Re: how to avoid repeating expensive computation in select

Is using a pl/pgsql function a viable option. Within or without the use of
a function you can create a temporary table to hold the needed intermediate
results. You can even use a permanent working table and write functions to
perform the needed queries against it.

Especially for expensive calculation you want to consider whether it is
safe/reasonable to pre-calculate and store values instead of running the
calculation during each query.

If you need procedural language capabilities (variables, multiple uses of
the same data) trying to work out a solution in pure transactional SQL can
be difficult or outright impossible; you really need to use the procedural
facilities built into the server OR your application environment. In other
words put down the hammer and go find yourself a chainsaw :)

David J

-----Original Message-----
From: pgsql-general-owner(at)postgresql(dot)org
[mailto:pgsql-general-owner(at)postgresql(dot)org] On Behalf Of Bob Price
Sent: Thursday, February 03, 2011 12:18 PM
To: pgsql-general(at)postgresql(dot)org
Subject: [GENERAL] how to avoid repeating expensive computation in select

I have been searching through the docs and mailing list and haven't found a
way to do this, so I thought I would ask the community.

I would like to know if there is a way in PostgreSQL to avoid repeating an
expensive computation in a SELECT where the result is needed both as a
returned value and as an expression in the WHERE clause.

As a simple example, consider the following query on a table with 'id' and
'value' columns, and an expensive computation represented as a function:

SELECT id, expensivefunc(value) AS score FROM mytable
WHERE id LIKE '%z%' AND expensivefunc(value) > 0.5;

It would be great if I could find a way to only compute expensivefunc(value)
at most once per row, and not at all if the other WHERE constraints are not
satisfied.

For this simple case I know that I could rewrite the SELECT as something
like the following:

WITH other_where AS (
SELECT id, value FROM mytable WHERE id LIKE '%z%'
), calc_scores AS (
SELECT id, expensivefunc(value) AS score FROM other_where
)
SELECT id, score from calc_scores WHERE score > 0.5;

This works in this simple case, but my guess is that it probably adds a lot
of overhead (is this true?), and I also have to deal with much more
complicated scenarios with multiple expensive calculations that may not fit
into this kind of rewrite.

Does anyone know of a simpler way to accomplish this?

For example, it would be great if there were a function that could reference
the Nth select list item so it is only computed once, like:

SELECT id, expensivefunc(value) AS score FROM mytable
WHERE id LIKE '%z%' AND sel_list_item(2) > 0.5;

or if there were temporary variables in the WHERE expressions like:

SELECT id, tmp1 AS score FROM mytable
WHERE id LIKE '%z%' AND (tmp1 = expensivefunc(value)) > 0.5;

Any ideas anyone!

Thanks in advance!
Bob

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