Tom,

> In general, estimating n-distinct from a sample is just plain a hard
> problem, and it's probably foolish to suppose we'll ever be able to
> do it robustly.  What we need is to minimize the impact when we get
> it wrong.  

Well, I think it's pretty well proven that to be accurate at all you need 
to be able to sample at least 5%, even if some users choose to sample 
less.   Also I don't think anyone on this list disputes that the current 
algorithm is very inaccurate for large tables.  Or do they?

While I don't think that we can estimate N-distinct completely accurately, 
I do think that we can get within +/- 5x for 80-90% of all cases, instead 
of 40-50% of cases like now.  We can't be perfectly accurate, but we can 
be *more* accurate.

-- 
--Josh

Josh Berkus
Aglio Database Solutions
San Francisco

In response to

• Re: Improving N-Distinct estimation by ANALYZE at 2006-01-04 19:49:16 from Tom Lane

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• Re: Improving N-Distinct estimation by ANALYZE at 2006-01-05 00:22:05 from Greg Stark

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