
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Importance: Normal
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Status: OR
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 | 
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> -----Original Message-----
 | 
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> From: Bruce Momjian [mailto:pgman@candle.pha.pa.us]
 | 
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> 
 | 
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> > "Hiroshi Inoue" <Inoue@tpf.co.jp> writes:
 | 
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> > > I've wondered why we cound't analyze database without vacuum.
 | 
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> > > We couldn't run vacuum light-heartedly because it acquires an
 | 
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> > > exclusive lock for the target table. 
 | 
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> > 
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> > There is probably no real good reason, except backwards compatibility,
 | 
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> > why the ANALYZE function (obtaining pg_statistic data) is part of
 | 
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> > VACUUM at all --- it could just as easily be a separate command that
 | 
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> > would only use read access on the database.  Bruce is thinking about
 | 
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> > restructuring VACUUM, so maybe now is a good time to think about
 | 
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> > splitting out the ANALYZE code too.
 | 
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> 
 | 
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> I put it in vacuum because at the time I didn't know how to do such
 | 
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> things and vacuum already scanned the table.  I just linked on the the
 | 
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> scan.  Seemed like a good idea at the time.
 | 
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> 
 | 
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> It is nice that ANALYZE is done during vacuum.  I can't imagine why you
 | 
						|
> would want to do an analyze without adding a vacuum to it.  I guess
 | 
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> that's why I made them the same command.
 | 
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> 
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> If I made them separate commands, both would have to scan the table,
 | 
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> though the analyze could do it without the exclusive lock, which would
 | 
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> be good.
 | 
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>
 | 
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 | 
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The functionality of VACUUM and ANALYZE is quite different.
 | 
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I don't prefer to charge VACUUM more than now about analyzing
 | 
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database.  Probably looong lock,more aborts .... 
 | 
						|
Various kind of analysis would be possible by splitting out ANALYZE.
 | 
						|
 
 | 
						|
Regards.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
Hiroshi Inoue
 | 
						|
Inoue@tpf.co.jp
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
From owner-pgsql-hackers@hub.org Fri Jan 21 11:01:59 2000
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Date: Fri, 21 Jan 2000 08:10:44 -0800
 | 
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To: xun@cs.ucsb.edu, pgsql-hackers@postgreSQL.org
 | 
						|
From: Don Baccus <dhogaza@pacifier.com>
 | 
						|
Subject: Re: Re. [HACKERS] Some notes on optimizer cost estimates
 | 
						|
In-Reply-To: <200001210219.SAA22377@xp10-06.dialup.commserv.ucsb.edu>
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Status: OR
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						|
At 06:19 PM 1/20/00 -0800, Xun Cheng wrote:
 | 
						|
>I'm very glad you bring up this cost estimate issue.
 | 
						|
>Recent work in database research have argued a more
 | 
						|
>detailed disk access cost model should be used for
 | 
						|
>large queries especially joins.
 | 
						|
>Traditional cost estimate only considers the number of
 | 
						|
>disk pages accessed. However a more detailed model
 | 
						|
>would consider three parameters: avg. seek, avg. latency
 | 
						|
>and avg. page transfer. For old disk, typical values are
 | 
						|
>SEEK=9.5 milliseconds, LATENCY=8.3 ms, TRANSFER=2.6ms.
 | 
						|
>A sequential continuous reading of a table (assuming
 | 
						|
>1000 continuous pages) would cost
 | 
						|
>(SEEK+LATENCY+1000*TRANFER=2617.8ms); while quasi-randomly
 | 
						|
>reading 200 times with 2 continuous pages/time would
 | 
						|
>cost (SEEK+200*LATENCY+400*TRANSFER=2700ms).
 | 
						|
>Someone from IBM lab re-studied the traditional
 | 
						|
>ad hoc join algorithms (nested, sort-merge, hash) using the detailed cost
 | 
						|
model
 | 
						|
>and found some interesting results.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
One complication when doing an index scan is that you are
 | 
						|
accessing two separate files (table and index), which can frequently
 | 
						|
be expected to cause an considerable increase in average seek time.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
Oracle and other commercial databases recommend spreading indices and
 | 
						|
tables over several spindles if at all possible in order to minimize
 | 
						|
this effect.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
I suspect it also helps their optimizer make decisions that are
 | 
						|
more consistently good for customers with the largest and most
 | 
						|
complex databases and queries, by making cost estimates more predictably
 | 
						|
reasonable.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
Still...this doesn't help with the question about the effect of the
 | 
						|
filesystem system cache.  I wandered around the web for a little bit
 | 
						|
last night, and found one summary of a paper by Osterhout on the
 | 
						|
effect of the Solaris cache on a fileserver serving diskless workstations.
 | 
						|
There was reference to the hierarchy involved (i.e. the local workstation
 | 
						|
cache is faster than the fileserver's cache which has to be read via
 | 
						|
the network which in turn is faster than reading from the fileserver's
 | 
						|
disk).  It appears the rule-of-thumb for the cache-hit ratio on reads,
 | 
						|
presumably based on measuring some internal Sun systems, used in their
 | 
						|
calculations was 80%.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
Just a datapoint to think about.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
There's also considerable operating system theory on paging systems
 | 
						|
that might be useful for thinking about trying to estimate the
 | 
						|
Postgres cache/hit ratio.  Then again, maybe Postgres could just
 | 
						|
keep count of how many pages of a given table are in the cache at
 | 
						|
any given time?  Or simply keep track of the current ratio of hits
 | 
						|
and misses?
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
>>I have been spending some time measuring actual runtimes for various
 | 
						|
>>sequential-scan and index-scan query plans, and have learned that the
 | 
						|
>>current Postgres optimizer's cost estimation equations are not very
 | 
						|
>>close to reality at all.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
>One interesting question I'd like to ask is if this non-closeness
 | 
						|
>really affects the optimal choice of postgresql's query optimizer.
 | 
						|
>And to what degree the effects might be? My point is that
 | 
						|
>if the optimizer estimated the cost for sequential-scan is 10 and
 | 
						|
>the cost for index-scan is 20 while the actual costs are 10 vs. 40,
 | 
						|
>it should be ok because the optimizer would still choose sequential-scan
 | 
						|
>as it should.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
This is crucial, of course - if there are only two types of scans 
 | 
						|
available, what ever heuristic is used only has to be accurate enough
 | 
						|
to pick the right one.  Once the choice is made, it doesn't really
 | 
						|
matter (from the optimizer's POV) just how long it will actually take,
 | 
						|
the time will be spent and presumably it will be shorter than the
 | 
						|
alternative.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
How frequently will the optimizer choose wrongly if:
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
1. All of the tables and indices were in PG buffer cache or filesystem
 | 
						|
   cache? (i.e. fixed access times for both types of scans)
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
or
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
2. The table's so big that only a small fraction can reside in RAM
 | 
						|
   during the scan and join, which means that the non-sequential
 | 
						|
   disk access pattern of the indexed scan is much more expensive.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
Also, if you pick sequential scans more frequently based on a presumption
 | 
						|
that index scans are expensive due to increased average seek time, how
 | 
						|
often will this penalize the heavy-duty user that invests in extra
 | 
						|
drives and lots of RAM?
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
...
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
>>The current cost estimation
 | 
						|
>>method essentially assumes that the buffer cache plus OS disk cache will
 | 
						|
>>be 100% efficient --- we will never have to read the same page of the
 | 
						|
>>main table twice in a scan, due to having discarded it between
 | 
						|
>>references.  This of course is unreasonably optimistic.  Worst case
 | 
						|
>>is that we'd fetch a main-table page for each selected tuple, but in
 | 
						|
>>most cases that'd be unreasonably pessimistic.
 | 
						|
>
 | 
						|
>This is actually the motivation that I asked before if postgresql
 | 
						|
>has a raw disk facility. That way we have much control on this cache
 | 
						|
>issue. Of course only if we can provide some algo. better than OS
 | 
						|
>cache algo. (depending on the context, like large joins), a raw disk
 | 
						|
>facility will be worthwhile (besides the recoverability).
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
Postgres does have control over its buffer cache.  The one thing that
 | 
						|
raw disk I/O would give you is control over where blocks are placed,
 | 
						|
meaning you could more accurately model the cost of retrieving them.
 | 
						|
So presumably the cache could be tuned to the allocation algorithm
 | 
						|
used to place various structures on the disk.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
I still wonder just how much gain you get by this approach.  Compared,
 | 
						|
to, say simply spending $2,000 on a gigabyte of RAM.  Heck, PCs even
 | 
						|
support a couple gigs of RAM now.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
>Actually I have another question for you guys which is somehow related
 | 
						|
>to this cost estimation issue. You know the difference between OLTP
 | 
						|
>and OLAP. My question is how you target postgresql on both kinds
 | 
						|
>of applications or just OLTP. From what I know OLTP and OLAP would
 | 
						|
>have a big difference in query characteristics and thus 
 | 
						|
>optimization difference. If postgresql is only targeted on
 | 
						|
>OLTP, the above cost estimation issue might not be that
 | 
						|
>important. However for OLAP, large tables and large queries are
 | 
						|
>common and optimization would be difficult.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
- Don Baccus, Portland OR <dhogaza@pacifier.com>
 | 
						|
  Nature photos, on-line guides, Pacific Northwest
 | 
						|
  Rare Bird Alert Service and other goodies at
 | 
						|
  http://donb.photo.net.
 | 
						|
 | 
						|
************
 | 
						|
 |