Calculating statistic via function rather than with query is slowing my query

Hi everyone,

I'm using postgres 9.0.3, and here's the OS I'm running this on:
Linux 2.6.18-238.12.1.el5xen #1 SMP Tue May 31 14:02:29 EDT 2011 x86_64
x86_64 x86_64 GNU/Linux

I have a fairly straight forward query. I'm doing a group by on an ID, and
then calculating some a statistic on the resulting data. The problem I'm
running into is that when I'm calculating the statistics via a function,
it's twice as slow as when I'm calculating the statistics directly in my
query. I want to be able to use a function, since I'll be using this
particular calculation in many places.

Any idea of what's going on? Below, I've included my function, and both
queries (I removed the type_ids, and just wrote …ids…

Here's my function (I also tried stable):
CREATE OR REPLACE FUNCTION calc_test(a double precision, b integer, c
integer)
RETURNS double precision AS $$
BEGIN
return a/b/c* 1000000000::double precision;
END;
$$ LANGUAGE plpgsql immutable;

The query that takes 7.6 seconds, when I calculate the statistic from within
the query:
explain analyze
select
agg.primary_id,
avg(agg.a / agg.b / agg.c * 1000000000::double precision) foo,
stddev(agg.a / agg.b / agg.c * 1000000000::double precision) bar
from mytable agg
where agg.type_id in (....ids....)
group by agg.primary_id;

The execution plan:
HashAggregate (cost=350380.58..350776.10 rows=9888 width=20) (actual
time=7300.414..7331.659 rows=20993 loops=1)
-> Bitmap Heap Scan on mytable agg (cost=28667.90..337509.63
rows=1716127 width=20) (actual time=200.064..2861.600 rows=2309230 loops=1)
Recheck Cond: (type_id = ANY ('{....ids....}'::integer[]))
-> Bitmap Index Scan on mytable_type_id_idx (cost=0.00..28238.87
rows=1716127 width=0) (actual time=192.725..192.725 rows=2309230 loops=1)
Index Cond: (type_id = ANY ('{....ids....}'::integer[]))
Total runtime: 7358.337 ms
(6 rows)

The same query, but now I'm calling the function. When I call the function
it's taking 15.5 seconds.
explain analyze select
agg.primary_id,
avg(calc_test(agg.a,agg.b,agg.c)) foo,
stddev(calc_test(agg.a,agg.b,agg.c)) bar
from mytable agg
where agg.type_id in (....ids....)
group by agg.primary_id;

and, here's the execution plan:

HashAggregate (cost=350380.58..355472.90 rows=9888 width=20) (actual
time=13660.838..13686.618 rows=20993 loops=1)
-> Bitmap Heap Scan on mytable agg (cost=28667.90..337509.63
rows=1716127 width=20) (actual time=170.385..2881.122 rows=2309230 loops=1)
Recheck Cond: (type_id = ANY ('{....ids....}'::integer[]))
-> Bitmap Index Scan on mytable_type_id_idx (cost=0.00..28238.87
rows=1716127 width=0) (actual time=162.834..162.834 rows=2309230 loops=1)
Index Cond: (type_id = ANY ('{....ids....}'::integer[]))
Total runtime: 13707.560 ms

Thanks!

Anish