Building Query Compilers

(Under Construction)
[expected time to completion: 5 years]

Guido Moerkotte

September 3, 2009
Contents

I Basics 3

1 Introduction 5
1.1 General Remarks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
1.2 DBMS Architecture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
1.3 Interpretation versus Compilation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
1.4 Requirements for a Query Compiler . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
1.5 Search Space . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
1.6 Generation versus Transformation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
1.7 Focus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
1.8 Organization of the Book . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13

2 Textbook Query Optimization 15

2.1 Example Query and Outline . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
2.2 Algebra . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
2.3 Canonical Translation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
2.4 Logical Query Optimization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
2.5 Physical Query Optimization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
2.6 Discussion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25

3 Join Ordering 31
3.1 Queries Considered . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
3.1.1 Query Graph . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
3.1.2 Join Tree . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
3.1.3 Simple Cost Functions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
3.1.4 Classification of Join Ordering Problems . . . . . . . . . . 40
3.1.5 Search Space Sizes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
3.1.6 Problem Complexity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
3.2 Deterministic Algorithms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
3.2.1 Heuristics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
3.2.2 Determining the Optimal Join Order in Polynomial Time 49
3.2.3 The Maximum-Value-Precedence Algorithm . . . . . . . . 56
3.2.4 Dynamic Programming . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
3.2.5 Memoization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78
3.2.6 Join Ordering by Generating Permutations . . . . . . . . 79
3.2.7 A Dynamic Programming based Heuristics for Chain Queries 81
3.2.8 Transformation-Based Approaches . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94

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3.3 Probabilistic Algorithms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101

3.3.1 Generating Random Left-Deep Join Trees with Cross Prod-
ucts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101
3.3.2 Generating Random Join Trees with Cross Products . . . 103
3.3.3 Generating Random Join Trees without Cross Products . 107
3.3.4 Quick Pick . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116
3.3.5 Iterative Improvement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116
3.3.6 Simulated Annealing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117
3.3.7 Tabu Search . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118
3.3.8 Genetic Algorithms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119
3.4 Hybrid Algorithms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122
3.4.1 Two Phase Optimization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122
3.4.2 AB-Algorithm . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122
3.4.3 Toured Simulated Annealing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122
3.4.4 GOO-II . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123
3.4.5 Iterative Dynamic Programming . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123
3.5 Ordering Order-Preserving Joins . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123
3.6 Characterizing Search Spaces . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131
3.6.1 Complexity Thresholds . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131
3.7 Discussion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135
3.8 Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 136

4 Database Items, Building Blocks, and Access Paths 137

4.1 Disk Drive . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137
4.2 Database Buffer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 146
4.3 Physical Database Organization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 147
4.4 Slotted Page and Tuple Identifier (TID) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 150
4.5 Physical Record Layouts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 151
4.6 Physical Algebra (Iterator Concept) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 152
4.7 Simple Scan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 152
4.8 Scan and Attribute Access . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153
4.9 Temporal Relations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155
4.10 Table Functions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155
4.11 Indexes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 156
4.12 Single Index Access Path . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 158
4.12.1 Simple Key, No Data Attributes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 158
4.12.2 Complex Keys and Data Attributes . . . . . . . . . . . . 163
4.13 Multi Index Access Path . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 165
4.14 Indexes and Joins . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167
4.15 Remarks on Access Path Generation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 172
4.16 Counting the Number of Accesses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 173
4.16.1 Counting the Number of Direct Accesses . . . . . . . . . . 173
4.16.2 Counting the Number of Sequential Accesses . . . . . . . 182
4.16.3 Pointers into the Literature . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 187
4.17 Disk Drive Costs for N Uniform Accesses . . . . . . . . . . . . . 188
4.17.1 Number of Qualifying Cylinders, Tracks, and Sectors . . . 188
4.17.2 Command Costs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 189
CONTENTS iii

4.17.3 Seek Costs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 189

4.17.4 Settle Costs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 191
4.17.5 Rotational Delay Costs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 191
4.17.6 Head Switch Costs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 193
4.17.7 Discussion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 193
4.18 Concluding Remarks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 194
4.19 Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 194

II Foundations 197

5 Logic, Null, and Boolean Expressions 199

5.1 Two-valued logic . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 199
5.2 NULL values and three valued logic . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 199
5.3 Simplifying Boolean Expressions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 200
5.4 Optimizing Boolean Expressions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 200
5.5 Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 200

6 Functional Dependencies 203

6.1 Functional Dependencies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 203
6.2 Functional Dependencies in the presence of NULL values . . . . . 204
6.3 Deriving Functional Dependencies over algebraic operators . . . . 204
6.4 Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 204

7 An Algebra for Sets, Bags, and Sequences 205

7.1 Sets, Bags, and Sequences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 205
7.1.1 Sets . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 205
7.1.2 Duplicate Data: Bags . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 206
7.1.3 Ordered Data: Sequences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 208
7.2 Algebra . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 209
7.2.1 The Operators . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 210
7.2.2 Preliminaries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 211
7.2.3 Operator Signatures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 213
7.2.4 Selection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 215
7.2.5 Projection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 215
7.2.6 Map . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 215
7.2.7 Join Operators . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 215
7.2.8 Linearity and Reorderability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 217
7.2.9 Reordering of joins and outer-joins . . . . . . . . . . . . . 220
7.2.10 Basic Equivalences for d-Join and Grouping . . . . . . . . 223
7.2.11 Simplifying Expressions Containing Joins . . . . . . . . . 224
7.2.12 Reordering Joins and Grouping . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 226
7.2.13 ToDo . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 233
7.3 Logical Algebra for Sequences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 233
7.3.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 233
7.3.2 Algebraic Operators . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 235
7.3.3 Equivalences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 238
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7.3.4 Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 238

7.4 Literature . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 238

8 Declarative Query Representation 241

8.1 Calculus Representations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 241
8.2 Datalog . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 241
8.3 Tableaux Representation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 241
8.4 Monoid Comprehension . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 241
8.5 Expressiveness . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 241
8.6 Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 241

9 Translation and Lifting 243

9.1 Query Language to Calculus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 243
9.2 Query Language to Algebra . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 243
9.3 Calculus to Algebra . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 243
9.4 Algebra to Calculus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 243
9.5 Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 243

10 Query Equivalence, Containment, Minimization, and Factor-

ization 245
10.1 Set Semantics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 246
10.1.1 Conjunctive Queries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 246
10.1.2 . . . with Inequalities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 248
10.1.3 . . . with Negation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 249
10.1.4 . . . under Constraints . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 249
10.1.5 . . . with Aggregation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 249
10.2 Bag Semantics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 249
10.2.1 Conjunctive Queries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 249
10.3 Sequences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 250
10.3.1 Path Expressions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 250
10.4 Minimization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 251
10.5 Detecting common subexpressions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 251
10.5.1 Simple Expressions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 251
10.5.2 Algebraic Expressions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 251
10.6 Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 251

III Rewrite Techniques 253

11 Simple Rewrites 255

11.1 Simple Adjustments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 255
11.1.1 Rewriting Simple Expressions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 255
11.1.2 Normal forms for queries with disjunction . . . . . . . . . 257
11.2 Deriving new predicates . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 257
11.2.1 Collecting conjunctive predicates . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 257
11.2.2 Equality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 257
11.2.3 Inequality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 258
CONTENTS v

11.2.4 Aggregation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 259

11.2.5 ToDo . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 261
11.3 Predicate Push-Down and Pull-Up . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 261
11.4 Eliminating Redundant Joins . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 261
11.5 Distinct Pull-Up and Push-Down . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 261
11.6 Set-Valued Attributes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 261
11.6.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 261
11.6.2 Preliminaries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 262
11.6.3 Query Rewrite . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 263
11.7 Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 264

12 View Merging 267

12.1 View Resolution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 267
12.2 Simple View Merging . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 267
12.3 Predicate Move Around (Predicate pull-up and push-down) . . . 268
12.4 Complex View Merging . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 269
12.4.1 Views with Distinct . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 269
12.4.2 Views with Group-By and Aggregation . . . . . . . . . . 270
12.4.3 Views in IN predicates . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 271
12.4.4 Final Remarks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 271
12.5 Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 272

13 Quantifier treatment 273

13.1 Pseudo-Quantifiers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 273
13.2 Existential quantifier . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 274
13.3 Universal quantifier . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 274
13.4 Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 278

14 Unnesting Nested Queries 279

14.1 Classification of nested queries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 279
14.2 Queries of Type A . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 280
14.3 Queries of Type N . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 281
14.4 Queries of Type J . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 284
14.5 Queries of Type JA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 286
14.6 Alternative locations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 287
14.7 Different Kinds of Dependency . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 289
14.8 Unnesting IN . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 291
14.9 Further reading . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 291
14.10History . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 291
14.11Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 292
14.12ToDo . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 292

15 Optimizing Queries with Materialized Views 295

15.1 Conjunctive Views . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 295
15.2 Views with Grouping and Aggregation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 295
15.3 Views with Disjunction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 295
15.4 Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 295
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16 Semantic Query Rewrite 297

16.1 Constraints and their impact on query optimization . . . . . . . 297
16.2 Semantic Query Rewrite . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 297
16.3 Exploiting Uniqueness in Query Optimization . . . . . . . . . . . 298
16.4 Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 298

IV Plan Generation 299

17 Current Search Space and Its Limits 301

17.1 Plans with Outer Joins, Semijoins and Antijoins . . . . . . . . . 301
17.2 Expensive Predicates and Functions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 301
17.3 Techniques to Reduce the Search Space . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 301
17.4 Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 301

18 Optimizing Queries with Disjunctions 303

18.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 303
18.2 Using Disjunctive or Conjunctive Normal Forms . . . . . . . . . 304
18.3 Bypass Plans . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 304
18.4 Implementation remarks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 306
18.5 Other plan generators/query optimizer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 306
18.6 Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 307

19 Grouping and Aggregation 309

19.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 309
19.2 Aggregate Functions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 310
19.3 Normalization and Translation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 313
19.3.1 Grouping and Aggregation in Different Query Languages 313
19.3.2 Extensions to Algebra . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 314
19.3.3 Normalization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 314
19.3.4 Translation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 314
19.4 Lazy and eager group by . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 314
19.5 Coalescing Grouping . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 316
19.6 More Possibilities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 319
19.6.1 Eager/Lazy Group-By-Count . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 321
19.7 Translation into Our Notation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 326
19.8 Aggregation of Non-Equi-Join Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 327
19.9 Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 327

20 Grouping and Aggregation 329

20.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 329
20.2 Lazy and eager group by . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 330
20.3 Coalescing Grouping . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 333
20.4 ToDo . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 336

21 Generating Plans for the Full Algebra 339

22 Generating DAG-structured Plans 341

CONTENTS vii

23 Deriving and Dealing with Interesting Orderings and Group-

ings 343
23.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 343
23.2 Problem Definition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 344
23.2.1 Ordering . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 344
23.2.2 Grouping . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 346
23.2.3 Functional Dependencies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 347
23.2.4 Algebraic Operators . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 347
23.2.5 Plan Generation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 348
23.3 Overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 349
23.4 Detailed Algorithm . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 352
23.4.1 Overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 352
23.4.2 Determining the Input . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 353
23.4.3 Constructing the NFSM . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 354
23.4.4 Constructing the DFSM . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 356
23.4.5 Precomputing Values . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 357
23.4.6 During Plan Generation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 358
23.4.7 Reducing the Size of the NFSM . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 358
23.4.8 Complex Ordering Requirements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 361
23.5 Experimental Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 363
23.6 Total Impact . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 363
23.7 Influence of Groupings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 365
23.8 Annotated Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 369

24 Cardinality and Cost Estimates 373

24.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 373
24.2 A First Approach . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 376
24.2.1 Top-Most Cost Formula (Overall Costs) . . . . . . . . . . 376
24.2.2 Summation of Operator Costs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 376
24.2.3 CPU Cost . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 377
24.2.4 Abbreviations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 377
24.2.5 I/O Costs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 377
24.2.6 Cardinality Estimates . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 379
24.3 A First Logical Profile and its Propagation . . . . . . . . . . . . 381
24.3.1 The Logical Profile . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 381
24.3.2 Assumptions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 382
24.3.3 Propagation for Selections . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 383
24.3.4 Profile Propagation for Joins . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 387
24.3.5 Profile Propagation for Projections . . . . . . . . . . . . . 389
24.3.6 Profile Propagation for Division . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 392
24.3.7 Remarks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 394
24.4 Approximation of a Set of Values . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 394
24.4.1 Approximations and Error Metrics . . . . . . . . . . . . . 394
24.4.2 Example Applications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 396
24.5 Approximation with Linear Models . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 396
24.5.1 Linear Models . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 396
24.5.2 Example Applications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 401
viii CONTENTS

24.5.3 Linear Models Under l2 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 405

24.5.4 Linear Models Under l∞ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 410
24.5.5 Linear Models Under lq . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 414
24.5.6 Non-Linear Models . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 420

V Implementation 423

25 Architecture of a Query Compiler 425

25.1 Compilation process . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 425
25.2 Architecture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 425
25.3 Control Blocks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 425
25.4 Memory Management . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 427
25.5 Tracing and Plan Visualization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 427
25.6 Driver . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 427
25.7 Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 427

26 Internal Representations 431

26.1 Requirements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 431
26.2 Algebraic Representations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 431
26.2.1 Graph Representations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 432
26.2.2 Query Graph . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 432
26.2.3 Operator Graph . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 432
26.3 Query Graph Model (QGM) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 432
26.4 Classification of Predicates . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 432
26.5 Treatment of Distinct . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 432
26.6 Query Analysis and Materialization of Analysis Results . . . . . 432
26.7 Query and Plan Properties . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 433
26.8 Conversion to the Internal Representation . . . . . . . . . . . . . 435
26.8.1 Preprocessing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 435
26.8.2 Translation into the Internal Representation . . . . . . . . 435
26.9 Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 435

27 Details on the Phases of Query Compilation 437

27.1 Parsing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 437
27.2 Semantic Analysis, Normalization, Factorization, Constant Fold-
ing, and Translation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 437
27.3 Normalization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 439
27.4 Factorization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 439
27.5 Constant Folding . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 440
27.6 Semantic analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 440
27.7 Translation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 442
27.8 Rewrite I . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 447
27.9 Plan Generation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 447
27.10Rewrite II . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 447
27.11Code generation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 447
27.12Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 448
CONTENTS ix

28 Hard-Wired Algorithms 449

28.1 Hard-wired Dynamic Programming . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 449
28.1.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 449
28.1.2 A plan generator for bushy trees . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 453
28.1.3 A plan generator for bushy trees and expensive selections 453
28.1.4 A plan generator for bushy trees, expensive selections and
functions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 455
28.2 Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 455

29 Rule-Based Algorithms 457

29.1 Rule-based Dynamic Programming . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 457
29.2 Rule-based Memoization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 457
29.3 Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 457

30 Example Query Compiler 459

30.1 Research Prototypes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 459
30.1.1 AQUA and COLA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 459
30.1.2 Black Dahlia II . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 459
30.1.3 Epoq . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 459
30.1.4 Ereq . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 461
30.1.5 Exodus/Volcano/Cascade . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 462
30.1.6 Freytags regelbasierte System R-Emulation . . . . . . . . 464
30.1.7 Genesis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 465
30.1.8 GOMbgo . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 467
30.1.9 Gral . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 470
30.1.10 Lambda-DB . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 473
30.1.11 Lanzelotte in short . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 473
30.1.12 Opt++ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 474
30.1.13 Postgres . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 474
30.1.14 Sciore & Sieg . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 476
30.1.15 Secondo . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 476
30.1.16 Squiral . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 476
30.1.17 System R and System R∗ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 478
30.1.18 Starburst and DB2 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 478
30.1.19 Der Optimierer von Straube . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 481
30.1.20 Other Query Optimizer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 482
30.2 Commercial Query Compiler . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 484
30.2.1 The DB 2 Query Compiler . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 484
30.2.2 The Oracle Query Compiler . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 484
30.2.3 The SQL Server Query Compiler . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 488

VI Selected Topics 489

31 Generating Plans for Top-N-Queries? 491

31.1 Motivation and Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 491
31.2 Optimizing for the First Tuple . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 491
x CONTENTS

31.3 Optimizing for the First N Tuples . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 491

32 Recursive Queries 493

33 Issues Introduced by OQL 495

33.1 Type-Based Rewriting and Pointer Chasing Elimination . . . . . 495
33.2 Class Hierarchies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 497
33.3 Cardinalities and Cost Functions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 499

34 Issues Introduced by XPath 501

34.1 A Naive XPath-Interpreter and its Problems . . . . . . . . . . . 501
34.2 Dynamic Programming and Memoization . . . . . . . . . . . . . 501
34.3 Naive Translation of XPath to Algebra . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 501
34.4 Pushing Duplicate Elimination . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 501
34.5 Avoiding Duplicate Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 501
34.6 Avoiding Duplicate Generation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 501
34.7 Index Usage and Materialized Views . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 501
34.8 Cardinalities and Costs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 501
34.9 Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 501

35 Issues Introduced by XQuery 503

35.1 Reordering in Ordered Context . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 503
35.2 Result Construction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 503
35.3 Unnesting Nested XQueries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 503
35.4 Cardinalities and Cost Functions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 503
35.5 Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 503

36 Outlook 505

A Query Languages? 507

A.1 Designing a query language . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 507
A.2 SQL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 507
A.3 OQL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 507
A.4 XPath . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 507
A.5 XQuery . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 507
A.6 Datalog . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 507

B Query Execution Engine (?) 509

C Glossary of Rewrite and Optimization Techniques 511

D Useful Formulas 517

Bibliography 518

Index 578

E ToDo 579
List of Figures

1.1 DBMS architecture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6

1.2 Query interpreter . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
1.3 Simple query interpreter . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
1.4 Query compiler . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
1.5 Query compiler architecture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
1.6 Execution plan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
1.7 Potential and actual search space . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
1.8 Generation vs. transformation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13

2.1 Relational algebra . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17

2.2 Equivalences for the relational algebra . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
2.3 (Simplified) Canonical translation of SQL to algebra . . . . . . . 19
2.4 Text book query optimization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
2.5 Logical query optimization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
2.6 Different join trees . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
2.7 Plans for example query (Part I) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
2.8 Plans for example query (Part II) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
2.9 Physical query optimization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
2.10 Plan for example query after physical query optimization . . . . 30

3.1 Query graph for example query of Section 2.1 . . . . . . . . . . . 32

3.2 Query graph shapes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
3.3 Illustrations for the IKKBZ Algorithm . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
3.4 A query graph, its directed join graph, some spanning trees and
join trees . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56
3.5 A query graph, its directed join tree, a spanning tree and its
problem . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58
3.6 Search space with sharing under optimality principle . . . . . . . 63
3.7 Algorithm DPsize . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70
3.8 Algorithm DPsub . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72
3.9 Size of the search space for different graph structures . . . . . . . 74
3.10 Algorithm DPccp . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
3.11 Enumeration Example for DPccp . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
3.12 Sample graph to illustrate EnumerateCsgRec . . . . . . . . . . . 76
3.13 Call sequence for Figure 3.12 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77
3.14 Example of rule transformations (RS-1) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99

xi
xii LIST OF FIGURES

3.15 Encoding Trees . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 104

3.16 Paths . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
3.17 Tree-merge . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108
3.18 Algorithm UnrankDecomposition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110
3.19 Leaf-insertion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110
3.20 A query graph, its tree, and its standard decomposition graph . . 111
3.21 Algorithm Adorn . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114
3.22 A query graph, a join tree, and its encoding . . . . . . . . . . . . 121
3.23 Pseudo code for IDP-1 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 124
3.24 Pseudocode for IDP-2 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125
3.25 Subroutine applicable-predicates . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127
3.26 Subroutine construct-bushy-tree . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 128
3.27 Subroutine extract-plan and its subroutine . . . . . . . . . . . 128
3.28 Impact of selectivity on the search space . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 134
3.29 Impact of relation sizes on the search space . . . . . . . . . . . . 134
3.30 Impact of parameters on the performance of heuristics . . . . . . 134
3.31 Impact of selectivities on probabilistic procedures . . . . . . . . . 135

4.1 Disk drive assembly . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138

4.2 Disk drive read request processing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139
4.3 Time to read 100 MB from disk (depending on the number of
8 KB blocks read at once) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 142
4.4 Time needed to read n random pages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 144
4.5 Break-even point in fraction of total pages depending on page size145
4.6 Physical organization of a relational database . . . . . . . . . . . 148
4.7 Slotted pages and TIDs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 150
4.8 Various physical record layouts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 151
4.9 Clustered vs. non-clustered index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157
4.10 Illustration of seek cost estimate . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 190

5.1 Truth tables for two-valued logic . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 199

5.2 Simplification Rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 200
5.3 Laws for two-valued logic . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 201
5.4 Comparison functions in the presence of NULL values . . . . . . 201
5.5 Truth tables for three-valued logic . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 202
5.6 Interpretation of ⊥ values . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 202

7.1 Laws for Set Operations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 205

7.2 Laws for Bag Operations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 207
7.3 Outer join examples . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 221
7.4 Two equivalent plans . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 228
7.5 Applications of coalescing grouping . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 234
7.6 Example for Map Operator . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 236
7.7 Examples for Unary and Binary Γ̂ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 237

11.1 Simplification rules for boolean expressions . . . . . . . . . . . . 258

11.2 Axioms for equality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 258
11.3 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 265
LIST OF FIGURES xiii

11.4 Axioms for inequality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 266

18.1 DNF plans . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 304

18.2 CNF plans . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 305
18.3 Bypass plans . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 305

19.1 Two equivalent plans . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 311

19.2 Applications of coalescing grouping . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 320

20.1 Two equivalent plans . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 331

20.2 Applications of coalescing grouping . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 337

23.1 Propagation of orderings and groupings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 348

23.2 Possible FSM for orderings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 350
23.3 Possible FSM for groupings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 351
23.4 Combined FSM for orderings and groupings . . . . . . . . . . . . 351
23.5 Possible DFSM for Figure 23.4 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 351
23.6 Preparation steps of the algorithm . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 353
23.7 Initial NFSM for sample query . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 355
23.8 NFSM after adding DF D edges . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 356
23.9 NFSM after pruning artificial states . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 356
23.10Final NFSM . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 356
23.11Resulting DFSM . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 357
23.12contains Matrix . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 357
23.13transition Matrix . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 357
23.14Plan generation for different join graphs, Simmen’s algorithm
(left) vs. our algorithm (middle) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 363
23.15Memory consumption in KB for Figure 23.14 . . . . . . . . . . . 365
23.16Time requirements for the preparation step . . . . . . . . . . . . 368
23.17Space requirements for the preparation step . . . . . . . . . . . . 369

24.1 Overview of operations for cardinality and cost estimations . . . 374

24.2 Calculating the lower bound DG ⊥ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 391
24.3 Calculating the estimate for DG . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 393
24.4 Q-error and plan optimality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 405
24.5 Algorithm for best linear approximation under l∞ . . . . . . . . 414
24.6 Algorithm finding best linear approximation under lq . . . . . . . 419

25.1 The compilation process . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 426

25.2 Class Architecture of the Query Compiler . . . . . . . . . . . . . 428
25.3 Control Block Structure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 429

27.1 Expression . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 438

27.2 Expression hierarchy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 439
27.3 Expression . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 440
27.4 Query 1 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 441
27.5 Internal representation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 443
27.6 An algebraic operator tree with a d-join . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 446
xiv LIST OF FIGURES

27.7 Algebra . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 447

28.1 A sample execution plan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 450

28.2 Different join operator trees . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 451
28.3 Bottom up plan generation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 453
28.4 A Dynamic Programming Optimization Algorithm . . . . . . . . 454

30.1 Beispiel einer Epoq-Architektur . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 460

30.2 Exodus Optimierer Generator . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 462
30.3 Organisation der Optimierung . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 465
30.4 Ablauf der Optimierung . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 468
30.5 Architektur von GOMrbo . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 469
30.6 a) Architektur des Gral-Optimierers; b) Operatorhierarchie nach
Kosten . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 470
30.7 Die Squiralarchitektur . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 477
30.8 Starburst Optimierer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 479
30.9 Der Optimierer von Straube . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 481

33.1 Algebraic representation of a query . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 495

33.2 A join replacing pointer chasing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 497
33.3 A Sample Class Hierarchy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 498
33.4 Implementation of Extents . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 499
Preface

Goals
Primary Goals:

• book covers many query languages (at least SQL, OQL, XQuery (XPath))

• techniques should be represented as query language independent as pos-

sible

• book covers all stages of the query compilation process

• book completely covers fundamental issues

• book gives implementation details and tricks

Secondary Goals:

• book is thin

• book is not totally unreadable

• book separates concepts from implementation techniques

Organizing the material is not easy: The same topic pops up

• at different stages of the query compilation process and

• at different query languages

Acknowledgements
Introducer to query optimization: Günther von Bültzingsloewen
Peter Lockemann
First paper coauthor: Stefan Karl,
Coworkers: Alfons Kemper, Klaus Peithner, Michael Steinbrunn, Donald
Kossmann, Carsten Gerlhof, Jens Claussen,
Sophie Cluet, Vassilis Christophides, Georg Gottlob, V.S. Subramanian,
Sven Helmer, Birgitta König-Ries, Wolfgang Scheufele, Carl-Christian Kanne,
Thomas Neumann, Norman May, Matthias Brantner
Robin Aly

xv
LIST OF FIGURES 1

Discussions: Umesh Dayal, Dave Maier, Gail Mitchell, Stan Zdonik, Tamer
Özsu, Arne Rosenthal,
Don Chamberlin, Bruce Lindsay, Guy Lohman, Mike Carey, Bennet Vance,
Laura Haas, Mohan, CM Park,
Yannis Ioannidis, Götz Graefe, Serge Abiteboul, Claude Delobel Patrick
Valduriez, Dana Florescu, Jerome Simeon, Mary Fernandez, Christoph Koch,
Adam Bosworth, Joe Hellerstein, Paul Larson, Hennie Steenhagen, Harald
Schöning, Bernhard Seeger,
Encouragement: Anand Deshpande
Manuscript: Simone Seeger,
and many others to be inserted.
2 LIST OF FIGURES
Part I

Basics

3
Chapter 1

Introduction

1.1 General Remarks

Query languages like SQL or OQL are declarative. That is, they specify what
the user wants to retrieve and not how to retrieve it. It is the task of the
query compiler to generate a query evaluation plan (evaluation plan for short,
or execution plan or simply plan) for a given query. The query evaluation plan
(QEP) essentially is an operator tree with physical algebraic operators as nodes.
It is evaluated by the runtime system. Figure 1.6 shows a detailed execution
plan ready to be interpreted by the runtime system. Figure 28.1 shows an
abstraction of a query plan often used to explain algorithms or optimization
techniques.
The book tries to demystify query optimization and query optimizers. By
means of the multi-lingual query optimizer BD II, the most important aspects
of query optimizers and their implementation are discussed. We concentrate
not only on the query optimizer core (Rewrite I, Plan Generator, Rewrite II)
of the query compilation process but touch on all issues from parsing to code
generation and quality assurance.
We start by giving a two-module overview of a database management sys-
tem. One of these modules covers the functionality of the query compiler.
The query compiler itself involves several submodules. For each submodule we
discuss the features relevant for query compilation.

1.2 DBMS Architecture

Any database management system (DBMS) can be divided into two major
parts: the compile time system (CTS) and the runtime system (RTS). User
commands enter the compile time system which translates them into executa-
bles which are then interpreted by the runtime system (Fig. 1.1).
The input to the CTS are statements of several kinds, for example connect
to a database (starts a session), disconnect from a database, create a database,
drop a database, add/drop a schema, perform schema changes (add relations,
object types, constraints, . . . ), add/drop indexes, run statistics commands,
manually modify the DBMS statistics, begin of a transaction, end of a transac-

5
6 CHAPTER 1. INTRODUCTION

user command (e.g. query)

CTS
execution plan

RTS
result

Figure 1.1: DBMS architecture

Rewrite

query interpretation
calculus result

Figure 1.2: Query interpreter

tion, add/drop a view, update database items (e.g. tuples, relations, objects),
change authorizations, and state a query. Within the book, we will only be
concerned with the tiny last item.

1.3 Interpretation versus Compilation

There are two essential approaches to process a query: interpretation and com-
pilation.
The path of a query through a query interpreter is illustrated in Figure 1.2.
Query interpretation translates the query string into some internal representa-
tion that is mostly calculus-based. Optionally, some rewrite on this representa-
tion takes place. Typical steps during this rewrite phase are unnesting nested
queries, pushing selections down, and introducing index structures. After that,
the query is interpreted. A simple query interpreter is sketched in Figure 1.3.
The first function, interprete, takes a simple SQL block and extracts the dif-
ferent clauses, initializes the result R and calls eval. Then, eval recursively
evaluates the query by first producing the cross product of the entries in the
from clause. After all of them have been processed, the predicate is applied and
for those tuples where the where predicate evaluates to true, a result tuple is
constructed and added to the result set R. Obviously, the sketeched interpreter
is far from being efficient. A much better approach has been described by Wong
and Youssefi [808, 840].
Let us now discuss the compilation approach. The different steps are sum-
1.3. INTERPRETATION VERSUS COMPILATION 7

interprete(SQLBlock x) {

/* possible rewrites go here */

s := x.select();
f := x.from();
w := x.where();
R := ∅; /* result */
t := []; /* empty tuple */
eval(s, f , w, t, R);
return R;
}

eval(s, f , w, t, R) {

if(f .empty())
if(w(t))
R += s(t);
else
foreach(t0 ∈ first(f ))
eval(s, tail(f ), w, t ◦ t0 , R);
}

Figure 1.3: Simple query interpreter

Rewrite Rewrite / Transformation

query plan generation / code execution

calculus algebra
generation plan
translation

Figure 1.4: Query compiler

marized in Figure 1.4. First, the query is rewritten. Again, unnesting nested
queries is a main technique for performance gains. Other rewrites will be dis-
cussed in Part ??. After the rewrite, the plan generation takes place. Here,
an optimal plan is constructed. Whereas typically rewrite takes place on a
calculus-based representation of the query, plan generation constructs an alge-
braic expression containing well-known operators like selection and join. Some-
times, after plan generation, the generated plan is refined: some polishing takes
place. Then, code is generated, that can be interpreted by the runtime system.
More specifically, the query execution engine—a part of the runtime system—
interpretes the query execution plan. Let us illustrate this. The following query
8 CHAPTER 1. INTRODUCTION

query

parsing CTS
abstract syntax tree

nfst
internal representation

rewrite I query
internal representationoptimizer

plan generation
internal representation

rewrite II
internal representation

code generation
execution plan

Figure 1.5: Query compiler architecture

is Query 1 of the now obsolete TPC-D benchmark [761].

SELECT RETURNFLAG, LINESTATUS,

SUM(QUANTITY) as SUM QTY,
SUM(EXTENDEDPRICE) as SUM EXTPR,
SUM(EXTENDEDPRICE * (1 - DISCOUNT)),
SUM(EXTENDEDPRICE * (1 - DISCOUNT)*
(1 + TAX)),
AVG(QUANTITY),
AVG(EXTENDEDPRICE),
AVG(DISCOUNT),
COUNT(*)
FROM LINEITEM
WHERE SHIPDDATE <= DATE ’1998-12-01’
GROUP BY RETURNFLAG, LINESTATUS
ORDER BY RETURNFLAG, LINESTATUS
1.4. REQUIREMENTS FOR A QUERY COMPILER 9

The CTS translates this query into a query execution plan. Part of the plan
is shown in Fig. 1.6. One rarely sees a query execution plan. This is the reason
why I included one. But note that the form of query execution plans differs
from DBMS to DBMS since it is (unfortunately) not standardized the way SQL
is. Most DBMSs can give the user abstract representations of query plans. It
is worth the time to look at the plans generated by some commercial DBMSs.
I do not expect the reader to understand the plan in all details. Some of
these details will become clear later. Anyway, this plan is given to the RTS
which then interprets it. Part of the result of the interpretation might look like
this:
RETURNFLAG LINESTATUS SUM QTY SUM EXTPR ...
A F 3773034 5319329289.68 ...
N F 100245 141459686.10 ...
N O 7464940 10518546073.98 ...
R F 3779140 5328886172.99 ...
This should look familar to you.
The above query plan is very simple. It contains only a few algebraic op-
erators. Usually, more algebraic operators are present and the plan is given in
a more abstract form that cannot be directly executed by the runtime system.
Fig. 2.10 gives an example of an abstracted more complex operator tree. We
will work with representations closer to this one.
A typical query compiler architecture is shown in Figure 1.5. The first com-
ponent is the parser. It produces an abstract syntax tree. This is not always the
case but this intermediate representation very much simplifies the task of fol-
lowing component. The NFST component performs several tasks. The first step
is normalization. This mainly deals with introducing new variables for subex-
pressions. Factorization and semantic analysis are performed during NFST.
Last, the abstract syntax tree is translated into the internal representation. All
these steps can typically be performed during a single path through the query
representation. Semantic analysis requires looking up schema definitions. This
can be expensive and, hence, the number of lookups should be minimized. Af-
ter NFST the core optimization steps rewrite I and plan generation take place.
Rewrite II does some polishing before code generation. These modules directly
correspond to the phases in Figure 1.4. They are typically further devided into
submodules handling subphases. The most prominent example is the prepara-
tion phase that takes place just before the actual plan generation takes place.
In our figures, we think of preparation as being part of the plan generation.

1.4 Requirements for a Query Compiler

Here are the main requirements for a query compiler:
1. Correctness

2. Completeness

3. Generate optimal plan (viz avoid the worst case)

10 CHAPTER 1. INTRODUCTION

(group
(tbscan
{segment ’lineitem.C4Kseg’ 0 4096}
{nalslottedpage 4096}
{ctuple ’lineitem.cschema’}
[ 20
LOAD_PTR 1
LOAD_SC1_C 8 1 2 // L_RETURNFLAG
LOAD_SC1_C 9 1 3 // L_LINESTATUS
LOAD_DAT_C 10 1 4 // L_SHIPDATE
LEQ_DAT_ZC_C 4 ’1998-02-09’ 1
] 2 1 // number of help-registers and selection-register
) 10 22 // hash table size, number of registers
[ // init
MV_UI4_C_C 1 0 // COUNT(*) = 0
LOAD_SF8_C 4 1 6 // L_QUANTITY
LOAD_SF8_C 5 1 7 // L_EXTENDEDPRICE
LOAD_SF8_C 6 1 8 // L_DISCOUNT
LOAD_SF8_C 7 1 9 // L_TAX
MV_SF8_Z_C 6 10 // SUM/AVG(L_QUANTITY)
MV_SF8_Z_C 7 11 // SUM/AVG(L_EXTENDEDPRICE)
MV_SF8_Z_C 8 12 // AVG(L_DISCOUNT)
SUB_SF8_CZ_C 1.0 8 13 // 1 - L_DISCOUNT
ADD_SF8_CZ_C 1.0 9 14 // 1 + L_TAX
MUL_SF8_ZZ_C 7 13 15 // SUM(L_EXTDPRICE * (1 - L_DISC))
MUL_SF8_ZZ_C 15 14 16 // SUM((...) * (1 + L_TAX))
] [ // advance
INC_UI4 0 // inc COUNT(*)
MV_PTR_Y 1 1
LOAD_SF8_C 4 1 6 // L_QUANTITY
LOAD_SF8_C 5 1 7 // L_EXTENDEDPRICE
LOAD_SF8_C 6 1 8 // L_DISCOUNT
LOAD_SF8_C 7 1 9 // L_TAX
MV_SF8_Z_A 6 10 // SUM/AVG(L_QUANTITY)
MV_SF8_Z_A 7 11 // SUM/AVG(L_EXTENDEDPRICE)
MV_SF8_Z_A 8 12 // AVG(L_DISCOUNT)
SUB_SF8_CZ_C 1.0 8 13 // 1 - L_DISCOUNT
ADD_SF8_CZ_C 1.0 9 14 // 1 + L_TAX
MUL_SF8_ZZ_B 7 13 17 15 // SUM(L_EXTDPRICE * (1 - L_DISC))
MUL_SF8_ZZ_A 17 14 16 // SUM((...) * (1 + L_TAX))
] [ // finalize
UIFC_C 0 18
DIV_SF8_ZZ_C 10 18 19 // AVG(L_QUANTITY)
DIV_SF8_ZZ_C 11 18 20 // AVG(L_EXTENDEDPRICE)
DIV_SF8_ZZ_C 12 18 21 // AVG(L_DISCOUNT)
] [ // hash program
HASH_SC1 2 HASH_SC1 3
] [ // compare program
CMPA_SC1_ZY_C 2 2 0
EXIT_NEQ 0
CMPA_SC1_ZY_C 3 3 0
])
Figure 1.6: Execution plan

4. Efficiency, generate the plan fast, do not waste memory

5. Graceful degradation
1.5. SEARCH SPACE 11

6. Robustness

First of all, the query compiler must produce correct query evaluation plans.
That is, the result of the query evaluation plan must be the result of the query
as given by the specification of the query language. It must also cover the
complete query language. The next issue is that an optimal query plan must
(should) be generated. However, this is not always that easy. That is why some
database researchers say that one must avoid the worst plan. Talking about
the quality of a plan requires us to fix the optimization goal. Several goals are
reasonable: We can optimize throughput, minimize response time, minimize
resource consumption (both, memory and CPU), and so on. A good query
compiler supports two optimization goals: minimize resource consumption and
minimize the time to produce the first tuple. Obviously, both goals cannot be
achieved at the same time. Hence, the query compiler must be instructed about
the optimization goal.
Irrespective of the optimization goal, the query compiler should produce the
query evaluation plan fast. It does not make sense to take 10 seconds to optimize
a query whose execution time is below a second. This sounds reasonable but
is not trivial to achieve. As we will see, the number of query execution plans
that are equivalent to a given query, i.e. produce the same result as the query,
can be very large. Sometimes, very large even means that not all plans can
be considered. Taking the wrong approach to plan generation will result in no
plan at all. This is the contrary of graceful degradation. Expressed positively,
graceful degradation means that in case of limited resources, a plan is generated
that may not be the optimal plan, but also not that far away from the optimal
plan.
Last, typical software quality criteria should be met. We only mentioned
robustness in our list, but others like maintainability must be met also.

1.5 Search Space

For a given query, there typically exists a high number of plans that are equiva-
lent to the plan. Not all of these plans are accessible. Only those plans that can
be generated by known optimization techniques (mainly algebraic equivalences)
can potentially be generated. Since this number may still be too large, many
query compilers restrict their search space further. We call the search space
explored by a query optimizer the actual search space. The potential search
space is the set of all plans that are known to be equivalent to the given query
by applying the state of the art of query optimization techniques. The whole
set of plans equivalent to a given query is typically unknown: we are not sure
whether all optimization techniques have been discovered so far. Figure 1.7
illustrates the situation. Note that we run into problems if the actual search
space is not a subset of the equivalent plans. Then the query compiler produces
wrong results. As we will see in several chapters of this book, some optimization
techniques have been proposed that produce plans that are not equivalent to
the original query.
12 CHAPTER 1. INTRODUCTION

equivalent
plans

actual
search space

potential
search space

Figure 1.7: Potential and actual search space

1.6 Generation versus Transformation

Two different approaches to plan generation can be distinguished:

• The transformation-based approach transforms one query execution plan

into another equivalent one. This can, for example, happen by applying
an algebraic equivalence to a query execution plan in order to yield a
better plan.

• The generic or synthetic approach produces a query execution plan by

assembling building blocks and adding one algebraic operator after the
other, until a complete query execution plan has been produced. Note
that in this approach only when all building blocks and algebraic opertors
have been introduced the internal representation can be executed. Before
that, no (complete) plan exists.

For an illustration see Figure 1.8.

A very important issue is how to explore the search space. Several well-
known approaches exist: A∗ , Branch-and-bound, greedy algorithms, hill-climbing,
dynamic programming, memoization, [179, 452, 453, 580]. These form the basis
for most of the plan generation algorithms.

1.7 Focus
In this book, we consider only the compilation of queries. We leave out many
special aspects like query optimization for multi-media database systems or
1.8. ORGANIZATION OF THE BOOK 13

a) Generative Approach b) Transformational Approach

Figure 1.8: Generation vs. transformation

multidatabase systems. These are just two omissions. We further do not con-
sider the translation of update statements which — especially in the presence
of triggers — can become quite complex. Furthermore, we assume the reader to
be familiar with the fundamentals of database systems [225, 413, 550, 604, 707]
and their implementation [347, 270]. Especially, knowledge on query execution
engines is required [294].
Last, the book presents a very personal view on query optimization. To
see other views on the same topic, I strongly recommend to read the literature
cited in this book and the references found therein. A good start are overview
articles, PhD theses, and books, e.g. [782, 275, 381, 382, 398, 465] [522, 526,
562, 719, 739, 766, 767].

1.8 Organization of the Book

The first part of the book is an introduction to the topic. It should give an
idea about the breadth and depth of query optimization. We first recapitulate
query optimization the way it is described in numerous text books on database
systems. There should be nothing really new here except for some pitfalls we
will point out. The Chapter 3 is devoted to the join ordering problem. This
has several reasons. First of all, at least one of the algorithms presented in
this chapter forms the core of every plan generator. The second reason is that
14 CHAPTER 1. INTRODUCTION

this problem allows to discuss some issues like search space sizes and problem
complexities. The third reason is that we do not have to delve into details.
We can stick to very simple (you might call them unrealistic) cost functions,
do not have to concern ourselves with details of the runtime system and the
like. Expressed positively, we can concentrate on some algorithmic aspects
of the problem. In Chapter 4 we do the opposite. The reader will not find
any advanced algorithms in this chapter but plenty of details on disks and cost
functions. The goal of the rest of the book is then to bring these issues together,
broaden the scope of the chapters, and treat problems not even touched by
them. The main issue not touched is query rewrite.
Chapter 2

Textbook Query Optimization

Almost every introductory textbook on database systems contains a section on

query optimization (or at least query processing) [225, 413, 550, 604, 707]. Also,
the two existing books on implementing database systems contain a section on
query optimization [347, 270]. In this chapter we give an excerpt1 of these
sections and subsequently discuss the problems with the described approach.
The bottom line will be that these descriptions of query optimization capture
the essence of it but contain pitfalls that need to be pointed out and gaps to
be filled.

2.1 Example Query and Outline

We use the following relations for our example query:

Student(SNo, SName, SAge, SYear)

Attend(ASNo, ALNo, AGrade)
Lecture(LNo, LTitle, LPNo)
Professor(PNo, PName)

Those attributes belonging to the key of the relations have been underlined.
With the following query we ask for all students attending a lecture by a
Professor called “Larson”.

select distinct s.SName

from Student s, Attend a, Lecture l, Professor p
where s.SNo = a.ASNo and a.ALNo = l.LNo
and l.LPNo = p.PNo and p.PName = ‘Larson’

The outline of the rest of the chapter is as follows. A query is typically

translated into an algebraic expression. Hence, we first review the relational
algebra and then discuss the translation process. Thereafter, we present the two
phases of textbook query optimization: logical and physical query optimization.
A brief discussion follows.
1
We do not claim to be fair to the above mentioned sections.

15
16 CHAPTER 2. TEXTBOOK QUERY OPTIMIZATION

2.2 Algebra
Let us briefly recall the standard definition of the most important algebra-
ic operators. Their inputs are relations, that is sets of tuples. Sets do not
contain duplicates. The attributes of the tuples are assumed to be simple (non-
decomposable) values. The most common algebraic operators are defined in
Fig. 2.1. Although the common set operations union (∪), intersection (∩), and
setdifference (\) belong to the relational algebra, we did not list them. Re-
member that ∪ and ∩ are both commutative and associative. \ is neither of
them. Further, for ∪ and ∩, two distributivity laws hold. However, since these
operations are not used in this section, we refer to Figure 7.1 in Section 7.1.1.
Before we can understand Figure 2.1, we must clarify some terms and no-
tations. For us, a tuple is a mapping from a set of attribute names (or at-
tributes for short) to their corresponding values. These values are taken from
certain domains. An actual tuple is denoted embraced by brackets. They
include a comma-separated list of the form attribute name, column and at-
tribute value as in [name: ‘‘Anton’’, age: 2]. If we have two tuples
with different attribute names, they can be concatenated, i.e. we can take the
union of their attributes. Tuple concatentation is denoted by ‘◦’. For exam-
ple [name: ‘‘Anton’’, age: 2] ◦ [toy: ‘‘digger’’] results in [name:
‘‘Anton’’, age: 2, toy: ‘‘digger’’]. Let A and A0 be two sets of at-
tributes where A0 ⊆ A holds. Further let t a tuple with schema A. Then, we can
project t on the attributes in A (written as t.A). The resulting tuple contains on-
ly the attributes in A0 ; others are discarded. For example, if t is the tuple [name:
‘‘Anton’’, age: 2, toy: ‘‘digger’’] and A = {name, age}, then t.A is
the tuple [name: ‘‘Anton’’, age: 2].
A relation is a set of tuples with the same attributes. The schema of a
relation is the set of attributes. For a relation R this is sometimes denoted by
sch(R), the schema of R. We denote it by A(R) and extend it to any algebraic
expression producing a set of tuples. That is, A(e) for any algebraic expression
is the set of attributes the resulting relation defines. Consider the predicate
age = 2 where age is an attribute name. Then, age behaves like a free variable
that must be bound to some value before the predicate can be evaluated. This
motivates us to often use the terms attribute and variable synonymously. In the
above predicate, we would call age a free variable. The set of free variables of
an expression e is denoted by F(e).
Sometimes it is useful to work with sequences of attributes in compari-
son predicates. Let A = ha1 , . . . , ak i and B = hb1 , . . . , bk i be two attribute
sequences. Then for any comparison operator θ ∈ {=, ≤, <, ≥, >, 6=}, the ex-
pression AθB abbreviates a1 θb1 ∧ a2 θb2 ∧ . . . ∧ ak θbk .
Often, a natural join is defined. Consider two relations R1 and R2 . Define
Ai := A(Ri ) for i ∈ {1, 2}, and A := A1 ∩ A2 . Assume that A is non-empty
and A = ha1 , . . . , an i. If A is non-empty, the natural join is defined as
R1 1 R2 := ΠA1 ∪A2 (R1 1p ρA:A0 (R2 ))
where ρA:A0 renames the attributes ai in A to a0i in A0 and the predicate p has
the form A = A0 , i.e. a1 = a01 ∧ . . . ∧ an = a0n .
2.3. CANONICAL TRANSLATION 17

σp (R) := {r|r ∈ R, p(r)}

ΠA (R) := {r.A|r ∈ R}
R1 × R2 := {r1 ◦ r2 |r1 ∈ R1 , r2 ∈ R2 }
R1 1p R2 := σp (R1 × R2 )

Figure 2.1: Relational algebra

For our algebraic operators, several equivalences hold. They are given in
Figure 2.2. For them to hold, we typically require that the relations involved
have disjoint attribute sets. That is, we assume—even for the rest of the book—
that attribute names are unique. This is often achieved by using the notation
R.a for a relation R or v.a for a variable ranging over tuples with an attribute
a. Another possibility is to use the renaming operator ρ.
Some equivalences are not always valid. Their validity depends on whether
some condition(s) are satisfied or not. For example, Eqv. 2.4 requires F(p) ⊆ A.
That is, all attribute names occurring in p must be contained in the attribute set
A the projection retains: otherwise, we could not evaluate p after the projection
has been applied. Although all conditions in Fig. 2.2 are of this flavor, we will
see throughout the course of the book that more complex conditions exist.

2.3 Canonical Translation

The next question is how to translate a given SQL query into the algebra.
Since the relational algebra works on sets and not bags (multisets), we can only
translate SQL queries that contain a distinct. Further, we restrict ourselves EX
to flat queries not containing any subquery. Since negation, disjunction, aggre-
gation, and quantifiers pose further problems, we neglect them. Further, we
do not allow group by, order by, union, intersection, and except in our
query. Last, we allow only attributes in the select clause and not more complex
expressions.
Thus, the generic SQL query pattern we can translate into the algebra looks
as follows:

select distinct a1 , a2 , . . . , am
from R1 c1 , R2 c2 , . . . , Rn cn
where p

Here, the Ri are relation names and the ci are correlation names. The ai in
the select clause are attribute names (or expressions of the form ci .ai ) taken
from the relations in the from clause. The predicate p is assumed to be a
conjunction of comparisions between attributes or attributes and constants.
The translation process then follows the procedure described in Figure 2.3.
First, we construct an expression that produces the cross product of the entries
18 CHAPTER 2. TEXTBOOK QUERY OPTIMIZATION

σp1 ∧...∧pk (R) ≡ σp1 (. . . (σpk (R)) . . .) (2.1)

σp1 (σp2 (R)) ≡ σp2 (σp1 (R)) (2.2)
ΠA1 (ΠA2 (. . . (ΠAk (R)) . . .)) ≡ ΠA1 (R)
if Ai ⊆ Aj for i < j (2.3)
ΠA (σp (R)) ≡ σp (ΠA (R))
if F(p) ⊆ A (2.4)
(R1 × R2 ) × R3 ≡ R1 × (R2 × R3 ) (2.5)
(R1 1p1,2 R2 ) 1p2,3 R3 ≡ R1 1p1,2 (R2 1p2,3 R3 )
if F(p1,2 ) ⊆ A(R1 ) ∪ A(R2 )
and F(p2,3 ) ⊆ A(R2 ) ∪ A(R3 ) (2.6)
R1 × R2 ≡ R1 × R2 (2.7)
R1 1p R2 ≡ R2 1p R1 (2.8)
σp (R1 × R2 ) ≡ σp (R1 ) × R2
if F(p) ⊆ A(R1 ) (2.9)
σp (R1 1q R2 ) ≡ σp (R1 ) 1q R2
if F(p) ⊆ A(R1 ) (2.10)
ΠA (R1 × R2 ) ≡ ΠA1 (R1 ) × ΠA2 (R2 )
if A = A1 ∪ A2 , Ai ⊆ A(Ri ) (2.11)
ΠA (R1 1p R2 ) ≡ ΠA1 (R1 ) 1p ΠA2 (R2 )
if F(p) ⊆ A, A = A1 ∪ A2 ,
and Ai ⊆ A(Ri ) (2.12)
σp (R1 θR2 ) ≡ σp (R1 )θσp (R2 )
where θ is any of ∪, ∩, \ (2.13)
ΠA (R1 ∪ R2 ) ≡ ΠA (R1 ) ∪ ΠA (R2 ) (2.14)
σp (R1 × R2 ) ≡ R1 1p R2 (2.15)

Figure 2.2: Equivalences for the relational algebra

found in the from clause. The result is

((. . . ((R1 × R2 ) × R3 ) . . .) × Rn ).

Next, we add a selection with the where predicate:

σp ((. . . ((R1 × R2 ) × R3 ) . . .) × Rn ).

Last, we project on the attributes found in the select clause.

Πa1 ,...,an (σp ((. . . ((R1 × R2 ) × R3 ) . . .) × Rn )).

For our example query

2.3. CANONICAL TRANSLATION 19

1. Let R1 . . . Rk be the entries in the from clause of the query. Construct

the expression

R1 if k = 1
F :=
((. . . (R1 × R2 ) × . . .) × Rk ) else

2. The where clause is optional in SQL. Therefore, we distinguish the

cases that there is no where clause and that the where clause exists
and contains a predicate p. Construct the expression

F if there is no where clause
W :=
σp (F ) if the where clause contains p

3. Let s be the content of the select distinct clause. For the canonical
translation it must be of either ’*’ or a list a1 , . . . , an of attribute names.
Construct the expression

W if s = ’*’
S :=
Πa1 ,...,an (W ) if s = a1 , . . . , an

4. Return S.

Figure 2.3: (Simplified) Canonical translation of SQL to algebra

select distinct s.SName

from Student s, Attend a, Lecture l, Professor p
where s.SNo = a.ASNo and a.ALNo = l.LNo
and l.LPNo = p.PNo and p.PName = ‘Larson’

the result of the translation is

Πs.SN ame (σp (((Student[s] × Attend[a]) × Lecture[l]) × Prof essor[p]))

where p equals

s.SNo = a.ASNo and a.ALNo = l.LNo and l.LPNo = p.PNo and p.PName =
‘Larson’.

Note that we used the notation R[r] to say that a relation named R has the
correlation name r. During the course of the book we will be more precise
about the semantics of this notation and it will deviate from the one suggested
here. We will take r as a variable successively bound to the elements (tuples)
in R. However, for the purpose of this chapter it is sufficient to think of it
as associating a correlation name with a relation. The query is represented
graphically in Figure 2.7 (top).
20 CHAPTER 2. TEXTBOOK QUERY OPTIMIZATION

1. translate query into its canonical algebraic expression

2. perform logical query optimization
3. perform physical query optimization

Figure 2.4: Text book query optimization

2.4 Logical Query Optimization

Textbook query optimization takes place in two separate phases. The first phase
is called logical query optimization and the second physical query optimization.
Figure 2.4 lists all these steps together with the translation step. In this section
we discuss logical query optimization. The foundation for this step is formed
by the set of algebraic equivalences (see Figure 2.2). The set of algebraic equiv-
alences spans the potential search space for this step. Given an initial algebraic
expression—resulting from the translation of the given query—the algebraic
equivalences can be used to derive all algebraic expressions that are equivalent
to the initial algebraic expression. This set of all equivalent algebraic expres-
sions can be derived by applying the equivalences first to the initial expression
and then to all derived expressions until no new expression is derivable. There-
by, the algebraic equivalences can be applied in both directions: from left to
right and from right to left. Care has to be taken that the conditions attached
to the equivalences are obeyed.
Of course, whenever we find a new algebraic equivalence that could not
be derived from those already known, adding this equivalence increases our
potential search space. On the one hand, this has the advantage that in a larg-
er search space we may find better plans. On the other hand, it increases the
already large search space which might cause problems for its exploration. Nev-
ertheless, finding new equivalences is a well-established sport among database
researchers.
One remark on better plans. Plans can only be compared if costs can be at-
tached to them via some cost function. This is what happens in most industrial
strength query optimizers. However, at the level of logical algebraic expres-
sions adding precise costs is not possible: too many implementation details are
missing. These are added to the plan during the next phase called physical
query optimization. As a consequence, we are left with plans without costs.
The only thing we can do is to heuristically judge the effectiveness of applying
an equivalence from left to right or in the opposite direction. As always with
heuristics, the hope is that they work for most queries. However, it is typically
very easy to find counter examples where the heuristics do not result in the
best plan possible. (Again, best with respect to some metrics.) This finding can
be generalized: any query optimization that takes place in more than a single
phase risks missing the best plan. This is an important observation and we will
come back to this issue more than once.
2.4. LOGICAL QUERY OPTIMIZATION 21

1. break up conjunctive selection predicates

(Eqv. 2.1: →)

2. push down selections

(Eqv. 2.2: →), (Eqv. 2.9: →)

3. introduce joins
(Eqv. 2.15: →)

4. determine join order

Eqv. 2.8, Eqv. 2.6, Eqv. 2.5, Eqv. 2.7

5. introduce and push down projections

(Eqv. 2.3: ←), (Eqv. 2.4: →),
(Eqv. 2.11: →), (Eqv. 2.12: →)

Figure 2.5: Logical query optimization

After these words of warning let us continue to discuss textbook query

optimization. Logical query optimization requires the organization of all equiv-
alences into groups. Further, the equivalences are directed. That is, it is fixed
whether they are applied in a left to right or right to left manner. A directed
equivalence is called rewrite rule. The groups of rewrite rules are then suc-
cessively applied to the initial algebraic expression. Figure 2.5 describes the
different steps performed during logical query optimization. Associated with
each step is a set of rewrite rules that are applied to the input expression to
yield a result expression. The numbers correspond to the equivalences in Fig-
ure 2.2. A small arrow indicates the direction in which the equivalences are
applied.
The first step breaks up conjunctive selection predicates. The motivation
behind this step is that selections with simple predicates can be moved around
easier. The rewrite rule used in this step is Equivalence 2.1 applied from left to
right. For our example query Step 1 results in

Πs.SN ame (
σs.SN o=a.ASN o (
σa.ALN o=l.LN o (
σl.LP N o=p.P N o (
σp.P N ame=‘Larson0 (
((Student[s] × Attend[a]) × Lecture[l]) × Prof essor[p])))))

The query is represented graphically in Figure 2.7 (middle).

Step 2 pushes selections down the operator tree. The motivation here is to
reduce the number of tuples as early as possible such that subsequent (expen-
sive) operators have smaller input. Applying this step to our example query
yields:
22 CHAPTER 2. TEXTBOOK QUERY OPTIMIZATION

Πs.SN ame (
σl.LP N o=p.P N o (
σa.ALN o=l.LN o (
σs.SN o=a.ASN o (Student[s] × Attend[a])
×Lecture[l])
×(σp.P N ame=‘Larson0 (Prof essor[p]))))

The query is represented graphically in Figure 2.7 (bottom).

Excursion In general, we might encounter problems when pushing down se-

lections. It may be the case that the order of the cross products is not well-suited
for pushing selections down. If this is the case, we must consider reordering cross
products during this step (Eqv. 2.7 and 2.5). To illustrate this point consider
the following example query.

select distinct s.SName

from Student s, Lecture l, Attend a
where s.SNo = a.ASNo and a.ALNo = l.LNo
and l.LTitle = ‘Databases I’

After translation and Steps 1 and 2 the algebraic expression looks like

Πs.SN ame (
σs.SN o=a.ASN o (
σa.ALN o=l.LN o (
(Student[s] × σl.LT itle=‘Databases I 0 (Lecture[l])) × Attend[a]))).

Neither of σs.SN o=a.ASN o and σa.ALN o=l.LN o can be pushed down further. Only
after reordering the cross products such as in

Πs.SN ame (
σs.SN o=a.ASN o (
σa.ALN o=l.LN o (
(Student[s] × Attend[a]) × σl.LT itle=‘Databases I 0 (Lecture[l]))))

can σs.SN o=a.ASN o be pushed down:

Πs.SN ame (
σa.ALN o=l.LN o (
σs.SN o=a.ASN o (Student[s] × Attend[a])
×σl.LT itle=‘Databases I 0 (Lecture[l])))

This is the reason why in some textbooks reorder cross products before selec-
tions are pushed down [225]. In this appoach, reordering of cross products takes
into account the selection predicates that can possibly be pushed down to the
leaves and down to just prior a cross product. In any case, the Steps 2 and 4
are highly interdependent and there is no simple solution. 2
After this small excursion let us resume rewriting our main example query.
The next step to be applied is converting cross products to join operations (Step
3). The motivation behind this step is that the evaluation of cross products
2.4. LOGICAL QUERY OPTIMIZATION 23

is very expensive and results in huge intermediate results. For every tuple in
the left input an output tuple must be produced for every tuple in the right
input. A join operation can be implemented much more efficiently. Applying
Equivalence 2.15 from left to right to our example query results in

Πs.SN ame (
((Student[s] 1s.SN o=a.ASN o Attend[a])
1a.ALN o=l.LN o Lecture[l])
1l.LP N o=p.P N o (σp.P N ame=‘Larson0 (Prof essor[p])))

The query is represented graphically in Figure 2.8 (top).

The next step is really tricky and involved: we have to find an optimal
order for evaluating the joins. The join’s associativity and commutativity
gives us plenty of alternative (equivalent) evaluation plans. For our rather
simple query Figure 2.6 lists some of the possible join orders where we left
out the join predicates and used the single letter correlation names to denote
the relations to be joined. Only p abbreviates the more complex expression
σp.P N ame=‘Larson0 (Prof essor[p]). The edges show how plans can be derived
from other plans by applying commutativity (c) or associativity (a).
Unfortunately, we cannot ignore the problem of finding a good join order.
It has been shown that the order in which joins are evaluated has an enormous
influence on the total evaluation cost of a query. Thus, it is an important
problem. On the other hand, the problem is really tough. Most join ordering
problems turn out to be NP-hard. As a consequence, many different heuristics
and cost-based algorithms have been invented. They are discussed in depth in
Chapter 3. There we will also find examples showing how important (in terms
of costs) the right choice of the join order is.
To continue with our example query, we use a very simple heuristics: among
all possible joins select the one first that produces the smallest intermediate
result. This can be motivated as follows. In our current algebraic expression,
the first join to be executed is

Student[s] 1s.SN o=a.ASN o Attend[a].

All students and their attendances to some lecture are considered. The result
and hence the input to the next join will be very big. On the other hand, if there
is only one professor named Larson, the output of σp.P N ame=‘Larson0 (Prof essor[p])
is a single tuple. Joining this single tuple with the relation Lecture results in
an output containing one tuple for every lecture taught by Larson. For a large
university, this will be a small subset of all lectures. Continuing this line, we
get the following algebraic expression:

Πs.SN ame (
((σp.P N ame=‘Larson0 (Prof essor[p])
1p.P N o=l.LP N o Lecture[l])
1l.LN o=a.ALN o Attend[a])
1a.ASno=s.SN o Student[s])

The query is represented graphically in Figure 2.8 (middle).

 24 CHAPTER 2. TEXTBOOK QUERY OPTIMIZATION

The last step minimizes intermediate results by projecting out irrelevant

attributes. An attribute is irrelevant, if it is not used further up the operator
EX tree. When pushing down projections, we only apply them just before a pipeline
breaker [294]. The reason is that for pipelined operators like selection, elimi-
nating superfluous attributes does not gain much. The only pipeline breaker
occurring in our plan is the join operator. Hence, before a join is applied, we
project on the attributes that are further needed. The result is

Πs.SN ame (
Πa.ASN o (
Πl.LN O (
Πp.P N o (σp.P N ame=‘Larson0 (Prof essor[p]))
1p.P N o=l.LP N o
Πl.LP no,l.LN o (Lecture[l]))
1l.LN o=a.ALN o
Πa.ALN o,a.ASN o (Attend[a]))
1a.ASno=s.SN o
Πs.SN o,s.SN ame (Student[s]))

This expression is represented graphically in Figure 2.8 (bottom).

2.5 Physical Query Optimization

Physical query optimization adds more information to the logical query eval-
uation plan. First, there exist many different ways to access the data stored
in a database. One possibility is to scan a relation to find the relevant tuples.
Another alternative is to use an index to access only the relevant parts. If an
unclustered index is used, it might be beneficial to sort the tuple identifiers
(TIDs2 ) to turn otherwise random disk accesses into sequential accesses. Since
there is a multitutude of possibilities to access data, this topic is discussed in
depth in Chapter 4. Second, the algebraic operators used in the logical plan
may have different alternative implementations. The most prominent exam-
ple is the join operator that has many different implementations: simple nested
loop join, blockwise nested loop join, blockwise nested loop join with in-memory
hash table, index nested loop join, hybrid hash join, sort merge join, bandwidth
join, special spatial joins, set joins, and structural joins. Most of these join im-
plementations can be applied only in certain situations. Most algorithms only
implement equi-joins where the join predicate is a conjunction of simple equal-
ities. Further, all the implementations differ in cost and robustness. But also
other operators like grouping may have alternative implementations. Typically,
for these operators exist sort-based and hash-based alternatives. Third, some
operators require certain properties for their input streams. For example, a sort
merge join requires its input to be sorted on the join attributes occurring in
the equalities of the join predicate. These attributes are called join attributes.
The sortedness property can be enforced by a sort operator. The sort operator
2
Sometimes TIDs are called RIDs (Row Identifiers).
2.6. DISCUSSION 25

is thus an enforcer since it makes sure that the required property holds. As we
will see, properties and enforcers play a crucial role during plan generation.
If common subexpressions are detected at the algebraic level, it might be
beneficial to compute them only once and store the result. To do so, a tmp
operator must be introduced. Later on, we will see more of these operators
that materialize (partial) intermediate results in order to avoid the same com-
putation to be performed more than once. An alternative is to allow QEPs
which are DAGs and not merely trees (see Section ??).
Physical query optimization is concerned with all the issues mentioned
above. The outline of it is given in Figure 2.9. Let us demonstrate this for
our small example query. Let us assume that there exists an index on the name
of the professors. Then, instead of scanning the whole professor relation, it
is beneficial to use the index to retrieve only those professors named Larson.
Further, since a sort merge join is very robust and not the slowest alternative,
we choose it as an implementation for all our join operations. This requires that
we sort the inputs to the join operator on the join attributes. Since sorting is
a pipeline breaker, we introduce it between the projections and the joins. The
resulting plan is

Πs.SN ame (
Sorta.ASN o (Πa.ASN o (
Sortl.LN o (Πl.LN O (
Sortp.P N o (Πp.P N o (IdxScanp.P N ame=‘Larson0 (Prof essor[p])))
1smj
p.P N o=l.LP N o
Sortl.LP N o (Πl.LP no,l.LN o (Lecture[l])))
1smj
l.LN o=a.ALN o
Sorta.ALN o (Πa.ALN o,a.ASN o (Attend[a]))))
1smj
a.ASno=s.SN o
Sorts.SN o (Πs.SN o,s.SN ame (Student[s])))

where we annotated the joins with smj to indicate that they are sort merge
joins. The sort operator has the attributes on which to sort as a subscript. We
cheated a little bit with the notation of the index scan. The index is a physical
entity stored in the database. An index scan typically allows to retrieve the
TIDs of the tuples qualifying the predicate. If this is the case, another access
to the relation itself is necessary to fetch the relevant attributes (p.PNo in
our case) from the qualifying tuples of the relation. This issue is rectified in
Chapter 4. The plan is shown as an operator graph in Figure 2.10.

2.6 Discussion
This chapter left open many interesting issues. We took it for granted that the
presentation of a query is an algebraic expression or operator tree. Is this really
true? We have been very vague about ordering joins and cross products. We
only considered queries of the form select distinct. How can we assure correct
duplicate treatment for select all? We separated query optimization into two
distinct phases: logical and physical query optimization. Any separation into
26 CHAPTER 2. TEXTBOOK QUERY OPTIMIZATION

different phases results in the danger of not producing an optimal plan. Logical
query optimization turned out to be a little difficult: pushing selections down
and reordering joins are mutually interdependent. How can we integrate these
steps into a single one and thereby avoid the problem mentioned? Further, our
logical query optimization was not cost based and cannot be: too much infor-
mation is still missing from the plan to associate precise costs with a logical
algebraic expression. How can we integrate the phases? How can we determine
the costs of a plan? We covered only a small fraction of SQL. We did not discuss
disjunction, negation, union, intersection, except, aggregate functions, group-
by, order-by, quantifiers, outer joins, and nested queries. Furthermore, how
about other query languages like OQL, XPath, XQuery? Further, enhance-
ments like materialized views exist nowadays in many commercial systems.
How can we exploit them beneficially? Can we exploit semantic information?
Is our exploitation of index structures complete? What happens if we encounter
NULL-values? Many questions and open issues remain. The rest of the book
is about filling these gaps.
2.6. DISCUSSION 27

p c p c p a
l l l
p l s a
s a c s a c s a
c
c
p p p
c c a
l l l p l a s
a s a a s a s
a c

p p p
c c
s s s
l p a s
a l a a l a a l c

c s s s
c c c
p p p
l p s a
a l c a l c a l

s c s c s
p p p
c a s p l
l a a l a l a c

p c p c p
s s s a s l p
l a a l a l a c

s c s c s a
a a a s a l p
l p c l p cl p
c

s c s c s a
a a a s a p l
p l p l p l

Figure 2.6: Different join trees

28 CHAPTER 2. TEXTBOOK QUERY OPTIMIZATION

Πs.SN ame

σs.SN o = a.ASN o ∧ a.ALN o = l.LN o ∧

l.LP N o = p.P N o ∧ p.P N ame = ′ Larson′

Student[s] Attend[a] Lecture[l] Professor[p]

Πs.SN ame

σs.SN o = a.ASN o

σa.ALN o = l.LN o

σl.LP N o = p.P N o

σp.P N ame = ′ Larson′

Student[s] Attend[a] Lecture[l] Professor[p]

Πs.SN ame

σl.P N o = p.P N o

σa.ALN o = l.LN o σp.P N ame = ′ Larson′

Professor[p]

σs.SN o = a.ASN o Lecture[l]

Student[s] Attend[a]

Figure 2.7: Plans for example query (Part I)

2.6. DISCUSSION 29

Πs.SN ame

l.P N o = p.P N o

a.ALN o = l.LN o σp.P N ame = ′ Larson′

s.SN o =a.ASN o Lecture[l] Professor[p]

Student[s] Attend[a]

Πs.SN ame

a.ASN o = s.SN o

l.LN o = a.ALN o Student[s]

p.P N o = l.LP N o Attend[a]

σp.P N ame = ′ Larson′ Lecture[l]

Professor[p]

Πs.SN ame

a.ASN o = s.SN o

Πa.ASN o Πs.SN o,s.SN ame

l.LN o Student[s]

Πl.LN o Πa.ALN o,a.ASN o

p.P N o = l.LP N o Attend[a]

Πp.P N o Πl.LP N o,l.LN o

σp.P N ame = ′ Larson′ Lecture[l]

Professor[p]

Figure 2.8: Plans for example query (Part II)

30 CHAPTER 2. TEXTBOOK QUERY OPTIMIZATION

1. introduce index accesses

2. choose implementations for algebraic operators
3. introduce physical operators (sort, tmp)

Figure 2.9: Physical query optimization

Πs.SN ame
smj
a.ASno = s.SN o

Sorta.ASN o Sorts.SN o

Πa.ASN o Πs.SN o,s.SN ame

smj
l.LN o=a.ALN o Student[s]

Sortl.LN o Sorta.ALN o

Πl.LN o Πa.ALN o,a.ASN o

smj
p.P N o=l.LP N o Attend[a]

Sortp.P N o Sortl.LP N o

Πp.P N o Πl.LP N o,l.LN o

IdxScanp.P N ame=′Larson′ Lecture[l]

Professor[p]

Figure 2.10: Plan for example query after physical query optimization
Chapter 3

Join Ordering

The problem of join ordering is a very restricted and — at the same time —
a very complex one. We have touched this issue while discussing logical query
optimization in Chapter 2. Join ordering is performed in Step 4 of Figure 2.5.
In this chapter, we simplify the problem of join ordering by not considering du-
plicates, disjunctions, quantifiers, grouping, aggregation, or nested queries. Ex-
pressed positively, we concentrate on conjunctive queries with simple and cheap
join predicates. What this exactly means will become clear in the next section.
Subsequent sections discuss different algorithms for solving the join ordering
problem. Finally, we take a look at the structure of the search space. This is
important if different join ordering algorithms are compared via benchmarks.
If the wrong parameters are chosen, benchmark results can be misleading.
The algorithms of this chapter form the core of every plan generator.

3.1 Queries Considered

A conjunctive query is one whose where clause contains a (complex) predicate
which in turn is a conjunction of (simple) predicates. Hence, a conjunctive
query involves only and and no or or not operations. A simple predicate is of
the form e1 θe2 where θ ∈ {=, 6=, <, >, ≤, ≥} is a comparison operator and the ei
are simple expressions in attribute names possibly containing some simple and
cheap arithmetic operators. By cheap we mean that it is not worth applying
extra optimization techniques. In this chapter, we restrict simple predicates
even further to the form A = B for attributes A and B. A and B must also
belong to different relations such that every simple predicate in this chapter
is a join predicate. There are two reasons for this restriction. First, the most
efficient join algorithms rely on the fact that the join predicate is of the form
A = B. Such joins are called equi-joins. Any other join is called a non-equi-
join. Second, in relational systems joins on foreign key attributes of one relation
and key attributes of the other relation are very common. Other joins are rare.
A base relation is a relation that is stored (explicitly) in the database. For
the rest of the chapter, let Ri (1 ≤ i ≤ n) be n relations. These relations
can be base relations but do not necessarily have to be. They could also be
base relations to which predicates have already been supplied, e.g. as a result

31
 32 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

s.SNo = a.ASNo
Student Attend

a.ALNo = l.LNo

Professor Lecture
l.LPNo = p.PNo

p.PName = ’Larson’

Figure 3.1: Query graph for example query of Section 2.1

of applying the first three steps of logical query optimization.

Summarizing, the queries we consider can be expressed in SQL as

select distinct *
from R1 ,. . . ,Rn
where p

where p is a conjunction of simple join predicates with attributes from exactly

two relations. The latter restriction is not really necessary for the algorithms
presented in this chapter but simplifies the exposition.

3.1.1 Query Graph

A query graph is a convenient representation of a query. It is an undirected
graph with nodes R1 , . . . , Rn . For every simple predicate in the conjunction P
whose attributes belong to the relations Ri and Rj , we add an edge between
Ri and Rj . This edge is labeled by the simple predicate. From now on, we
denote the join predicate connecting Ri and Rj by pi,j . In general, pi,j can be
a conjunction of simple join predicates connecting Ri and Rj .
If query graphs are used for more than join ordering, selections need to be
represented. This is done by self-edges from the relation to which the selection
applies to itself. For the example query of Chapter 2.6, Figure 3.1 contains the
according query graph.
Query graphs can have many different shapes. The shapes that play a
certain role in query optimization and the evaluation of join ordering algorithms
are shown in Fig. 3.2. The query graph classes relevant for this chapter are chain
queries, star queries, tree queries, cyclic queries and clique queries. Note that
these classes are not disjoint and that some classes are subsets of other classes.
EX
In this chaper, we only treat connected query graphs. These can be evalu-
ated without cross products.

Excursion In general, the query graph is a hypergraph [768] as the following

example shows.
3.1. QUERIES CONSIDERED 33

chain queries star queries tree query

cyclic query cycle queries grid query clique queries

Figure 3.2: Query graph shapes

select *
from R1, R2, R3, R4
where f(R1.a, R2.a,R3.a) = g(R2.b,R3.b,R4.b)

3.1.2 Join Tree

A join tree is an algebraic expression in relation names and join operators.
Sometimes, cross products are allowed, too. A cross product is the same as a
join operator with true as its join predicate. A join tree has its name from its
graph representation. There, a join tree is a binary tree whose leaf nodes are
the relations and whose inner nodes are joins (and possibly cross products).
The edges represent the input/output relationship. Examples of join trees have
been shown in Figure 2.6.
Join trees fall into different classes. The most important classes are left-deep
trees, right-deep trees, zig-zag trees, and bushy trees. Left-deep trees are join
trees where every join has one of the relations Ri as its right input. Right-deep
trees are defined analogously. In zig-zag trees at least one input of every join
is a relation Ri . The class of zig-zag trees contains both left-deep and right-
deep trees. For bushy trees no restriction applies. Hence, the class of bushy
trees contains all of the above three classes. The roots of these notions date
back to the paper by Selinger et al. [672], where the search space of the query
optimizer was restricted to left-deep trees. There are two main reasons for this
restriction. First, only one intermediate result is generated at any time during
query evaluation. Second, the number of left-deep trees is far less than the
number of e.g. bushy trees. The other classes were then added later by other
researchers whenever they found better join trees in them. The different classes
are illustrated in Figure 2.6. From left to right, the columns contain left-deep,
zig-zag, right-deep, and bushy trees.
34 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

Left-deep trees directly correspond to an ordering (i.e. a permutation) of

the relations. For example, the left-deep tree

((((R2 1 R3 ) 1 R1 ) 1 R4 ) 1 R5 )

directly corresponds to the permutation R2 , R3 , R1 , R4 , R5 . It should be clear

that there is a one-to-one correspondence between permutations and left-deep
join trees. We will also use the term sequence of relations synonymously. The
notion of join ordering goes back to the times where only left-deep trees were
considered and, hence, producing an optimal join tree was equivalent to opti-
mally ordering the joins, i.e. determining a permutation with lowest cost.
Left-deep, right-deep, and zig-zag trees can be classed under the general
term linear trees. Sometimes, the term linear trees is used synonymously for
left-deep trees. We will not do so. Join trees are sometimes called operator trees
or query evaluation plans. Although this is not totally wrong, these terms have
a slightly different connotation. Operator trees typically contain more than
only join operators. Query evaluation plans (QEPs or plans for short) typically
have more information from physical query optimization associated with them.

3.1.3 Simple Cost Functions

In order to judge the quality of join trees, we need a cost function that associates
a certain positive cost with each join tree. Then, the task of join ordering is to
find among all equivalent join trees the join tree with lowest associated costs.
One part of any cost function are cardinality estimates. They are based on
the cardinalities of the relations, i.e. the number of tuples contained in them.
For a given relation Ri , we denote its cardinality by |Ri |.
Then, the cardinality of intermediate results must be estimated. This is
done by introducing the notion of join selectivity. Let pi,j be a join predicate
between relations Ri and Rj . The selectivity fi,j of pi,j is then defined as

|Ri 1pi,j Rj |
fi,j =
|Ri | ∗ |Rj |

This is the number of tuples in the join’s result divided by the number of tuples
in the Cartesian Product between Ri and Rj . If fi,j is 0.1, then only 10% of
all tuples in the Cartesian Product survive the predicate pi,j . Note that the
selectivity is always a number between 0 and 1 and that fi,j = fj,i . We use an
f and not an s, since the selectivity of a predicate is often called filter factor .
Besides the relation’s cardinalities, the selectivities of the join predicates
pi,j are assumed to be given as input to the join ordering algorithm. Therefore,
we can compute the output cardinality of a join Ri 1pi,j Rj , as

|Ri 1pi,j Rj | = fi,j |Ri ||Rj |

From this it becomes clear that if there is no join predicate for two relations
Ri and Rj , we can assume a join predicate true and associate a selectivity of
1 with it. The output cardinality is then the cardinality of the cross product
3.1. QUERIES CONSIDERED 35

between Ri and Rj . We also define fi,i = 1 for all 1 ≤ i ≤ n. This allows us to

keep subsequent formulas simple.
We now need to extend our cardinality estimation to join trees. This can be
done by recursively applying the above formula. Consider a join tree T joining
two join trees T1 and T2 , i.e. T = T1 1 T2 . Then, the result cardinality |T | can
be calculated as follows. If T is a leaf Ri , then |T | := |Ri |. Otherwise,
Y
|T | = ( fi,j ) |T1 | |T2 |.
Ri ∈T1 ,Rj ∈T2

Note that this formula assumes that the selectivities are independent of each
other. Assuming independence is common but may be very misleading. More
on this issue can be found in Chapter ??. Nevertheless, we assume independence
and stick to the above formula.
For sequences of joins we can give a simple cardinality definition. Let s =
R1 , . . . , Rn be a sequence of relations. Then
n Y
Y k
|s| = ( fi,k |Rk |).
k=1 i=1

Given the above, a query graph alone is not really sufficient for the speci-
fication of a join ordering problem: cardinalities and selectivities are missing.
On the other hand, from a complete list of cardinalities and selectivities we can
derive the query graph. Obviously, the following defines a chain query with
query graph R1 − − − R2 − − − R3 :

|R1 | = 10
|R2 | = 100
|R3 | = 1000
f1,2 = 0.1
f2,3 = 0.2

In all examples, we assume for all i and j for which fi,j is not given that there
is no join predicate and hence fi,j = 1.
We now come to cost functions. The first cost function we consider is called
Cout . For a join tree T , Cout (T ) is the sum of all output cardinalities of all joins
in T . Recursively, we can define Cout as

0 if T is a single relation
Cout (T ) =
|T | + Cout (T1 ) + Cout (T2 ) if T = T1 1 T2

From a theoretial point of view, Cout has many interesting properties: it is

symmetric, it has the ASI property, and it can be applied to an expression of
the logical algebra. From a practical point of view, however, it is rarely applied
(yet).
In real cost functions, the cardinalities only serve as input to more complex
formulas capturing the costs of a join implementation. Since real cost functions
36 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

are too complex for this section, we stick to simple cost functions proposed by
Krishnamurthy, Boral, and Zaniolo [443]. They argue that these cost functions
are appropriate for main memory database systems. For the three different
join implementations nested loop join (nlj), hash join (hj), and sort merge join
(smj), they give the following cost functions:

Cnlj (e1 1p e2 ) = |e1 ||e2 |

Chj (e1 1p e2 ) = h|e1 |
Csmj (e1 1p e2 ) = |e1 |log(|e1 |) + |e2 |log(|e2 |)

where ei are join trees and h is the average length of the collision chain in the
hash table. We will assume h = 1.2. All these cost functions are defined for a
single join operator. The cost of a join tree is defined as the sum of the costs of
all joins it contains. We use the symbols Cx to also denote the costs of not only
a single join but the costs of the whole tree. Hence, for sequences s of relations,
we have
n
X
Cnlj (s) = |s1 , . . . , si−1 | ∗ |si |
i=2
Xn
Chj (s) = 1.2|s1 , . . . , si−1 |
i=2
Xn n
X
Csmj (s) = |s1 , . . . , si−1 | log(|s1 , . . . , si−1 |) + |si | log(|si |)
i=2 i=1

Some notes on the cost functions are in order. First, note that these cost
functions are even for main memory a little incomplete. For example, constant
factors are missing. Second, the cost functions are mainly devised for left-deep
trees. This becomes apparent when looking at the costs of hash joins. It is
assumed that the right input is already stored in an appropriate hash table.
Obviously, this can only hold for base relations, giving rise to left-deep trees.
Third, Chj and Csmj do not work for cross products. However, we can extend
these cost functions by defining the cost of a cross product to be equal to
its output cardinality, which happens to be the cost of Cnlj . Fourth, in reality,
more complex cost functions are used and other parameters like the width of the
tuples—i.e. the number of bytes needed to store them—also play an important
role. Fifth, the above cost functions assume that the same join algorithm is
chosen throughout the whole plan. In practice, this will not be true.
For the above chain query, we compute the costs of different join trees. The
last join tree contains a cross product.
Cout Cnlj Chj Csmj
R1 1 R2 100 1000 12 697.61
R2 1 R3 20000 100000 120 10630.26
R1 × R3 10000 10000 10000 10000.00
(R1 1 R2 ) 1 R3 20100 101000 132 11327.86
(R2 1 R3 ) 1 R1 40000 300000 24120 32595.00
(R1 × R3 ) 1 R2 30000 1010000 22000 143542.00
3.1. QUERIES CONSIDERED 37

For the calculation of Cout note that |R1 1 R2 1 R3 | = 20000 is included in all
of the last three lines of its column. For the nested loop cost function, the costs
are calculated as follows:

Cnlj ((R1 1 R2 ) 1 R3 ) = 1000 + 100 ∗ 1000 = 101000

Cnlj ((R2 1 R3 ) 1 R1 ) = 100000 + 20000 ∗ 10 = 300000
Cnlj ((R1 × R3 ) 1 R2 ) = 10000 + 10000 ∗ 100 = 1010000

The reader should verify the other costs.

Several observations can be made from the above numbers:
• The costs of different join trees differ vastly under every cost function.
Hence, it is worth spending some time to find a cheap join order.

• The costs of the same join tree differ under the different cost functions.

• The cheapest join tree is (R1 1 R2 ) 1 R3 under all four cost functions.

• Join trees with cross products are expensive.

Thus, a heuristics often used is not to consider join trees that contain
unnecessary cross products. (If the query graph consists of several un-
connected components, then and only then cross products are necessary.
In other words: if the query graph is connected, no cross products are
necessary.).

• The join order matters even for join trees without cross products.
We would like to emphasize that the join order is also relevant under other cost
functions.
Avoiding cross products is not always beneficial, as the following query
specifiation shows:

|R1 | = 1000
|R2 | = 2
|R3 | = 2
f1,2 = 0.1
f1,3 = 0.1

For Cout we have costs

Join Tree Cout

R1 1 R2 200
R2 × R3 4
R1 1 R3 200
(R1 1 R2 ) 1 R3 240
(R2 × R3 ) 1 R1 44
(R1 1 R3 ) 1 R2 240
38 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

Note that although the absolute numbers are quite small, the ratio of the best
and the second best join tree is quite large. The reader is advised to find more
examples and to apply other cost functions.
The following example illustrates that a bushy tree can be superior to any
linear tree. Let us use the following query specification:

|R1 | = 10
|R2 | = 20
|R3 | = 20
|R4 | = 10
f1,2 = 0.01
f2,3 = 0.5
f3,4 = 0.01

If we do not consider cross products, we have for the symmetric (see below)
cost function Cout the following join trees and costs:
Join Tree Cout
R1 1 R2 2
R2 1 R3 200
R3 1 R4 2
((R1 1 R2 ) 1 R3 ) 1 R4 24
((R2 1 R3 ) 1 R1 ) 1 R4 222
(R1 1 R2 ) 1 (R3 1 R4 ) 6
Note that all other linear join trees fall into one of these classes, due to the
symmetry of the cost function and the join ordering problem. Again, the reader
is advised to find more examples and to apply other cost functions.
If we want to annotate a join operator by its implementation—which is
necessary for the correct computation of costs—we write 1impl for an imple-
mentation impl. For example, 1smj is a sort-merge join, and the according cost
function Csmj is used to compute its costs.
Two properties of cost functions have some impact on the join ordering
problem. The first is symmetry. A cost function Cimpl is called symmetric if
Cimpl (R1 1impl R2 ) = Cimpl (R2 1impl R1 ) for all relations R1 and R2 . For
symmetric cost functions, it does not make sense to consider commutativity.
Hence, it suffices to consider left-deep trees only if we want to restrict ourselves
to linear join trees. Note that Cout , Cnlj , Csmj are symmetric while Chj is not.
The other property is the adjacent sequence interchange (ASI) property.
Informally, the ASI property states that there exists a rank function such that
the order of two subsequences is optimal if they are ordered according to the
rank function. The ASI property is formally defined in Section 3.2.2. Only for
tree queries and cost functions with the ASI property, a polynomial algorithm
to find an optimal join order is known. Our cost functions Cout and Chj have the
ASI property, Csmj does not. Summarizing the properties of our cost functions,
we see that the classification is orthogonal:
3.1. QUERIES CONSIDERED 39

ASI ¬ ASI
symmetric Cout , Cnlj Csmj
¬ symmetric Chj (see text)

For the missing case of a non-symmetric cost function not having the ASI
property, we can use the cost function of the hybrid hash join [204, 576].
We turn to another not really well-researched topic. The goal is to cut
down the number of cost functions which have to be considered for optimization
and to possibly allow for simpler cost functions, which saves time during plan
generation. Unfortunately, we have to restrict ourselves to left-deep join trees.
Let s denote a sequence or permutation of a given set of joins. We define an
equivalence relation on cost functions.

Definition 3.1.1 Let C and C 0 be two cost functions. Then

C ≡ C 0 :≺ (∀s C(s) minimal ≺ C 0 (s) minimal)

Here, s is a join sequence.

Obviously, ≡ is an equivalence relation.

Now we can define the ΣIR property.

Definition 3.1.2 A cost function C is ΣIR :≺ C ≡ Cout .

That is, ΣIR is the set of all cost functions that are equivalent to Cout .
Let us consider a very simple example. The last element of the sum in Cout
is the size of the final join (all relations are joined). This is not the case for the
following cost function:
n−1
X
0
Cout (s) := |s1 , . . . , si |
i=2

0
Obviously, we have Cout is ΣIR. The next observation shows that we can
construct quite complex ΣIR cost functions:

Observation 3.1.3 Let C1 and C2 be two ΣIR cost functions. For non-
decreasing functions f1 : R → R and f2 : R × R → R and constants c ∈ R
and d ∈ R+ , we have that EX

C1 + c
C1 ∗ d
f1 ◦ C1
f2 ◦ (C1 , C2 )

are ΣIR. Here, ◦ denotes function composition and (·, ·) function pairing.

There are of course many more possibilites of constructing ΣIR functions. For
the cost functions Chj , Csmj , and Cnlj , we now investigate which of them have
the ΣIR property.
 40 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

Let us consider Chj first. From

n
X
Chj (s) = 1.2|s1 , . . . , si−1 |
i=2
n−1
X
= 1.2|s1 | + 1.2 |s1 , . . . , si |
i=2
0
= 1.2|s1 | + 1.2Cout (s)

and observation 3.1.3, we conclude that Chj is ΣIR for a fixed relation to be
joined first. If we can optimize Cout in polynomial time, then we can optimize
Cout for a fixed starting relation. Indeed, by trying each relation as a starting
EX relation, we can find the optimal join tree in polynomial time. An algorithm
that computes the optimal solution for an arbitrary relation to be joined first
can be found in Section 3.2.2.
Now, consider Csmj . Since
n
X
|s1 , . . . , si−1 |log(|s1 , . . . , si−1 |)
i=2

is minimal if and only if

n
X
|s1 , . . . , si−1 |
i=2
Pn
is minimal and i=2 |si | log(|si |) is independent of the order of the relations
within s — that is constant — we conclude that Csmj is ΣIR.
Last, we have that Cnlj is not ΣIR. To see this, consider the following
counter example with three relations R1 , R2 , and R3 of sizes 10, 10, and 100,
9 1 1
resp. The selectivities are f1,2 = 10 , f2,3 = 10 , and f1,3 = 10 . Now,

|R1 R2 | = 90
|R1 R3 | = 100
|R2 R3 | = 100

and

Cnl (R1 R2 R3 ) = 10 ∗ 10 + 90 ∗ 100 = 9100

Cnl (R1 R3 R2 ) = 10 ∗ 100 + 100 ∗ 10 = 2000
Cnl (R2 R3 R1 ) = 10 ∗ 100 + 100 ∗ 10 = 2000

We see that R1 R2 R3 has the smallest sum of intermediate result sizes but
produces the highest cost. Hence, Cnlj is not ΣIR.

3.1.4 Classification of Join Ordering Problems

After having discussed the different classes of query graphs, join trees and
cost functions, we can classify join ordering problems. To define a certain join
ordering problem, we have to pick one entry from every class:
3.1. QUERIES CONSIDERED 41

Query Graph Classes × Possible Join Tree Classes × Cost Function

Classes

The query graph classes considered are chain, star , tree, and cyclic. For the join
tree classes we distinguish between the different join tree shapes, i.e. whether
they are left-deep, zig-zag, or bushy trees. We left out the right-deep trees, since
they do not differ in their behavior from left-deep trees. We also have to take
into account whether cross products are considered or not. For cost functions,
we use a simple classification: we only distinguish between those that have the
ASI property and those that do not. This leaves us with 4∗3∗2∗2 = 48 different
join ordering problems. For these, we will first review search space sizes and
complexity. Then, we discuss several algorithms for join ordering. Last, we give
some insight into cost distributions over the search space and how this might
influence the benchmarking of different join ordering algorithms.

3.1.5 Search Space Sizes

Since search space sizes are easier to count if cross products are allowed, we
consider them first. Then we turn to search spaces where cross products are
not considered.

Join Trees with Cross Products We consider the number of join trees for
a query graph with n relations. When cross products are allowed, the number
of left-deep and right-deep join trees is n!. By allowing cross products, the
query graph does not restrict the search space in any way. Hence, any of the n!
permutations of the n relations corresponds to a valid left-deep join tree. This
is true independent of the query graph.
Similarly, the number of zig-zag trees can be estimated independently of
the query graph. First note that for joining n relations, we need n − 1 join
operators. From any left-deep tree, we derive zig-zag trees by using the join’s
commutativity and exchange the left and right inputs. Hence, from any left-
deep tree for n relations, we can derive 2n−2 zig-zag trees. We have to subtract
another one, since the bottommost joins’ arguments are exchanged in different
left-deep trees. Thus, there exists a total of 2n−2 n! zig-zag trees. Again, this
number is independent of the query graph.
The number of bushy trees can be estimated as follows. First, we need the
number of binary trees. For n leaf nodes, the number of binary trees is given
by C(n − 1), where C(n) is defined by the recurrence

n−1
X
C(n) = C(k)C(n − k − 1)
k=0

with C(0) = 1. The numbers C(n) are called the Catalan Numbers (see [179]).
They can also be computed by the following formula:
 
1 2n
C(n) = .
n+1 n
42 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

The Catalan Numbers grow in the order of Θ(4n /n3/2 ).

After we know the number of binary trees with n leaves, we now have to
attach the n relations to the leaves in all possible ways. For a given binary
tree, this can be done in n! ways. Hence, the total number of bushy trees is
n!C(n − 1). This can be simplified as follows (see also [262, 454, 753]):

 
1 2(n − 1)
n!C(n − 1) = n!
n n−1
1 (2n − 2)!
= n!
n (n − 1)!((2n − 2) − (n − 1))!
(2n − 2)!
=
(n − 1)!

Chain Queries, Left-Deep Join Trees, No Cartesian Product We now

derive the function that calculates the number of left-deep join trees with no
cross products for a chain query of n relations. That is, the query graph is
R1 – R2 – . . . – Rn−1 – Rn . Let us denote the number of join trees by f (n).
Obviously, for n = 0 there is only one (the empty) join tree. For n = 1, there
is also only one join tree (no join). For larger n: Consider the join trees for R1
– . . . – Rn−1 where relation Rn−1 is the k-th relation from the bottom where k
ranges from 1 to n − 1. From such a join tree we can derive join trees for all n
relations by adding relation Rn at any position following Rn−1 . There are n − k
such join trees. Only for k = 1, we can also add Rn below Rn−1 . Hence, for
k = 1 we have n join trees. How many join trees with Rn−1 at position k are
there? For k = 1, Rn−1 must be the first relation to be joined. Since we do not
consider cross products, it must be joined with Rn−2 . The next relation must
be Rn−3 , and so on. Hence, there is only one such join tree. For k = 2, the first
relation must be Rn−2 , which is then joined with Rn−1 . Then Rn−3 , . . . , R1
must follow in this order. Again, there is only one such join tree. For higher k,
for Rn−1 to occur safely at position k (no cross products) the k − 1 relations
Rn−2 , . . . , Rn−k must occur before Rn−1 . There are exactly f(k − 1) join trees
for the k − 1 relations. On each such join tree we just have to add Rn−1 on top
of it to yield a join tree with Rn−1 at position k.
Pn−1
Now we can compute the f(n) as n + k=2 f (k − 1) ∗ (n − k) for n > 1.
Solving this recurrence gives us f (n) = 2 n−1 . The proof is by induction. The
case n = 1 is trivial.
3.1. QUERIES CONSIDERED 43

The induction step for n > 1 provided by Thomas Neumann goes as follows:

n−1
X
f (n) = n + f (k − 1) ∗ (n − k)
k=2
n−3
X
= n+ f (k + 1) ∗ (n − k − 2)
k=0
n−3
X
= n+ 2k ∗ (n − k − 2)
k=0
n−2
X
= n+ k2n−k−2
k=1
n−2
X n−2
X
n−k−2
= n+ 2 + (k − 1)2n−k−2
k=1 k=2
n−2
X n−2
X
= n+ 2n−j−2
i=1 j=i
n−2
X n−i−2
X
= n+ 2j
i=1 j=0
n−2
X
= n+ (2n−i−1 − 1)
i=1
n−2
X
= n+ 2i − (n − 2)
i=1
= n + (2n−1 − 2) − (n − 2)
= 2n−1

Chain Queries, Zig-Zag Join Trees, No Cartesian Product All possible

zig-zag trees can be derived from a left-deep tree by exchanging the left and
right arguments of a subset of the joins. Since for the first join these alternatives
are already considered within the set of left-deep trees, we are left with n − 2
joins. Hence, the number of zig-zag trees for n relations in a chain query is
2n−2 ∗ 2n−1 = 22n−3 .

Chain Queries, Bushy Join Trees, No Cartesian Product We can com-

pute the number of bushy trees with no cross products for a chain query in the
following way. Let us denote this number by f(n). Again, let us assume that
the chain query has the form R1 – R2 – . . . – Rn−1 – Rn . For n = 0, we only
have the empty join tree. For n = 1 we have one join tree. For n = 2 we have
two join trees. For more relations, every subtree of the join tree must contain
a subchain in order to avoid cross products. Further, the subchain can occur
 44 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

as the left or right argument of the join. Hence, we can compute f(n) as

n−1
X
2 f(k) f(n − k)
k=1

This is equal to
2n−1 C(n − 1)

EX where C(n) are the Catalan Numbers.

Star Queries, No Cartesian Product The first join has to connect the
center relation R0 with any of the other relations. The other relations can
follow in any order. Since R0 can be the left or the right input of the first
join, there are 2 ∗ (n − 1)! possible left-deep join trees for Star Queries with no
Cartesian Product.
The number of zig-zag join trees is derived by exchanging the arguments
of all but the first join in any left-deep join tree. We cannot consider the first
join since we did so in counting left-deep join trees. Hence, the total number of
zig-zag join trees is 2 ∗ (n − 1)! ∗ 2n−2 = 2n−1 ∗ (n − 1)!.
Constructing bushy join trees with no Cartesian Product from a Star Query
other than zig-zag join trees is not possible.

Remarks The numbers for star queries are also upper bounds for tree queries.
For clique queries, no join tree containing a cross product is possible. Hence,
all join trees are valid join trees and the search space size is the same as the
corresponding search space for join trees with cross products.
To give the reader a feeling for the numbers, the following tables contain
the potential search space sizes for some n.

Join trees without cross products

chain query star query
left-deep zig-zag bushy left-deep zig-zag/bushy
n 2n−1 22n−3 2n−1 C(n − 1) 2 ∗ (n − 1)! 2n−1 (n − 1)!
1 1 1 1 1 1
2 2 2 2 2 2
3 4 8 8 4 8
4 8 32 40 12 48
5 16 128 224 48 384
6 32 512 1344 240 3840
7 64 2048 8448 1440 46080
8 128 8192 54912 10080 645120
9 256 32768 366080 80640 10321920
10 512 131072 2489344 725760 185794560
3.1. QUERIES CONSIDERED 45

With cross products/clique

left-deep zig-zag bushy
n n! 2n−2 ∗ n! n!C(n − 1)
1 1 1 1
2 2 2 2
3 6 12 12
4 24 96 120
5 120 960 1680
6 720 11520 30240
7 5040 161280 665280
8 40320 2580480 17297280
9 362880 46448640 518918400
10 3628800 928972800 17643225600

Note that in Figure 2.6 only 32 join trees are listed, whereas the number of
bushy trees for chain queries with four relations is 40. The missing eight cases
are those zig-zag trees which are symmetric (i.e. derived by applying commu-
tativity to all occurring joins) to the ones contained in the second column.
From these numbers, it becomes immediately clear why historically the
search space of query optimizers was restricted to left-deep trees and cross
products for connected query graphs were not considered.

3.1.6 Problem Complexity

The complexity of the join ordering problem depends on several parameters.
These are the shape of the query graph, the class of join trees to be considered,
whether cross products are considered or not, and whether the cost function
has the ASI property or not. Not for all the combinations complexity results
are known. What is known is summarized in the following table.

Query graph Join tree Cross products Cost function Complexity

general left-deep no ASI NP-hard
tree/star/chain left-deep no one join method (ASI) P
star left-deep no two join methods (NLJ+SMJ) NP-hard
general/tree/star left-deep yes ASI NP-hard
chain left-deep yes — open
general bushy no ASI NP-hard
tree bushy no — open
star bushy no ASI P
chain bushy no any P
general bushy yes ASI NP-hard
tree/star/chain bushy yes ASI NP-hard
Ibaraki and Kameda were the first who showed that the problem of deriving
optimal left-deep trees for cyclic queries is NP-hard for a cost function for an
n-way nested loop join implementation [377]. The proof was repeated for the
cost function Cout which has the ASI property [165, 760]. In both proofs, the
46 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

clique problem was used for the reduction [273]. Cout was also used in the other
proofs of NP-hardness results. The next line goes back to the same paper.
Ibaraki and Kameda also described an algorithm to solve the join ordering
problem for tree queries producing optimal left-deep trees for a special cost
function for a nested-loop n-way join algorithm. Their algorithm was based on
the observation that their cost function has the ASI property. For this case,
they could derive an algorithm from an algorithm for a sequencing problem for
job scheduling designed by Monma and Sidney [533]. They, in turn, used an
earlier result by Lawler [459]. The algorithm of Ibaraki and Kameda was slightly
generalized by Krishnamurthy, Boral, and Zaniolo, who were also able to sketch
a more efficient algorithm. It improves the time bounds from O(n2 log n) to
O(n2 ). The disadvantage of both approaches is that with every relation, a fixed
(i.e. join-tree independent) join implementation must be associated before the
optimization starts. Hence, it only produces optimal trees if there is only one
join implementation available or one is able to guess the optimal join method
before hand. This might not be the case. The polynomial algorithm which we
term IKKBZ is described in Section 3.2.2.
For star queries, Ganguly investigated the problem of generating optimal
left-deep trees if no cross products but two different cost functions (one for
nested loop join, the other for sort merge join) are allowed. It turned out that
this problem is NP-hard [267].
The next line is due to Cluet and Moerkotte [165]. They showed by reduc-
tion from 3DM that taking into account cross products results in an NP-hard
problem even for star queries. Remember that star queries are tree queries and
general graphs.
The problem for general bushy trees follows from a result by Scheufele and
Moerkotte [657]. They showed that building optimal bushy trees for cross
products only (i.e. all selectivities equal one) is already NP-hard. This result
also explains the last two lines.
By noting that for star queries, all bushy trees that do not contain a cross
product are left-deep trees, the problem can be solved by the IKKBZ algorithm
for left-deep trees. Ono and Lohman showed that for chain queries dynamic
programming considers only a polynomial number of bushy trees if no cross
products are considered [553]. This is discussed in Section 3.2.4.
The table is rather incomplete. Many open problems exist. For example,
if we have chain queries and consider cross products: is the problem NP-hard
or in P? Some results for this problem have been presented [657], but it is
still an open problem (see Section 3.2.7). Open is also the case where we
produce optimal bushy trees with no cross products for tree queries. Yet another
example of an open problem is whether we could drop the ASI property and are
still able to derive a polynomial algorithm for a tree query. This is especially
important, since the cost function for a sort-merge algorithm does not have the
ASI property.
Good summaries of complexity results for different join ordering problems
can be found in the theses of Scheufele [655] and Hamalainen [338].
Given that join ordering is an inherently complex problem with no polyno-
mial algorithm in sight, one might wonder whether there exists good polynomial
3.2. DETERMINISTIC ALGORITHMS 47

approximation algorithms. Chances are that even this is not the case. Chatter-
ji, Evani, Ganguly, and Yemmanuru showed that three different optimization
problems — all asking for linear join trees — are not approximable [119].

3.2 Deterministic Algorithms

3.2.1 Heuristics
We now present some simple heuristic solutions to the problem of join ordering.
These heuristics only produce left-deep trees. Since left-deep trees are equiv-
alent with permutations, these heuristics order the joins according to some
criterion.
The core algorithm for the heuristics discussed here is the greedy algorithm
(for an introduction see [179]). In greedy algorithms, a weight is associated with
each entity. In our case, weights are associated with each relation. A typical
weight function is the cardinality of the relation (|R|). Given a weight function
weight, a greedy join ordering algorithm works as follows:

GreedyJoinOrdering-1({R1 , . . . , Rn }, (*weight)(Relation))
Input: a set of relations to be joined and a weight function
Output: a join order
S = ; // initialize S to the empty sequence
R = {R1 , . . . , Rn }; // let R be the set of all relations
while(!empty(R)) {
Let k be such that: weight(Rk ) = minRi ∈R (weight(Ri ));
R\ = Rk ; // eliminate Rk from R
S◦ = Rk ; // append Rk to S
}
return S
This algorithm takes cross products into account. If we are only interested
in left-deep join trees with no cross products, we have to require that Rk is
connected to some of the relations contained in S in case S 6= . Note that a
more efficient implementation would sort the relations according to their weight.
Not all heuristics can be implemented with a greedy algorithm as simple as
above. An often-used heuristics is to take the relation next that produces the
smallest (next) intermediate result. This cannot be determined by the relation
alone. One must take into account the sequence S already processed, since on-
ly then the selectivities of all predicates connecting relations in S and the new
relation are deducible. And we must take the product of these selectivities and
the cardinality of the new relation in order to get an estimate of the intermedi-
ate result’s cardinality. As a consequence, the weights become relative to S. In
other words, the weight function now has two parameters: a sequence of rela-
tions already joined and the relation whose relative weight is to be computed.
Here is the next algorithm:
48 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

GreedyJoinOrdering-2({R1 , . . . , Rn },
(*weight)(Sequence of Relations, Relation))
Input: a set of relations to be joined and a weight function
Output: a join order
S = ; // initialize S to the empty sequence
R = {R1 , . . . , Rn }; // let R be the set of all relations
while(!empty(R)) {
Let k be such that: weight(S, Rk ) = minRi ∈R (weight(S, Ri ));
R\ = Rk ; // eliminate Rk from R
S◦ = Rk ; // append Rk to S
}
return S

Note that for this algorithm, sorting is not possible. GreedyJoinOrdering-2

can be improved by taking every relation as the starting one.

GreedyJoinOrdering-3({R1 , . . . , Rn }, (*weight)(Sequence of Relations, Relation))

Input: a set of relations to be joined and a weight function
Output: a join order
Solutions = ∅;
for (i = 1; i ≤ n; + + i) {
S = Ri ; // initialize S to a singleton sequence
R = {R1 , . . . , Rn } \ {Ri }; // let R be the set of all relations
while(!empty(R)) {
Let k be such that: weight(S, Rk ) = minRi ∈R (weight(S, Ri ));
R\ = Rk ; // eliminate Rk from R
S◦ = Rk ; // append Rk to S
}
Solutions += S;
}
return cheapest in Solutions

In addition to the relative weight function mentioned before, another of-

ten used relative weight function is the product of the selectivities connecting
relations in S with the new relation. This heuristics is sometimes called MinSel .
The above two algorithms generate linear join trees. Fegaras proposed a
heuristic (named Greedy Operator Ordering (GOO)) to generate bushy join
trees [236, 237]. The idea is as follows. A set of join trees Trees is initialized
such that it contains all the relations to be joined. It then investigates all pairs
of trees contained in Trees. Among all of these, the algorithm joins the two
trees that result in the smallest intermediate result when joined. The two trees
are then eliminated from Trees and the new join tree joining them is added to
it. The algorithm then looks as follows:
3.2. DETERMINISTIC ALGORITHMS 49

GOO({R1 , . . . , Rn })
Input: a set of relations to be joined
Output: join tree
Trees := {R1 , . . . , Rn }
while (|Trees| != 1) {
find Ti , Tj ∈ Trees such that i 6= j, |Ti 1 Tj | is minimal
among all pairs of trees in Trees
Trees − = Ti ;
Trees − = Tj ;
Trees + = Ti 1 Tj ;
}
return the tree contained in Trees;
Our GOO variant differs slightly from the one proposed by Fegaras. He uses
arrays, explicitly handles the forming of the join predicates, and materializes
intermediate result sizes. Hence, his algorithm is a little more elaborated, but
we assume that the reader is able to fill in the gaps.
None of our algorithms so far considers different join implementations. An
explicit consideration of commutativity for non-symmetric cost functions could
also help to produce better join trees. The reader is asked to work out the details
of these extensions. In general, the heuristics do not produce the optimal plan. EX
The reader is advised to find examples where the heuristics are far off the best
possible plan. EX

3.2.2 Determining the Optimal Join Order in Polynomial Time

Since the general problem of join ordering is NP-hard, we cannot expect to
find a polynomial solution for it. However, for special cases, we can expect to
find solutions that work in polynomial time. These solutions can also be used
as heuristics for the general case, either to find a not-that-bad join tree or to
determine an upper bound for the costs that is then fed into a search procedure
to prune the search space.
The most general case for which a polynomial solution is known is charac-
tized by the following features:
• the query graph must be acyclic
• no cross products are considered
• the search space is restricted to left-deep trees
• the cost function must have the ASI property
The algorithm was presented by Ibaraki and Kameda [377]. Later Krishna-
murthy, Boral, and Zaniolo presented it again for some other cost functions
(still having the ASI property) [443]. They also observed that the upper bound
O(n2 log n) of the original algorithm could be improved to O(n2 ). In any case,
the algorithm is based on an algorithm discovered by Monma and Sidney for
job scheduling [459, 533] . Let us call the (unimproved) algorithm IKKBZ-
Algorithm.
50 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

The IKKBZ-Algorithm considers only join operations that have a cost func-
tion of the form:
cost(Ri 1 Rj ) = |Ri | ∗ hj (|Rj |)
where each Rj can have its own cost function hj . We denote the set of hj by
H and parameterize cost functions with it. Example instanciations are
• hj ≡ 1.2 for main memory hash-based joins
• hj ≡ id for nested-loop joins
where id is the identity function. Let us denote by ni the cardinality of the
relation Ri (ni := |Ri |). Then, the hi (ni ) represent the costs per input tuple to
be joined with Ri .
The algorithm works as follows. For every relation Rk it computes the
optimal join order under the assumption that Rk is the first relation in the join
sequence. The resulting subproblems then resemble a job-scheduling problem
that can be solved by the Monma-Sidney-Algorithm [533].
In order to present this algorithm, we need the notion of a precedence graph.
A precedence graph is formed by taking a node in the (undirected) query graph
and making this node a root node of a (directed) tree where the edges point
away from the selected root node. Hence, for acyclic, connected query graphs—
those we consider in this section—a precedence graph is a tree. We construct
the precedence graph of a query graph G = (V, E) as follows:
• Make some relation Rk ∈ V the root node of the precedence graph.
• As long as not all relations are included in the precedence graph: Choose
a relation Ri ∈ V , such that (Rj , Ri ) ∈ E is an edge in the query graph
and Rj is already contained in the (partial) precedence graph constructed
so far and Ri is not. Add Rj and the edge Rj → Ri to the precedence
graph.
A sequence S = v1 , . . . , vk of nodes conforms to a precedence graph G = (V, E)
if the following conditions are satisfied:
1. for all i (2 ≤ i ≤ k) there exists a j (1 ≤ j < i) with (vj , vi ) ∈ E and
2. there is no edge (vi , vj ) ∈ E for i > j.
For non-empty sequences U and V in a precedence graph, we write U → V if,
according to the precedence graph, U must occur before V . This requires U
and V to be disjoint. More precisely, there can only be paths from nodes in U
to nodes in V and at least one such path exists.
Consider the following query graph:
R1 R5

R3 R4

R2 R6
3.2. DETERMINISTIC ALGORITHMS 51

For this query graph, we can derive the following precedence graphs:
R1 R2 R3

R3 R3 R1 R2 R4

R2 R4 R1 R4 R5 R6

R5 R6 R5 R6

R4 R5 R6

R3 R5 R6 R4 R4

R3 R5 R6 R3 R5 R3

R1 R2 R1 R2

The IKKBZ-Algorithm takes a single precedence graph and produces a new

one that is totally ordered. From this total order it is very easy to construct a
corresponding join graph: the following figure contains a totally ordered prece-
dence graph (left-hand side) as generated by the IKKBZ-Algorithm and the
corresponding join graph on the right-hand side.
R1 1

R2 1 R6

R3 1 R5

R4 1 R4

R5 1 R3

R6 R1 R2

Define

R1,2,...,k := R1 1 R2 1 · · · 1 Rk
n1,2,...,k := |R1,2,...,k |

For a given precedence graph, let Ri be a relation and Ri be the set of relations
from which there exists a path to Ri . Then, in any join tree adhering to the
Q in Ri and only those will be joined before Ri .
precedence graph, all relations
Hence, we can define si = Rj ∈Ri fi,j for i > 1. Note that for any i only one j
 52 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

with fi,j 6= 1 exists in the product. If the precedence graph is a chain, then the
following holds:

n1,2,...,k+1 = n1,2...,k ∗ sk+1 ∗ nk+1

We define s1 = 1. Then we have

n1,2 = s2 ∗ (n1 ∗ n2 ) = (s1 ∗ s2 ) ∗ (n1 ∗ n2 )

and, in general,
k
Y
n1,2,...,k = (si ∗ ni ).
i=1

We call the si selectivities, although they depend on the precedence graph.

The costs for a totally ordered precedence graph G can thus be computed
as follows:
n
X
CostH (G) = [n1,2,...,i−1 ∗ hi (ni )]
i=2
n
X i−1
Y
= [( sj ∗ nj ) ∗ hi (ni )]
i=2 j=1

If we define hi (ni ) = si ni , then CostH ≡ Cout . The factor si ni determines by

how much the input relation to be joined with Ri changes its cardinality after
the join has been performed. If si ni is less than one, we call the join decreasing,
if it is larger than one, we call the join increasing. This distinction plays an
important role in the heuristic discussed in Section 3.2.3.
The cost function can also be defined recursively.

Definition 3.2.1 Define the cost function CH as follows:

CH () = 0
CH (Rj ) = 0 if Rj is the root
CH (Rj ) = hj (nj ) else
CH (S1 S2 ) = CH (S1 ) + T (S1 ) ∗ CH (S2 )

where

T () = 1
Y
T (S) = (si ∗ ni )
Ri ∈S

It is easy to prove by induction that CH is well-defined and that CH (G) =

EX CostH (G).
3.2. DETERMINISTIC ALGORITHMS 53

Definition 3.2.2 Let A and B be two sequences and V and U two non-empty
sequences. We say that a cost function C has the adjacent sequence interchange
property (ASI property) if and only if there exists a function T and a rank
function defined for sequences S as

T (S) − 1
rank(S) =
C(S)

such that for non-empty sequences S = AU V B the following holds

C(AU V B) ≤ C(AV U B) ≺ rank(U ) ≤ rank(V ) (3.1)

if AU V B and AV U B satisfy the precedence constraints imposed by a given

precedence graph.

Lemma 3.2.3 The cost function CH defined in Definition 3.2.1 has the ASI
property.

The proof is very simple. Using the definition of CH , we have

CH (AU V B) = CH (A)
+T (A)CH (U )
+T (A)T (U )CH (V )
+T (A)T (U )T (V )CH (B)

and, hence,

CH (AU V B) − CH (AV U B) = T (A)[CH (V )(T (U ) − 1) − CH (U )(T (V ) − 1)]

= T (A)CH (U )CH (V )[rank(U ) − rank(V )]

The proposition follows. 2

Definition 3.2.4 Let M = {A1 , . . . , An } be a set of node sequences in a given

precedence graph. Then, M is a called a module if for all sequences B that do
not overlap with the sequences in M one of the following conditions holds:

• B → Ai , ∀ 1 ≤ i ≤ n

• Ai → B, ∀ 1 ≤ i ≤ n

• B 6→ Ai and Ai 6→ B, ∀ 1 ≤ i ≤ n

Lemma 3.2.5 Let C be any cost function with the ASI property and {A, B}
a module. If A → B and additionally rank(B) ≤ rank(A), then we find an
optimal sequence among those in which B directly follows A.
54 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

Proof Every optimal permutation must have the form (U, A, V, B, W ), since
A → B. Assumption: V 6= . If rank(V ) ≤ rank(A), then we can ex-
change V and A without increasing the costs. If rank(A) ≤ rank(V ), we
have rank(B) ≤ rank(V ) due to the transitivity of ≤. Hence, we can exchange
B and V without increasing the costs. Both exchanges produce legal sequences
obeying the precedence graph, since {A, B} is a module. 2
If the precedence graph demands A → B but rank(B) ≤ rank(A), we speak
of contradictory sequences A and B. Since the lemma shows that no non-empty
subsequence can occur between A and B, we will combine A and B into a new
single node replacing A and B. This node represents a compound relation
comprising all relations in A and B. Its cardinality is computed by multiplying
the cardinalities of all relations occurring in A and B, and its selectivity s is
the product of all the selectivities si of the relations Ri contained in A and B.
The continued process of this step until no more contradictory sequence exists
is called normalization. The opposite step, replacing a compound node by the
sequence of relations it was derived from, is called denormalization.
We can now present the algorithm IKKBZ.

IKKBZ(G)
Input: an acyclic query graph G for relations R1 , . . . , Rn
Output: the best left-deep tree
R = ∅;
for (i = 1; i ≤ n; + + i) {
Let Gi be the precedence graph derived from G and rooted at Ri ;
T = IKKBZ-Sub(Gi );
R+ = T ;
}
return best of R;

IKKBZ-Sub(Gi )
Input: a precedence graph Gi for relations R1 , . . . , Rn rooted at some Ri
Output: the optimal left-deep tree under Gi
while (Gi is not a chain) {
let r be the root of a subtree in Gi whose subtrees are chains;
IKKBZ-Normalize(r);
merge the chains under r according to the rank function
in ascending order;
}
IKKBZ-Denormalize(Gi );
return Gi ;

IKKBZ-Normalize(r)
Input: the root r of a subtree T of a precedence graph G = (V, E)
Output: a normalized subchain
while (∃ r0 , c ∈ V , r →∗ r0 , (r0 , c) ∈ E: rank(r0 ) > rank(c)) {
replace r0 by a compound relation r00 that represents r0 c;
3.2. DETERMINISTIC ALGORITHMS 55

};

We do not give the details of IKKBZ-Denormalize, as it is trivial.

R1
100 18
R2 1 1 R5 19
2 3 R2 R3 R4 20
10 100 49 24
50 25
R1 1
R4
3
5
1 R6,7 5
1
4 2
R3 R6 1
R7
100 A) 10 10 20 D)
5
R5 6
R1
R1
19
R2 R3 R4 20
49 24
50 25
R2 R3 R4,6,7 199
320
4 49 24
R5 R6 5 50 25
5
6 5
E) R5 6
B)
1
R7 2

R1

19
R2 R3 R4 20
49 24
50 25

R5 R6,7 3 F)
C) 5
5
6

Figure 3.3: Illustrations for the IKKBZ Algorithm

Let us illustrate the algorithm IKKBZ-Sub by a simple example. We use

the cost function Cout . Figure 3.3 A) shows a query graph. The relations are
annotated with their sizes and the edges with the join selectivities. Chosing R1
as the root of the precedence graph results in B). There, the nodes are annotated
by the ranks of the relations. R4 is the root of a subtree all of whose subtrees
are chains. Hence, we normalize it. For R5 , there is nothing to do. The ranks
of R6 and R7 are contradictory. We form a compound relation R6,7 , calculate
its cardinality, selectivity, and rank. The latter is shown in C). Merging the
two subchains under R4 results in D). Now R1 is the root of a subtree with
only chains underneath. Normalization detects that the ranks for R4 and R5
are contradictory. E) shows the tree after introducing the compound relation
R4,5 . Now R4,5 and R6,7 have contradictory ranks, and we replace them by the
compound relation R4,5,6,7 as shown in F). Merging the chains under R1 gives
G). Since this is a chain, we leave the loop and denormalize. The final result is
shown in H).
56 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

R1 R2 R3 R4 p2,3
I II

p1,2 p3,4

III a) p3,4 III b)

R4
p2,3
R3

p1,2 R1 R2

IV a) p2,3 IV b)

p3,4
R1 R2 R3 R4

p1,2

V a) p2,3 V b)

p1,2 p3,4
R1 R2 R3 R4

Figure 3.4: A query graph, its directed join graph, some spanning trees and
join trees

We can use the IKKBZ-Algorithm to derive a heuristics also for cyclic

queries, i.e. for general query graphs. In a first step, we determine a mini-
mal spanning tree of the query graph. It is then used as the input query graph
for the IKKBZ-Algorithm. Let us call this the IKKBZ-based Heuristics.

3.2.3 The Maximum-Value-Precedence Algorithm

Lee, Shih, and Chen proposed a very interesting heuristics for the join ordering
problem [460]. They use a weighted directed join graph (WDJG) to represent
queries. Within this graph, every join tree corresponds to a spanning tree.
Given a conjunctive query with join predicates P . For a join predicate p ∈ P ,
3.2. DETERMINISTIC ALGORITHMS 57

we denote by R(p) the relations whose attributes are mentioned in p.

Definition 3.2.6 The directed join graph of a conjunctive query with join pred-
icates P is a triple G = (V, Ep , Ev ), where V is the set of nodes and Ep and
Ev are sets of directed edges defined as follows. For any two nodes u, v ∈ V , if
R(u) ∩ R(v) 6= ∅ then (u, v) ∈ Ep and (v, u) ∈ Ep . If R(u) ∩ R(v) = ∅, then
(u, v) ∈ Ev and (v, u) ∈ Ev . The edges in Ep are called physical edges, those
in Ev virtual edges.
Note that in G for every two nodes u, v, there is an edge (u, v) that is either
physical or virtual. Hence, G is a clique.
Let us see how we can derive a join tree from a spanning tree of a directed
join graph. Figure 3.4 I) gives a simple query graph Q corresponding to a chain
and Part II) presents Q’s directed join graph. Physical edges are drawn by
solid arrows, virtual edges by dotted arrows. Let us first consider the spanning
tree shown in Part III a). It says that we first execute R1 1p1,2 R2 . The next
join predicate to evaluate is p2,3 . Obviously, it does not make much sense to
execute R2 1p2,3 R3 , since R1 and R2 have already been joined. Hence, we
replace R2 in the second join by the result of the first join. This results in the
join tree (R1 1p1,2 R2 ) 1p2,3 R3 . For the same reason, we proceed by joining
this result with R4 . The final join tree is shown in Part III b). Part IV a)
shows another spanning tree. The two joins R1 1p1,2 R2 and R3 1p3,4 R4 can
be executed independently and do not influence each other. Next, we have to
consider p2,3 . Both R2 and R3 have already been joined. Hence, the last join
processes both intermediate results. The final join tree is shown in Part IV b).
The spanning tree shown in Part V a) results in the same join tree shown in
Part V b). Hence, two different spanning trees can result in the same join tree.
However, the spanning tree in Part IV a) is more specific in that it demands
R1 1p1,2 R2 to be executed before R3 1p3,4 .
Next, take a look at Figure 3.5. Part I), II), and III a) show a query graph,
its directed join tree and a spanning tree. To build a join tree from the spanning
tree we proceed as follows. We have to execute R2 1p2,3 R3 and R3 1 R4 first.
In which way we do so is not really fixed by the spanning tree. So let us do
both in parallel. Next is p1,2 . The only dependency the spanning tree gives
us is that it should be executed after p3,4 . Since there is no common relation
between those two, we perform R1 1p1,2 R2 . Last is p4,5 . Since we find p3,4
below it, we use the intermediate result produced by it as a replacement for R4 .
The result is shown in Part III b). It has three loose ends. Additional joins are
required to tie the partial results together. Obviously, this is not what we want.
A spanning tree that avoids this problem of additional joins is called effective.
It can be shown that a spanning tree T = (V, E) is effective if it satisfies the
following conditions [460]:
1. T is a binary tree,
2. for all inner nodes v and node u with (u, v) ∈ E it holds that R∗ (T (u)) ∩
R(v) 6= ∅, and
3. for all nodes v, u1 , u2 with u1 6= u2 , (u1 , v) ∈ E, and (u2 , v) ∈ E one of
the following two conditions holds:
58 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

I R1 R2 R3 R4 R5

II p1,2 p2,3 p3,4 p4,5

III a) p4,5 III b)

?
R5
p2,3 p1,2
R2 R3 R3 R4 R1 R2

p3,4

Figure 3.5: A query graph, its directed join tree, a spanning tree and its problem

(a) ((R∗ (T (u1 )) ∩ R(v)) ∩ (R∗ (T (u2 )) ∩ R(v))) = ∅ or

(b) (R∗ (T (u1 )) ∩ R(v) = R(v)) ∨ (R∗ (T (u2 )) ∩ R(v) = R(v)).

Thereby, we denote by T (v) the partial tree rooted at v and by R∗ (T 0 ) =

∪v∈T 0 R(v) the set of all relations in subtree T 0 .
We see that the spanning tree in Figure 3.5 III a) is ineffective since, for
example, R(p2,3 ) ∩ R(p4,5 ) = ∅. The spanning tree in Figure 3.4 IV a) is also
ineffective. During the algorithm we will take care—by checking the above
conditions—that only effective spanning trees are generated.
We now assign weights to the edges of the directed join graph. For two
nodes v, u ∈ V define u u v := R(u) ∩ R(v). For simplicity, we assume that
every predicate involves exactly two relations. Then for all u, v ∈ V , u u v
contains a single relation. Let v ∈ V be a node with R(v) = {Ri , Rj }. We
abbreviate Ri 1v Rj by 1v . Using these notations, we can attach weights to
the edges to define the weighted directed join graph.

Definition 3.2.7 Let G = (V, Ep , Ev ) be a directed join graph for a conjunctive

query with join predicates P . The weighted directed join graph is derived from
G by attaching a weight to each edge as follows:

• Let (u, v) ∈ Ep be a physical edge. The weight wu,v of (u, v) is defined as

| 1u |
wu,v = .
|u u v|

• For virtual edges (u, v) ∈ Ev , we define wu,v = 1.

(Lee, Shih, and Chen actually attach two weights to each edge: one additional
weight for the size of the tuples (in bytes) [460].)
3.2. DETERMINISTIC ALGORITHMS 59

The weights of physical edges are equal to the si of the dependency graph
used in the IKKBZ-Algorithm (Section 3.2.2). To see this, assume R(u) =
{R1 , R2 }, R(v) = {R2 , R3 }. Then

| 1u |
wu,v =
|u u v|
|R1 1u R2 |
=
|R2 |
f1,2 |R1 | |R2 |
=
|R2 |
= f1,2 |R1 |

Hence, if the join R1 1u R2 is executed before the join R2 1v R3 , the input

size to the latter join changes by a factor wu,v . This way, the influence of a join
on another join is captured by the weights. Since those nodes connected by a
virtual edge do not influence each other, a weight of 1 is appropriate.
Additionally, we assign weights to the nodes of the directed join graph.
The weight of a node reflects the change in cardinality to be expected when
certain other joins have been executed before. They are specified by a (partial)
spanning tree S. Given S, we denote by 1Spi,j the result of the join 1pi,j if all
joins preceding pi,j in S have been executed. Then the weight attached to node
pi,j is defined as
| 1Spi,j |
w(pi,j , S) = .
|Ri 1pi,j Rj |
For empty sequences , we define w(pi,j , ) = |Ri 1pi,j Rj |. Similarly, we define
the cost of a node pi,j depending on other joins preceding it in some given
spanning tree S. We denote this by cost(pi,j , S). The actual cost function can
be one we have introduced so far or any other one. In fact, if we have a choice
of several join implementations, we can take the minimum over all their cost
functions. This then choses the most effective join implementation.
The maximum value precedence algorithm works in two phases. In the first
phase, it searches for edges with a weight smaller than one. Among these, the
one with the biggest impact is chosen. This one is then added to the spanning
tree. In other words, in this phase, the costs of expensive joins are minimized by
making sure that (size) decreasing joins are executed first. The second phase
adds edges such that the intermediate result sizes increase as little as possible.

MVP(G)
Input: a weighted directed join graph G = (V, Ep , Ev )
Output: an effective spanning tree
Q1 .insert(V ); /* priority queue with smallest node weights w(·) first */
Q2 = ∅; /* priority queue with largest node weights w(·) first */
G0 = (V 0 , E 0 ) with V 0 = V and E 0 = Ep ; /* working graph */
S = (VS , ES ) with VS = V and ES = ∅; /* resulting effective spanning tree */
while (!Q1 .empty() && |ES | < |V | − 1) { /* Phase I */
60 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

v = Q1 .head();
among all (u, v) ∈ E 0 , wu,v < 1 such that
S 0 = (V, ES0 ) with ES0 = ES ∪ {(u, v)} is acyclic and effective
select one that maximizes cost(1v , S) - cost(1v , S 0 );
if (no such edge exists) {
Q1 .remove(v);
Q2 .insert(v);
continue;
}
MvpUpdate((u, v));
recompute w(·) for v and its ancestors; /* rearranges Q1 */
}
while (!Q2 .empty() && |ES | < |V | − 1) { /* Phase II */
v = Q2 .head();
among all (u, v), (v, u) ∈ E 0 denoted by (x, y) henceforth
such that
S 0 = (V, ES0 ) with ES0 = ES ∪ {(x, y)} is acyclic and effective
select the one that minimizes cost(1v , S 0 ) - cost(1v , S);
MvpUpdate((x, y));
recompute w(·) for y and its ancestors; /* rearranges Q2 */
}
return S;

MvpUpdate((u, v))
Input: an edge to be added to S
Output: side-effects on S, G0 ,
ES ∪ = {(u, v)};
E 0 \ = {(u, v), (v, u)};
E 0 \ = {(u, w)|(u, w) ∈ E 0 }; /* (1) */
E 0 ∪ = {(v, w)|(u, w) ∈ Ep , (v, w) ∈ Ev }; /* (3) */
if (v has two inflowing edges in S) { /* (2) */
E 0 \ = {(w, v)|(w, v) ∈ E 0 };
}
if (v has one outflowing edge in S) { /* (1) in paper but not needed */
E 0 \ = {(v, w)|(v, w) ∈ E 0 };
}

Note that in order to test for the effectiveness of a spanning tree in the
algorithm, we just have to check the conditions for the node the selected edge
leads to.
MvpUpdate first adds the selected edge to the spanning tree. It then elim-
inates edges that need not to be considered for building an effective spanning
tree. Since (u, v) has been added, both (u, v) and (v, u) do not have to be
considered any longer. Also, since effective spanning trees are binary trees, (1)
every node must have only one parent node and (2) at most two child nodes.
The edges leading to a violation are eliminated by MvpUpdate in the lines com-
3.2. DETERMINISTIC ALGORITHMS 61

mented with the corresponding numbers. For the line commented (3) we have
the situation that u → v 99K w and u → w in G. This means that u and w have
common relations, but v and w do not. Hence, the result of performing v on
the result of u will have a common relation with w. Thus, we add a (physical)
edge v → w.

3.2.4 Dynamic Programming

Algorithms
Consider the two join trees

(((R1 1 R2 ) 1 R3 ) 1 R4 ) 1 R5

and
(((R3 1 R1 ) 1 R2 ) 1 R4 ) 1 R5 .
If we know that ((R1 1 R2 ) 1 R3 ) is cheaper than ((R3 1 R1 ) 1 R2 ), we
know that the first join tree is cheaper than the second. Hence, we could avoid
generating the second alternative and still won’t miss the optimal join tree. The
general principle behind this is the optimality principle (see [178]). For the join
ordering problem, it can be stated as follows.1

Let T be an optimal join tree for relations R1 , . . . , Rn . Then, every

subtree S of T must be an optimal join tree for the relations it
contains.

To see why this holds, assume that the optimal join tree T for relations R1 , . . . , Rn
contains a subtree S which is not optimal. That is, there exists another join
tree S 0 for the relations contained in S with strictly lower costs. Denote by
T 0 the join tree derived by replacing S in T by S 0 . Since S 0 contains the same
relations as S, T 0 is a join tree for the relations R1 , . . . , Rn . The costs of the join
operators in T and T 0 that are not contained in S and S 0 are the same. Then,
since the total cost of a join tree is the sum of the costs of the join operators
and S 0 has lower costs than S, T 0 has lower costs than T . This contradicts the
optimality of T .
The idea of dynamic programming applied to the generation of optimal join
trees now is to generate optimal join trees for subsets of R1 , . . . , Rn in a bottom-
up fashion. First, optimal join trees for subsets of size one, i.e. single relations,
are generated. From these, optimal join trees of size two, three and so on until
n are generated.
Let us first consider generating optimal left-deep trees. There, join trees for
subsets of size k are generated from subsets of size k − 1 by adding a new join
operator whose left argument is a join tree for k − 1 relations and whose right
argument is a single relation. Exchanging left and right gives us the procedure
for generating right-deep trees. If we want to generate zig-zag trees since our
cost function is asymmetric, we have to consider both alternatives and take
the cheapest one. We capture this in a procedure CreateJoinTree that takes
1
The optimality principle does not hold in the presence of properties.
62 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

two join trees as arguments and generates the above-mentioned alternatives.

In case we want to consider different implementations for the join, we have to
perform the above steps for all of them and return the cheapest alternative.
Summarizing, the pseudo-code for CreateJoinTree looks as follows:

CreateJoinTree(T1 , T2 )
Input: two (optimal) join trees T1 and T2 .
for linear trees, we assume that T2 is a single relation
Output: an (optimal) join tree for joining T1 and T2 .
BestTree = NULL;
for all implementations impl do {
if(!RightDeepOnly) {
Tree = T1 1impl T2
if (BestTree == NULL || cost(BestTree) > cost(Tree)) {
BestTree = Tree;
}
}
if(!LeftDeepOnly) {
Tree = T2 1impl T1
if (BestTree == NULL || cost(BestTree) > cost(Tree)) {
BestTree = Tree;
}
}
}
return BestTree;

The boolean variables RightDeepOnly and LeftDeepOnly are used to restrict

the search space to right-deep trees and left-deep trees. If both are false, zig-zag
trees are generated. However, CreateJoinTree also generates bushy trees, if
none of the input trees is a single relation.
In case of linear trees, T2 will be the single relation in all of our algorithms.
CreateJoinTree should not copy T1 or T2 . Instead, the newly generated join
trees should share T1 and T2 by using pointers. Further, the join trees generated
do not really need to be generated except for the final (best) join tree: the cost
functions should be implemented such that they can be evaluated if they are
given the left and right argument of the join.
Using CreateJoinTree, we are now ready to present our first dynamic pro-
gramming algorithm in pseudo-code.

DP-Linear-1({R1 , . . . , Rn })
Input: a set of relations to be joined
Output: an optimal left-deep (right-deep, zig-zag) join tree
for (i = 1; i <= n; ++i) {
BestTree({Ri }) = Ri ;
3.2. DETERMINISTIC ALGORITHMS 63

{R1 R2 R3 R4}

{R1 R2 R4} {R1 R3 R4}

{R1 R2 R3} {R2 R3 R4}

{R1 R4}
{R1 R3} {R2 R4}
{R1 R2} {R3 R4}
{R2 R3}

R1 R2 R3 R4

Figure 3.6: Search space with sharing under optimality principle

}
for (i = 1; i < n; ++i) {
for all S ⊆ {R1 , . . . , Rn }, |S| = i do {
for all Rj ∈ {R1 , . . . , Rn }, Rj 6∈ S do {
if (NoCrossProducts && !connected({Rj }, S)) {
continue;
}
CurrTree = CreateJoinTree(BestTree(S),Rj );
S 0 = S ∪ {Rj };
if (BestTree(S 0 ) == NULL || cost(BestTree(S 0 )) > cost(CurrTree)) {
BestTree(S 0 ) = CurrTree;
}
}
}
}
return BestTree({R1 , . . . , Rn });

NoCrossProducts is a boolean variable indicating whether cross products should

be investigated. Of course, if the join graph is not connected, there must be
a cross product, but for DP-Linear-1 and subsequent algorithms we assume
that it is connected. The boolean function connected returns true, if there is
 64 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

a join predicate between one of the relations in its first argument and one of
the relations in its second. The variable BestTree keeps track of the best join
trees generated for every subset of the relations {R1 , . . . , Rn }. How this is done
may depend on several parameters. The approaches are to use a hash table or
XC search an array of size 2n (−1). Another issue is how to represent the sets of relations.
space size Typically, bitvector representations are used. Then, testing for membership,
difference computing a set’s complement, adding elements and unioning is cheap. Yet
problem another issue is the order in which join trees are generated. The procedure
DP-Linear-1 takes the approach to generate the join trees for subsets of size
1, 2, . . . , n. To do so, it must be able to access the subsets of {R1 , . . . , Rn } or
their respective join trees by their size. One possibility is to chain all the join
trees for subsets of a given size k (1 ≤ k ≤ n) and to use an array of size n to
keep pointers to the start of the lists. In this case, to every join tree the set of
relations it contains is attached, in order to be able to perform the test Ri 6∈ S.
One way to do this is to embed a bitvector into each join tree node.
Figure 3.6 illustrates how the procedure DP-Linear-1 works. In its first
loop, it initializes the bottom row of join trees of size one. Then it computes
the join trees joining exactly two relations. This is indicated by the next group
of join trees. Since the figure leaves out commutativity, only one alternative
join tree for every subset of size two is generated. This changes for subsets of
size three. There, three alternative join trees are generated. Only the best join
tree is retained. This is indicated by the ovals that encircle three join trees.
Only this best join tree of size three is used to generate the final best join tree.
The short clarification after the algorithm already adumbrated that the
order in which join trees are generated is not compulsory. The only necessary
condition is the following.
Let S be a subset of {R1 , . . . , Rn }. Then, before a join tree for S
can be generated, the join trees for all relevant subsets of S must
already be available.
Note that this formulation is general enough to also capture the generation of
bushy trees. It is, however, a little vague due to its reference to “relevance”.
EX For the different join tree classes, this term can be given a precise semantics.
Let us take a look at an alternative order to join tree generation. Assume
that sets of relations are represented as bitvectors. A bitvector is nothing more
than a base two integer. Successive increments of an integer/bitvector lead to
different subsets. Further, the above condition is satisfied. We illustrate this by
a small example. Assume that we have three relations R1 , R2 , R3 . The i-th bit
from the right in a three-bit integer indicates the presence of Ri for 1 ≤ i ≤ 3.
000 {}
001 {R1 }
010 {R2 }
011 {R1 , R2 }
100 {R3 }
101 {R1 , R3 }
110 {R2 , R3 }
111 {R1 , R2 , R3 }
3.2. DETERMINISTIC ALGORITHMS 65

This observation leads to another formulation of our dynamic programming

algorithm. For this algorithm, it is very convenient to use an array of size 2n
to represent BestTree(S) for subsets S of {R1 , . . . , Rn }.

DP-Linear-2({R1 , . . . , Rn })
Input: a set of relations to be joined
Output: an optimal left-deep (right-deep, zig-zag) join tree
for (i = 1; i <= n; ++i) {
BestTree(1 << i) = Ri ;
}
for (S = 1; S < 2n ; ++S) {
if (BestTree(S) != NULL) continue;
for all i ∈ S do {
S 0 = S \ {i};
CurrTree = CreateJoinTree(BestTree(S 0 ),Ri );
if (BestTree(S) == NULL || cost(BestTree(S)) > cost(CurrTree)) {
BestTree(S) = CurrTree;
}
}
}
return BestTree(2n − 1);

DP-Linear-2 differs from DP-Linear-1 not only in the order in which join trees
are generated. Another difference is that it takes cross products into account.
From DP-Linear-2, it is easy to derive an algorithm that explores the space
of bushy trees.

DP-Bushy({R1 , . . . , Rn })
Input: a set of relations to be joined
Output: an optimal bushy join tree
for (i = 1; i <= n; ++i) {
BestTree(1 << i) = Ri ;
}
for (S = 1; S < 2n ; ++S) {
if (BestTree(S) != NULL) continue;
for all S1 ⊂ S do {
S2 = S \ S1 ;
CurrTree = CreateJoinTree(BestTree(S1 ), BestTree(S2 ));
if (BestTree(S) == NULL || cost(BestTree(S)) > cost(CurrTree)) {
BestTree(S) = CurrTree;
}
}
}
return BestTree(2n − 1);
 66 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

This algorithm also takes cross products into account. The critical part is the
generation of all subsets of S. Fortunately, Vance and Maier [778] provide a
code fragment with which subset bitvector representations can be generated
very efficiently. In C, this fragment looks as follows:

S1 = S & - S;
do {
/* do something with subset S1 */
S1 = S & (S1 - S);
} while (S1 != S);

S represents the input set. S1 iterates through all subsets of S where S itself and
the empty set are not considered. Analogously, all supersets an be generated
as follows:

S1 = ~S & - ~S;
/* do something with first superset S1 */
while (S1 ) {
S1 = ~S & (S1 - ~S)
/* do something with superset S1
}
S represents the input set. S1 iterates through all supersets of S including S
itself.

Excursion Problem: exploiting orderings devastates the optimality principle.

XC ToDo Example: . . .

XC ToDo Excursion Pruning . . .

Number of Entries to be stored in the dynamic programming table

If dynamic programming uses a static hash table, determining its size in advance
is necessary as the search space sizes differ vastly for different query graphs.
In general, for every connected subgraph of the query graph one entry must
exist. Chains require far fewer entries than cliques. It would be helpful to
have a small routine solving the following problem: given a query graph, how
many connected subgraph are there? Unfortunatly, this problem is #-P hard
as Sutner, Satyanarayana, and Suffel showed [743]. They build on results by
Valiant [776] and Lichtenstein [478]. (For a definition of #P-hard see the book
by Lewis and Papadimitriou [476] or the original paper by Valiant [775].)
However, for specific cases, these numbers can be given. If cross products
are consideres, the number of join trees stored in the dynamic programming
table is
2n − 1
3.2. DETERMINISTIC ALGORITHMS 67

which is one for each non-empty subset of relations.

If we do not consider cross products, the number of entries in the dynamic
programming table corresponds to the number of connected subgraphs of the
query graph. For connected query graphs, we denote this by #csg. For chains,
cycles, stars, and cliques with n nodes, we have
n(n + 1)
#csgchain (n) = (3.2)
2
#csgcycle (n) = n2 − n + 1 (3.3)
star n−1
#csg (n) = 2 +n−1 (3.4)
clique n
#csg (n) = 2 − 1 (3.5)

These equations can be derived from the following by summing over k > 1
where k gives the size of the connected subset:

#csgchain (n, k) = (n − k + 1)

cycle 1 n=k
#csg (n, k) =
n else

n
k=1
#csgstar (n, k) = n−1
k>1
 k−1
n
#csgclique (n, k) =
k

Number of Join Trees Investigated

The number of join trees investigated by dynamic programming was extensively
studied by Ono and Lohman [552, 553]. In order to estimate these numbers, we
assume that CreateJoinTree produces a single join tree and hence counts as
one although it may evaluate the costs for several join alternatives. We further
do not count the initial join trees containing only a single relation.

Join Trees With Cartesian Product For the analysis of dynamic pro-
gramming variants that do consider cross products, the notion of join-pair is
helpful. Let S1 and S2 be subsets of the nodes (relations) of the query graph.
We say (S1 , S2 ) is a join-pair, if and only if
1. S1 and S2 are disjoint
If (S1 , S2 ) is a join-pair, then (S2 , S1 ) is a join pair. Further, if T1 is a join tree
for the relations in S1 and T2 is one for those in S2 , then we can construct two
valid join trees T1 1 T2 and T2 1 T1 where the joins may be cross products.
Hence, the number of join-pairs coincides with the search space a dynamic pro-
gramming algorithm explores. In fact, the number of join-pairs is the minimum
number of join trees any dynamic programming algorithm that considers cross
products has to investigate.
If CreateJoinTree considers commutativity of joins, the number of calls
to it is precisely expressed by the count of non-symmetric join-pairs. In other
68 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

implementations CreateJoinTree might be called for all join-pairs and, thus,

may not consider commutativity. The two formulas below only count non-
symmetric join pairs.
The numbers of linear and bushy join trees with cartesian product is easiest
to determine. They are independent of the query graph. For linear join trees,
the number of join trees investigated by dynamic programming is equal to the
number of non-symmetric join-pairs which is
n(n + 1)
n2n−1 −
2
Dynamic programming investigates the following number of bushy trees if
cross products are considered.
(3n − 2n+1 + 1)
2
This is equal to the number of non-symmetric join-pairs.

Join Trees without Cross Products In this paragraph, we assume that the
query graph is connected. For the analysis of dynamic programming variants
that do not consider cross products, it is helpful to have the notion of a csg-
cmp-pair. Let S1 and S2 be subsets of the nodes (relations) of the query graph.
We say (S1 , S2 ) is a csg-cmp-pair , if and only if
1. S1 induces a connected subgraph of the query graph,

2. S2 induces a connected subgraph of the query graph,

3. S1 and S2 are disjoint, and

4. there exists at least one edge connected a node in S1 to a node in S2 .

If (S1 , S2 ) is a csg-cmp-pair, then (S2 , S1 ) is a valid csg-cmp-pair. Further, if T1
is a join tree for the relations in S1 and T2 is one for those in S2 , then we can
construct two valid join trees T1 1 T2 and T2 1 T1 . Hence, the number of csg-
cmp-pairs coincides with the search space a dynamic programming algorithm
explores. In fact, the number of csg-cmp-pairs is the minimum number of
join trees any dynamic programming algorithm that does not consider cross
products has to investigate.
If CreateJoinTree considers commutativity of joins, the number of calls
to it is precisely expressed by the count of non-symmetric csg-cmp-pairs. In
other implementations CreateJoinTree might be called for all csg-cmp-pairs
and, thus, may not consider commutativity.
Let us denote the number of non-symmetric csg-cmp-pairs by #ccp. Then
1 3
#ccpchain (n) = (n − n)
6
#ccpcycle (n) = (n3 − 2n2 + n)/2
#ccpstar (n) = (n − 1)2n−2
#ccpclique (n) = (3n − 2n+1 + 1)/2
3.2. DETERMINISTIC ALGORITHMS 69

These numbers have to be multiplied by two if we want to count all csg-cmp-

pairs.
If we do not consider composite inners, that is we restrict ourselves to left-
deep join trees, then dynamic programming makes the following number of calls
to CreateJoinTree for chain queries [553]:

(n − 1)2

The following table presents some results for the above formulas.

without cross products with cross products

chain star any query graph
linear bushy linear linear bushy
n (n − 1)2 (n3 − n)/6 (n − 1)2n−2 n2n−1 − n(n + 1)/2 (3n − 2n+1 + 1)/2
2 1 1 1 1 1
3 4 4 4 6 6
4 9 10 12 22 25
5 16 20 32 65 90
6 25 35 80 171 301
7 36 56 192 420 966
8 49 84 448 988 3025
9 64 120 1024 2259 9330
10 81 165 2304 5065 28501

Compare this table with the actual sizes of the search spaces in Section 3.1.5.
The dynamic programming algorithms can be implemented very efficiently
and often form the core of commercial plan generators. However, they have
the disadvantage that no plan is generated if they run out of time or space
since the search space they have to explore is too big. One possible remedy
goes as follows. Assume that a dynamic programming algorithm is stopped
in the middle of its way through its actual search space. Further assume that
the largest plans generated so far involve k relations. Then the cheapest of the
plans with k relations is completed by applying any heuristics (e.g. MinSel). The
completed plan is then returned. In Section 3.4.5, we will see two alternative
solutions. Another solution is presented in [417].

Generating Bushy Trees without Cross Products

We now discuss dynamic programming algorithms to generate bushy trees with-
out cross products. For this section, we assume that the query graph is con-
nected. We will present three algorithms. The first algorithm (DPsize) gener-
ates its plans in increasing size of subplans and, hence, is a generalization of
DP-Linear-1. The second algorithm (DPsub) geneerates its plans by consider-
ing plans subsets as does DP-Linear-2. An analysis of these two algorithms
reveals that both are far away from the lower bound presented in the previous
sections. Thus, a third algorithm (DPccp) which reaches this lower bound is
presented. The results of this section are taken from [530, 529].
70 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

DPsize
Input: a connected query graph with relations R = {R0 , . . . , Rn−1 }
Output: an optimal bushy join tree without cross products
for all Ri ∈ R {
BestPlan({Ri }) = Ri ;
}
for all 1 < s ≤ n ascending // size of plan
for all 1 ≤ s1 < s { // size of left subplan
s2 = s − s1 ; // size of right subplan
for all S1 ⊂ R : |S1 | = s1
S2 ⊂ R : |S2 | = s2 {
++InnerCounter;
6 S1 ∩ S2 ) continue;
if (∅ =
if not (S1 connected to S2 ) continue;
++CsgCmpPairCounter;
p1 =BestPlan(S1 );
p2 =BestPlan(S2 );
CurrPlan = CreateJoinTree(p1 , p2 );
if (cost(BestPlan(S1 ∪ S2 )) > cost(CurrPlan)) {
BestPlan(S1 ∪ S2 ) = CurrPlan;
}
}
}
OnoLohmanCounter = CsgCmpPairCounter / 2;
return BestPlan({R0 , . . . , Rn−1 });

Figure 3.7: Algorithm DPsize

Size-based enumeration: DPsize In general, dynamic programming gen-

erates solutions for a larger problem in a bottom-up fashion by combining so-
lutions for smaller problems. Taking this description literally, we can construct
optimal plans of size n by joining plans P1 and P2 of size k and n − k. We just
have to take care that (1) the sets of relations contained in P1 and P2 do not
overlap, and (2) there is a join predicate connecting a relation P1 with a relation
in P2 . After this remark, we are prepared to understand the pseudocode for
algorithm DPsize (see Fig. 3.7). A table BestPlan associates with each set of
relations the best plan found so far. The algorithm starts by initializing this
table with plans of size one, i.e. single relations. After that, it constructs plans
of increasing size (loop over s). Thereby, the first size considered is two, since
plans of size one have already been constructed. Every plan joining n relations
can be constructed by joining a plan containing s1 relations with a plan con-
taining s2 relations. Thereby, si > 0 and s1 + s2 = n must hold. Thus, the
pseudocode loops over s1 and sets s2 accordingly. Since for every possible size
there exist many plans, two more loops are necessary in order to loop over the
plans of sizes s1 and s2 . Then, conditions (1) and (2) from above are tested.
Only if their outcome is positive, we consider joining the plans p1 and p2 . The
result is a plan CurrPlan. Let S be the relations contained in CurrPlan. If
3.2. DETERMINISTIC ALGORITHMS 71

BestPlan does not contain a plan for the relations in S or the one it contains
is more expensive than CurrPlan, we register CurrPlan with BestPlan.
The algorithm DPsize can be made more efficient in case of s1 = s2 . The
algorithm as stated cycles through all plans p1 joining s1 relations. For each
such plan, all plans p2 of size s2 are tested. Assume that plans of equal size are
represented as a linked list. If s1 = s2 , then it is possible to iterate through the
list for retrieving all plans p1 . For p2 we consider the plans succeeding p1 in the
list. Thus, the complexity can be decreased from s1 ∗s2 to s1 ∗s2 /2 The following
formulas are valid only for the variant of DPsize where this optimization has
been incorporated (see [529] for details).
If the counter InnerCounter is initialized with zero at the beginning of the
algorithm DPsize, then we are able to derive analytically its value after DPsize
terminates. Since this value of the inner counter depends on the query graph,
we have to distinguish several cases. For chain, cycle, star, and clique queries,
chain , I cycle , I star , and I clique the value of InnerCounter
we denote by IDPsize DPsize DPsize DPsize
after termination of algorithm DPsize.
chain (n) =
For chain queries, we then have: IDPsize

1/48(5n4 + 6n3 − 14n2 − 12n)


n even
1/48(5n4 + 6n3 − 14n2 − 6n + 11) n odd
cycle
For cycle queries, we have: IDPsize (n) =
 1 4 3 2
4 (n − n − n ) n even
1 4 3 2 + n) n odd
4 (n − n − n
star (n) =
For star queries, we have: IDPsize
(
22n−4 − 1/4 2(n−1)


n−1
+ q(n) n even
2n−4 2(n−1) n−1


2 − 1/4 n−1 + 1/4 (n−1)/2 + q(n) n odd

with q(n) = n2n−1 − 5 ∗ 2n−3 + 1/2(n2 − 5n + 4). For clique queries, we have:
clique
IDPsize (n) =
(
22n−2 − 5 ∗ 2n−2 + 1/4 2n n



n
− 1/4 n/2 + 1 n even
22n−2 − 5 ∗ 2n−2 + 1/4 2n
n +1 n odd

Note that 2n n √


n is in the order of Θ(4 / n).
Proofs of the above formulas as well as implementation details for the algo-
rithm DPsize can be found in [529].

Subset-Driven Enumeration: DPsub Fig. 3.8 presents the pseudocode for

the algorithm DPsub. The algorithm first initializes the table BestPlan with
all possible plans containing a single relation. Then, the main loop starts. It
iterates over all possible non-empty subsets of {R0 , . . . , Rn−1 } and constructs
the best possible plan for each of them. The enumeration makes use of a
bitvector representation of sets: The integer i induces the current subset S with
72 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

DPsub
Input: a connected query graph with relations R = {R0 , . . . , Rn−1 }
Output: an optimal bushy join tree
for all Ri ∈ R {
BestPlan({Ri }) = Ri ;
}
for 1 ≤ i < 2n − 1 ascending {
S = {Rj ∈ R|(bi/2j c mod 2) = 1}
if not (connected S) continue; // ∗
for all S1 ⊂ S, S1 6= ∅ do {
++InnerCounter;
S2 = S \ S1 ;
if (S2 = ∅) continue;
if not (connected S1 ) continue;
if not (connected S2 ) continue;
if not (S1 connected to S2 ) continue;
++CsgCmpPairCounter;
p1 = BestPlan(S1 );
p2 = BestPlan(S2 );
CurrPlan = CreateJoinTree(p1 , p2 );
if (cost(BestPlan(S)) > cost(CurrPlan)) {
BestPlan(S) = CurrPlan;
}
}
}
OnoLohmanCounter = CsgCmpPairCounter / 2;
return BestPlan({R0 , . . . , Rn−1 });

Figure 3.8: Algorithm DPsub

its binary representation. Taken as bitvectors, the integers in the range from 1
to 2n − 1 exactly represent the set of all non-empty subsets of {R0 , . . . , Rn−1 },
including the set itself. Further, by starting with 1 and incrementing by 1, the
enumeration order is valid for dynamic programming: for every subset, all its
subsets are generated before the subset itself.
This enumeration is very fast, since increment by one is a very fast operation.
However, the relations contained in S may not induce a connected subgraph of
the query graph. Therefore, we must test for connectedness. The goal of the
next loop over all subsets of S is to find the best plan joining all the relations
in S. Therefore, S1 ranges over all non-empty, strict subsets of S. This can be
done very efficiently by applying the code snippet of Vance and Maier [777, 778].
Then, the subset of relations contained in S but not in S1 is assigned to S2 .
Clearly, S1 and S2 are disjoint. Hence, only connectedness tests have to be
performed. Since we want to avoid cross products, S1 and S2 both must induce
connected subgraphs of the query graph, and there must be a join predicate
between a relation in S1 and one in S2 . If these conditions are fulfilled, we can
construct a plan CurrPlan by joining the plans associated with S1 and S2 . If
3.2. DETERMINISTIC ALGORITHMS 73

BestPlan does not contain a plan for the relations in S or the one it contains
is more expensive than CurrPlan, we register CurrPlan with BestPlan.
chain , I cycle ,
For chain, cycle, star, and clique queries, we denote by IDPsub DPsub
star , and I clique
IDPsub DPsub the value of InnerCounter after termination of algorithm
DPsub.
For chains, we have
chain
IDPsub (n) = 2n+2 − nn − 3n − 4 (3.6)

For cycles, we have

cycle
IDPsub (n) = n2n + 2n − 2n2 − 2 (3.7)

For stars, we have

star
IDPsub (n) = 2 ∗ 3n−1 − 2n (3.8)
For cliques, we have
clique
IDPsub (n) = 3n − 2n+1 + 1 (3.9)

The number of failures for the additional check can easily be calculated as
2n − #csg(n) − 1.

Sample numbers Fig. 3.9 contains tables with values produced by our for-
mulas for input query graph sizes between 2 and 20. For different kinds of query
graphs, it shows the number of csg-cmp-pairs (#ccp). and the values for the
inner counter after termination of DPsize and DPsub applied to the different
query graphs.
Looking at these numbers, we observe the following:

• For chain and cycle queries, the DPsize soon becomes much faster than
DPsub.

• For star and clique queries, the DPsub soon becomes much faster than
DPsize.

• Except for clique queries, the number of csg-cmp-pairs is orders of mag-

nitude less than the value of InnerCounter for all DP-variants.

From the latter observation we can conclude that in almost all cases the tests
performed by both algorithms in their innermost loop fail. Both algorithms
are far away from the theoretical lower bound given by #ccp. This conclusion
motivates us to derive a new algorithm whose InnerCounter value is equal to
the number of csg-cmp-pairs.

Csg-cmp-pair enumeration-based algorithm: DPccp The algorithm DPsub

solves the join ordering problem for a given subset S of relations by considering
all pairs of disjoint subproblems which were already solved. Since the enumer-
ation of subsets is very fast, this is a very efficient strategy if the search space
is dense, e.g. for clique queries. However, if the search space is sparse, e.g. for
74 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

Chain Cycle
n #ccp DPsub DPsize #ccp DPsub DPsize
2 1 2 1 1 2 1
5 20 84 73 40 140 120
10 165 3962 1135 405 11062 2225
15 560 130798 5628 1470 523836 11760
20 1330 4193840 17545 3610 22019294 37900
Star Clique
n #ccp DPsub DPsize #ccp DPsub DPsize
2 1 2 1 1 2 1
5 32 130 110 90 180 280
10 2304 38342 57888 28501 57002 306991
15 114688 9533170 57305929 7141686 14283372 307173877
20 4980736 2323474358 59892991338 1742343625 3484687250 309338182241

Figure 3.9: Size of the search space for different graph structures

chain queries, the DPsub algorithm considers many subproblems which are not
connected and, therefore, are not relevant for the solution, i.e. the tests in the
innermost loop fail for the majority of cases. The main idea of our algorithm
DPccp is that it only considers pairs of connected subproblems. More precisely,
the algorithm considers exactly the csg-cmp-pairs of a graph.
Thus, our goal is to efficiently enumerate all csg-cmp-pairs (S1 , S2 ). Clearly,
we want to enumerate every pair once and only once. Further, the enumera-
tion must be performed in an order valid for dynamic programming. That is,
whenever a pair (S1 , S2 ) is generated, all non-empty subsets of S1 and S2 must
have been generated before as a component of a pair. The last requirement is
that the overhead for generating a single csg-cmp-pair must be constant or at
most linear. This condition is necessary in order to beat DPsize and DPsub.
If we meet all these requirements, the algorithm DPccp is easily specified:
iterate over all csg-cmp-pairs (S1 , S2 ) and consider joining the best plans as-
sociated with them. Figure 3.10 shows the pseudocode. The first steps of an
example enumeration are shown in Figure 3.11. Thick lines mark the connect-
ed subsets while thin lines mark possible join edges. Note that the algorithm
explicitly exploits join commutativity. This is due to our enumeration algo-
rithm developed below. If (S1 , S2 ) is a csg-cmp-pair, then either (S1 , S2 ) or
(S2 , S1 ) will be generated, but never both of them. An alternative is to modify
CreateJoinTree to take care of commutativity.
We proceed as follows. Next we discuss an algorithm enumerating non-
empty connected subsets S1 of {R0 , . . . , Rn−1 }. Then, we show how to enumer-
ate the complements S2 such that (S1 , S2 ) is a csg-cmp-pair.
Let us start the exposition by fixing some notations. Let G = (V, E) be
an undirected graph. For a node v ∈ V define the neighborhood IN(v) of v as
IN(v) := {v 0 |(v, v 0 ) ∈ E}. For a subset S ⊆ V of V we define the neighborhood of
S as IN(S) := ∪v∈S IN(v) \ S. The neighborhood of a set of nodes thus consists
3.2. DETERMINISTIC ALGORITHMS 75

DPccp
Input: a connected query graph with relations R = {R0 , . . . , Rn−1 }
Output: an optimal bushy join tree
for all Ri ∈ R) {
BestPlan({Ri }) = Ri ;
}
for all csg-cmp-pairs (S1 , S2 ), S = S1 ∪ S2 {
++InnerCounter;
++OnoLohmanCounter;
p1 = BestPlan(S1 );
p2 = BestPlan(S2 );
CurrPlan = CreateJoinTree(p1 , p2 );
if (cost(BestPlan(S)) > cost(CurrPlan)) {
BestPlan(S) = CurrPlan;
}
CurrPlan = CreateJoinTree(p2 , p1 );
if (cost(BestPlan(S)) > cost(CurrPlan)) {
BestPlan(S) = CurrPlan;
}
}
CsgCmpPairCounter = 2 * OnoLohmanCounter;
return BestPlan({R0 , . . . , Rn−1 });

Figure 3.10: Algorithm DPccp

0 1 1 1 1 0 0 0 1
...
2 3 2 3 3 2 3 2 3 2 2 3
Graph 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. ...

Figure 3.11: Enumeration Example for DPccp

of all nodes reachable by a single edge. Note that for all S, S 0 ⊂ V we have
IN(S ∪ S 0 ) = (IN(S) ∪ IN(S 0 )) \ (S ∪ S 0 ). This allows for an efficient bottom-up
calculation of neighborhoods.
The following statement gives a hint on how to construct an enumeration
procedure for connected subsets. Let S be a connected subset of an undirected
graph G and S 0 be any subset of IN(S). Then S ∪ S 0 is connected. As a
consequence, a connected subset can be enlarged by adding any subset of its
neighborhood.
We could generate all connected subsets as follows. For every node vi ∈ V
we perform the following enumeration steps: First, we emit {vi } as a connected
subset. Then, we expand {vi } by calling a routine that extends a given connect-
ed set to bigger connected sets. Let the routine be called with some connected
set S. It then calculates the neighborhood IN(S). For every non-empty subset
76 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

R0

R1 R2 R3

R4

Figure 3.12: Sample graph to illustrate EnumerateCsgRec

N ⊆ IN(S), it emits S 0 = S ∪ N as a further connected subset and recursively

calls itself with S 0 . The problem with this routine is that it produces duplicates.
This is the point where the breadth-first numbering comes into play. Let
V = {v0 , . . . , vn−1 }, where the indices are consistent with a breadth-first num-
bering produced by a breadth-first search starting at node v0 [179]. The idea
is to use the numbering to define an enumeration order: In order to avoid du-
plicates, the algorithm enumerates connected subgraphs for every node vi , but
restricts them to contain no vj with j < i. Using the definition Bi = {vj |j ≤ i},
the pseudocode looks as follows:
EnumerateCsg
Input: a connected query graph G = (V, E)
Precondition: nodes in V are numbered according to a breadth-first search
Output: emits all subsets of V inducing a connected subgraph of G
for all i ∈ [n − 1, . . . , 0] descending {
emit {vi };
EnumerateCsgRec(G, {vi }, Bi );
}

EnumerateCsgRec(G, S, X)
N = IN(S) \ X;
for all S 0 ⊆ N , S 0 6= ∅, enumerate subsets first {
emit (S ∪ S 0 );
}
for all S 0 ⊆ N , S 0 6= ∅, enumerate subsets first {
EnumerateCsgRec(G, (S ∪ S 0 ), (X ∪ N ));
}

Let us consider an example. Figure 3.12 contains a query graph whose

nodes are numbered in a breadth-first fashion. The calls to EnumerateCsgRec
are contained in the table in Figure 3.13. In this table, S and X are the
arguments of EnumerateCsgRec. N is the local variable after its initialization.
The column emit/S contains the connected subset emitted, which then becomes
the argument of the recursive call to EnumerateCsgRec (labelled by →). Since
listing all calls is too lengthy, only a subset of the calls is listed.
Generating the connected subsets is an important first step but clearly not
sufficient: we have to generate all csg-cmp-pairs. The basic idea to do so is
as follows. Algorithm EnumerateCsg is used to create the first component S1
3.2. DETERMINISTIC ALGORITHMS 77

EnumerateCsgRec
S X N emit/S
{4} {0, 1, 2, 3, 4} ∅
{3} {0, 1, 2, 3} {4}
{3, 4}
{2} {0, 1, 2} {3, 4}
{2, 3}
{2, 4}
{2, 3, 4}
{1} {0, 1} {4}
{1, 4}
→ {1, 4} {0, 1, 4} {2, 3}
{1, 2, 4}
{1, 3, 4}
{1, 2, 3, 4}
{0} {0} {1, 2, 3}
{0, 1}
{0, 2}
{0, 3}
{0, 1, 2}
{0, 1, 3}
{0, 2, 3}
{0, 1, 2, 3}
→ {0, 1} {0, 1, 2, 3} {4}
{0, 1, 4}
→ {0, 2} {0, 1, 2, 3} {4}
{0, 2, 4}

Figure 3.13: Call sequence for Figure 3.12

of every csg-cmp-pair. Then, for each such S1 , we generate all its complement
components S2 . This can be done by calling EnumerateCsgRec with the correct
parameters. Remember that we have to generate every csg-cmp-pair once and
only once.
To achieve this, we use a similar technique as for connected subsets, using
the breadth-first numbering to define an enumeration order: we consider only
sets S2 in the complement of S1 (with (S1 , S2 ) being a csg-cmp-pair) such that
S2 contains only vj with j larger than any i with vi ∈ S1 . This avoids the
generation of duplicates.
We need some definitions to state the actual algorithm. Let S1 ⊆ V be
a non-empty subset of V . Then, we define min(S1 ) := min({i|vi ∈ S1 }).
This is used to extract the starting node from which S1 was constructed (see
Lemma ??). Let W ⊂ V be a non-empty subset of V . Then, we define
Bi (W ) := {vj |vj ∈ W, j ≤ i}. Using this notation, the algorithm to construct
all S2 for a given S1 such that (S1 , S2 ) is a csg-cmp-pair looks as follows:
 78 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

EnumerateCmp
Input: a connected query graph G = (V, E), a connected subset S1
Precondition: nodes in V are numbered according to a breadth-first search
Output: emits all complements S2 for S1 such that (S1 , S2 ) is a csg-cmp-pair
X = Bmin(S1 ) ∪ S1 ;
N = IN(S1 ) \ X;
for all (vi ∈ N by descending i) {
emit {vi };
EnumerateCsgRec(G, {vi }, X ∪ (Bi ∩ N ));
}

Algorithm EnumerateCmp considers all neighbors of S1 . First, they are used to

determine those S2 that contain only a single node. Then, for each neighbor of
S1 , it recursively calls EnumerateCsgRec to create those S2 that contain more
than a single node. Note that here both nodes concerning the enumeration
of S1 (Bmin(S1 ) ∪ S1 ) and nodes concerning the enumeration of S2 (N ) have
to be considered in order to guarantee a correct enumeration. Otherwise the
combined algorithm would emit (commutative) duplicates.
Let us consider an example for algorithm EnumerateCmp. The underlying
graph is again the one shown in Fig. 3.12. Assume EnumerateCmp is called with
S1 = {R1 }. In the first statement, the set {R0 , R1 } is assigned to X. Then, the
neighborhood is calculated. This results in

N = {R0 , R4 } \ {R0 , R1 } = {R4 }.

Hence, {R4 } is emitted and together with {R1 }, it forms the csg-cmp-pair
({R1 }, {R4 }). Then, the recursive call to EnumerateCsgRec follows with ar-
guments G, {R4 }, and {R0 , R1 , R4 }. Subsequent EnumerateCsgRec generates
the connected sets {R2 , R4 }, {R3 , R4 }, and {R2 , R3 , R4 }, giving three more
csg-cmp-pairs.

3.2.5 Memoization
Whereas dynamic programming constructs the join trees iteratively from small
trees to larger trees, i.e. works bottom up, memoization works recursively. For a
given set of relations S, it produces the best join tree for S by recursively calling
itself for every subset S1 of S and considering all join trees between S1 and its
complement S2 . The best alternative is memoized (hence the name). The rea-
son is that two (even different) (sub-) sets of all relations may very well have the
common subsets. For example, {R1 , R2 , R3 , R4 , R5 } and {R2 , R3 , R4 , R5 , R6 }
have the common subset {R2 , R3 , R4 , R5 }. In order to avoid duplicate work,
memoization is essential.
In the following variant of memoization, we explore the search space of all
EX bushy trees and consider cross products. We split the functionality across two
functions. The first one initializes the BestTree data structure with single
relation join trees for Ri and then calls the second one. The second one is the
core memoization procedure which calls itself recursively.
3.2. DETERMINISTIC ALGORITHMS 79

MemoizationJoinOrdering(R)
Input: a set of relations R
Output: an optimal join tree for R
for (i = 1; i <= n; ++i) {
BestTree({Ri }) = Ri ;
}
return MemoizationJoinOrderingSub(R);

MemoizationJoinOrderingSub(S)
Input: a (sub-) set of relations S
Output: an optimal join tree for S
if(NULL == BestTree(S)) {
for all S1 ⊂ S do {
S2 = S \ S1 ;
CurrTree = CreateJoinTree(MemoizationJoinOrderingSub(S1 ), MemoizationJoinOrderingSub(
if (BestTree(S) == NULL || cost(BestTree(S)) > cost(CurrTree)) {
BestTree(S) = CurrTree;
}
}
}
return BestTree(S);

Again, pruning techniques can help to speed up plan generation [688]. ToDo?

3.2.6 Join Ordering by Generating Permutations

For any set of cost functions, we can directly generate permutations. Gen-
erating all permutations is clearly too expensive for more than a couple of
relations. However, we can safely neglect some of them. Consider the join
sequence R1 R2 R3 R4 . If we know that R1 R3 R2 is cheaper than R1 R2 R3 , we
do not have to consider R1 R2 R3 R4 . The idea of the following algorithm is to
construct permutations by successively adding relations. Thereby, an extended
sequence is only explored if exchanging the last two relations does not result in
a cheaper sequence.

ConstructPermutations(Query Specification)
Input: query specification for relations {R1 , . . . , Rn }
Output: optimal left-deep tree
BestPermutation = NULL;
Prefix = ;
Rest = {R1 , . . . , Rn };
ConstructPermutationsSub(Prefix, Rest);
return BestPermutation
 80 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

ConstructPermutationsSub(Prefix, Rest)
Input: a prefix of a permutation and the relations to be added (Rest)
Ouput: none, side-effect on BestPermutation
if (Rest == ∅) {
if (BestPermutation == NULL || cost(Prefix) < cost(BestPermutation)) {
BestPermutation = Prefix;
}
return
}
foreach (Ri , Rj ∈ Rest) {
if (cost(Prefix ◦ hRi , Rj i) ≤ cost(Prefix ◦ hRj , Ri i)) {
ConstructPermutationsSub(Prefix ◦ hRi i, Rest \ {Ri });
}
if (cost(Prefix ◦ hRj , Ri i) ≤ cost(Prefix ◦ hRi , Rj i)) {
ConstructPermutationsSub(Prefix ◦ hRj i, Rest \ {Rj });
}
}
return

The algorithm can be made more efficient, if the foreach loop considers only
a single relation and performs the swap test with this relation and the last
relation occurring in Prefix.
The algorithm has two main advantages over dynamic programming and
memoization. The first advantage is that it needs only linear space opposed
to exponential space for the two mentioned alternatives. The other main
advantage over dynamic programming is that it generates join trees early,
whereas with dynamic programming we only generate a plan after the whole
search space has been explored. Thus, if the query contains too many joins—
that is, the search space cannot be fully explored in reasonable time and
space—dynamic programming will not generate any plan at all. If stopped,
ConstructPermutations will not necessarily compute the best plan, but still
some plans have been investigated. This allows us to stop it after some time
limit has exceeded. The time limit itself can be fixed, like 100 ms, or variable,
like 5% of the execution time of the best plan found so far.
The predicates in the if statement can be made more efficient if a (local)
ranking function is available. Further speed-up of the algorithm can be achieved
if additionally the idea of memoization is applied (of course, this jeopardizes
the small memory footprint).
The following variant might be interesting if one is willing to go from linear
space consumption to quadratic space consumption. The original algorithm
is then started n times, once for each relation as a starting relation. The n
different instantiations then have to run interleaved. This variant reduces the
dependency on the starting relation.
ToDo/EX Worst Case Analysis
ToDo/EX Pruning/memoization/propagation
3.2. DETERMINISTIC ALGORITHMS 81

3.2.7 A Dynamic Programming based Heuristics for Chain Queries

In Section 3.1.6, we saw that the complexity of producing optimal left-deep
trees possibly containing cross products for chain queries is an open problem.
However, the case does not seem to be hopeless. In fact, Scheufele and Mo-
erkotte present two algorithms [655, 657] for this problem. For one algorithm,
it can be proven that it has polynomial runtime, for the other, it can be proven
that it produces the optimal join tree. However, for none of them both could
be proven so far.

Basic Definitions and Lemmata

An instance of the join-ordering problem for chain queries (or a chain query
for short) is fully described by the following parameters. First, n relations
R1 , . . . , Rn are given. The size of relation Ri (1 ≤ i ≤ n) is denoted by |Ri | or
nRi . Second, the query graph G on the set of relations R1 , . . . , Rn must be a
chain. That is, its edges are {(Ri , Ri+1 ) | 1 ≤ i < n}:
R1 — R2 — . . . — Rn
For every edge (Ri , Ri+1 ), there is an associated selectivity fi,i+1 = |Ri 1
Ri+1 |/|Ri × Ri+1 |. We define all other selectivities fi,j = 1 for |i − j| =
6 1. They
correspond to cross products.
In this section we consider only left-deep processing trees. However, we
allow them to contain cross products. Hence, any permutation is a valid join
tree. There is a unique correspondence not only between left-deep join trees
but also between consecutive parts of a permutation and segments of a left-
deep tree. Furthermore, if a segment of a left-deep tree does not contain cross
products, it uniquely corresponds to a consecutive part of the chain in the query
graph. In this case, we also speak of (sub)chains or connected (sub)sequences.
We say that two relations Ri and Rj are connected if they are adjacent in G;
more generally, two sequences s and t are connected if there exist relations Ri
in s and Rj in t such that Ri and Rj are connected. A sequence of relations s
is connected if for all subsequences s1 and s2 satisfying s = s1 s2 it holds that
s1 is connected to s2 .
Given a chain query, we ask for a permutation s = r1 . . . rn of the n relations
(i.e. there is a permutation π such that ri = Rπ(i) for 1 ≤ i ≤ n) that produces
minimal costs under the cost function Cout .
Remember that the dynamic programming approach considers n2n−1 −n(n+
1)/2 alternatives for left-deep processing trees with cross products—independently
of the query graph and the cost function. The question arises whether it is pos-
sible to lower the complexity in case of simple chain queries.
The IKKBZ algorithm solves the join ordering problem for tree queries by
decomposing the problem into polynomially many subproblems which are sub-
ject to tree-like precedence constraints. The precedence constraints ensure that
the cost functions of the subproblems now have the ASI property. The remain-
ing problem is to optimize the constrained subproblems under the simpler cost
function. Unfortunately, this approach does not work in our case, since no such
decomposition seems to exist.
82 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

Let us introduce some notions used for the algorithms. We have to gener-
alize the rank used in the IKKBZ algorithm to relativized ranks. We start by
relativizing the cost function. The costs of a sequence s relative to a sequence
u are defined as

Cu () := 0
Cu (Ri ) := 0 if u = 
Y
Cu (Ri ) := ( fj,i )ni if u 6= 
Rj <uRi Ri

Cu (s1 s2 ) := Cu (s1 ) + Tu (s1 ) ∗ Cus1 (s2 )

with

Tu () := 1
Y Y
Tu (s) := ( fj,i ) ∗ ni
Ri ∈s Rj <us Ri

Here, Ri <s Rj is true if and only if Ri appears before Rj in s. As usual, empty

products evaluate to 1. Several things should be noted. First, Cus (t) = Cu (t)
holds if there is no connection between relations in s and t. Second, T (Ri ) =
|Ri | and T (s) = |s|. That is, Tu generalizes the size of a single relation or of a
sequence of relations. Third, note that Cu () = 0 for all u but C (s) = 0 only
if s does not contain more than one relation. The special case that C (R) = 0
for a single relation R causes some problems in the homogeneity of definitions
and proofs. Hence, we abandon this case from all definitions and lemmata of
this section. This will not be repeated in every definition and lemma, but will
implicitly be assumed. Further, the two algorithms will be presented in two
versions. The first version is simpler and relies on a modified cost function C 0 ,
and only the second version will apply to the original cost function C. As we
will see, C 0 differs from C in exactly the problematic case in which it is defined
as Cu0 (Ri ) := |Ri |. Now, C0 (s) = 0 holds if and only if s =  holds. Within
subsequent definitions and lemmata, C can also be replaced by C 0 without
changing their validity. Last, we abbreviate C by C for convenience.

Example 1: Consider a chain query involving the relations R1 , R2 , R3 . The

parameters are |R1 | = 1, |R2 | = 100, |R3 | = 10 and f1,2 = f2,3 = 0.9. The
expected size of the query result is independent of the ordering of the relations.
Hence, we have

T (R1 R2 R3 ) = · · · = T (R3 R2 R1 ) = 100 ∗ 10 ∗ 1 ∗ .9 ∗ .9 = 810.

3.2. DETERMINISTIC ALGORITHMS 83

There are 6 possible orderings of the relations with the following costs:
C(R1 R2 R3 ) = 1 ∗ 100 ∗ 0.9 + 1 ∗ 100 ∗ 10 ∗ 0.9 ∗ 0.9 = 900
C(R1 R3 R2 ) = 1 ∗ 10 + 1 ∗ 10 ∗ 100 ∗ 0.9 ∗ 0.9 = 820
C(R2 R3 R1 ) = 100 ∗ 10 ∗ 0.9 + 100 ∗ 10 ∗ 1 ∗ 0.9 ∗ 0.9 = 1710
C(R2 R1 R3 ) = C(R1 R2 R3 )
C(R3 R1 R2 ) = C(R1 R3 R2 )
C(R3 R2 R1 ) = C(R2 R3 R1 )
Note that the cost function is invariant with respect to the order of the first two
relations. The minimum over all costs is 820, and the corresponding optimal
join ordering is R1 R3 R2 .
2
Using the relativized cost function, we can define the relativized rank.
Definition 3.2.8 (rank) The rank of a sequence s relative to a non-empty
sequence u is given by
Tu (s) − 1
ranku (s) :=
Cu (s)
In the special case that s consists of a single relation Ri , the intuition behind
the rank function becomes transparent. Let fi be the product of the selectivities
between relations in u and Ri . Then ranku (Ri ) = fif|R i |−1
i |Ri |
. Hence, the rank
becomes a function of the form f (x) = x−1 x . This function is monotonously
increasing in x for x > 0. The argument to the function f (x) is (for the
computation of the size of a single relation Ri ) fi |Ri |. But this is the factor by
which the next intermediate result will increase (or decrease). Since we sum up
intermediate results, this is an essential number. Furthermore, it follows from
the monotonicity of f (x) that ranku (Ri ) ≤ ranku (Rj ) if and only if fi |Ri | ≤
fj |Rj | where fj is the product of all selectivities between Rj and relations in u.

Example 1 (cont’d): Supposing the query given in Example 1, the optimal

sequence R1 R3 R2 gives rise to the following ranks.
TR1 (R2 )−1 100∗0.9−1
rankR1 (R2 ) = CR1 (R2 ) = 100∗0.9 ≈ 0.9888
TR1 (R3 )−1
rankR1 (R3 ) = C R1 (R3 )
= 10∗1.0−1
10∗1.0 = 0.9
TR1 R3 (R2 )−1
rankR1 R3 (R2 ) = C R1 R3 (R2 )
= 100∗0.9∗0.9−1
100∗0.9∗0.9 ≈ 0.9877

Hence, within the optimal sequence, the relation with the smallest rank (here
R3 , since rankR1 (R3 ) < rankR1 (R2 )) is preferred. As the next lemma will
show, this is no accident.
2
Using the rank function, the following lemma can be proved.
Lemma 3.2.9 For sequences

S = r1 · · · rk−1 rk rk+1 rk+2 · · · rn

S 0 = r1 · · · rk−1 rk+1 rk rk+2 · · · rn
84 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

the following holds:

C(S) ≤ C(S 0 ) ⇔ ranku (rk ) ≤ ranku (rk+1 )

where u = r1 · · · rk−1 . Equality only holds if it holds on both sides.

Example 1 (cont’d): Since the ranks of the relations in Example 1 are

ordered with ascending ranks, Lemma 3.2.9 states that, whenever we exchange
two adjacent relations, the costs cannot decrease. In fact, we observe that
C(R1 R3 R2 ) ≤ C(R1 R2 R3 ). 2
An analogous lemma still holds for two unconnected subchains:

Lemma 3.2.10 Let u, x and y be three subchains where x and y are not inter-
connected. Then we have:

C(uxy) ≤ C(uyx) ⇔ ranku (x) ≤ ranku (y)

Equality only holds if it holds on both sides.

Next, we define the notion of a contradictory chain, which will be essential

to the algorithms. The subsequent lemmata will allow us to cut down the search
space to be explored by any optimization algorithm.

Definition 3.2.11 (contradictory pair of subchains) Let u, x, y be nonemp-

ty sequences. We call (x, y) a contradictory pair of subchains if and only if

Cu (xy) ≤ Cu (yx) ∧ ranku (x) > rankux (y)

A special case occurs when x and y are single relations. Then the above condi-
tion simplifies to
rankux (y) < ranku (x) ≤ ranku (y)
To explain the intuition behind the definition of contradictory subchains, we
need another example.

Example 2: Suppose a chain query involving R1 , R2 , R3 is given. The relation

sizes are |R1 | = 1, |R2 | = |R3 | = 10 and the selectivities are f1,2 = 0.5, f2,3 =
0.2. Consider the sequences R1 R2 R3 and R1 R3 R2 , which differ in the order of
the last two relations. We have

rankR1 (R2 ) = 0.8

rankR1 R2 (R3 ) = 0.0
rankR1 (R3 ) = 0.9
rankR1 R3 (R2 ) = 0.5

and

C(R1 R2 R3 ) = 15
C(R1 R3 R2 ) = 20
3.2. DETERMINISTIC ALGORITHMS 85

Hence,

rankR1 (R2 ) > rankR1 R2 (R3 )

rankR1 (R3 ) > rankR1 R3 (R2 )
C(R1 R2 R3 ) < C(R1 R3 R2 )

and (R2 , R3 ) is a contradictory pair within R1 R2 R3 . Now the use of the term
contradictory becomes clear: the costs do not behave as could be expected from
the ranks. 2
The next (obvious) lemma states that contradictory chains are necessarily
connected.

Lemma 3.2.12 If there is no connection between two subchains x and y, then

they cannot build a contradictory pair (x, y).

Now we present the fact that between a contradictory pair of relations, there
cannot be any other relation not connected to them without increasing cost.

Lemma 3.2.13 Let S = usvtw be a sequence. If there is no connection between

relations in s and v and relations in v and t, and ranku (s) ≥ rankus (t), then
there exists a sequence S 0 not having higher costs, where s immediately precedes
t.

Example 3: Consider five relations R1 , . . . , R5 . The relation sizes are |R1 | =

1, |R2 | = |R3 | = |R4 | = 8, and |R5 | = 2. The selectivities are f1,2 = 12 ,
f2,3 = 14 , f3,4 = 81 , and f4,5 = 12 . Relation R5 is not connected to relations R2
and R3 . Further, within the sequence R1 R2 R5 R3 R4 relations R2 and R3 have
contradictory ranks: rankR1 (R2 ) = 4−1 3 2−1
4 = 4 and rankR1 R2 R5 (R3 ) = 2 = 2 .
1

Hence, at least one of R1 R5 R2 R3 R4 and R1 R2 R3 R5 R4 must be of no greater

cost than R1 R2 R5 R3 R4 . This is indeed the case:

C(R1 R2 R3 R5 R4 ) = 4 + 8 + 16 + 8 = 36
C(R1 R2 R5 R3 R4 ) = 4 + 8 + 16 + 8 = 36
C(R1 R5 R2 R3 R4 ) = 2 + 8 + 16 + 8 = 34
2
The next lemma shows that, if there exist two sequences of single rank-
sorted relations, then their costs as well as their ranks are necessarily equal.

Lemma 3.2.14 Let S = x1 · · · xn and S 0 = y1 · · · yn be two different rank-

sorted chains containing exactly the relations R1 , . . . , Rn , i.e.

rankx1 ···xi−1 (xi ) ≤ rankx1 ···xi (xi+1 ) for all 1 ≤ i ≤ n,

ranky1 ···yi−1 (yi ) ≤ ranky1 ···yi (yi+1 ) for all 1 ≤ i ≤ n,

then S and S 0 have equal costs and, furthermore,

rankx1 ···xi−1 (xi ) = ranky1 ···yi−1 (yi ) for all 1 < i ≤ n

86 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

One could conjecture that the following generalization of Lemma 3.2.14 is

true, although no one has proved it so far.
Conjecture 3.2.1 Let S = x1 · · · xn and S 0 = y1 · · · ym be two different rank-
sorted chains for the relations R1 . . . , Rn where the x0i s and yi0 s are subsequences
such that

rankx1 ···xi−1 (xi ) ≤ rankx1 ···xi (xi+1 ) for all 1 ≤ i < n,

ranky1 ···yi−1 (yi ) ≤ ranky1 ···yi (yi+1 ) for all 1 ≤ i < m,

and the subsequences xi and yj are all optimal (with respect to the fixed prefixes
x1 . . . xi−1 and y1 . . . yj−1 ), then S and S 0 have equal costs.
Consider the problem of merging two optimal unconnected chains. If we
knew that the ranks of relations in an optimal chain are always sorted in as-
cending order, we could use the classical merge procedure to combine the two
chains. The resulting chain would also be rank-sorted in ascending order and,
according to Lemma 3.2.14, it would be optimal. Unfortunately, this does not
work, since there are optimal chains whose ranks are not sorted in ascending
order: those containing sequences with contradictory ranks.
Now, as shown in Lemma 3.2.13, between contradictory pairs of relations
there cannot be any other relation not connected to them. Hence, in the merging
process, we have to take care that we do not merge a contradictory pair of
relations with a relation not connected to the pair. In order to achieve this,
we apply the same trick as in the IKKBZ algorithm: we tie the relations of a
contradictory subchain together by building a compound relation. Assume that
we tie together the relations r1 , . . . , rn to a new relation r1,...,n . Then we define
the size of r1,...,n as |r1,...,n | = |r1 1 . . . 1 rn | Further, if some ri (1 ≤ i ≤ n)
does have a connection to some rk 6∈ {r1 , . . . , rn } then we define the selectivity
factor fr1,...,n ,rk between rk and r1,...,n as fr1,...,n ,rk = fi,k .
If we tie together contradictory pairs, the resulting chain of compound re-
lations still does not have to be rank-sorted with respect to the compound
relations. To overcome this, we iterate the process of tying contradictory pairs
of compound relations together until the sequence of compound relations is
rank-sorted, which will eventually be the case. That is, we apply the normal-
ization as used in the IKKBZ algorithm. However, we have to reformulate it
for relativized costs and ranks:

Normalize(p,s)
while (there exist subsequences u, v (u 6= ) and
compound relations x, y such that s = uxyv
and Cpu (xy) ≤ Cpu (yx)
and rankpu (x) > rankpux (y)) {
replace xy by a compound relation (x, y);
}
return (p, s);
3.2. DETERMINISTIC ALGORITHMS 87

The compound relations in the result of the procedure Normalize are called
contradictory chains. A maximal contradictory subchain is a contradictory sub-
chain that cannot be made longer by further tying steps. Resolving the tyings
introduced in the procedure normalize is called de-normalization. It works the
same way as in the IKKBZ algorithm. The cost, size and rank functions can
now be extended to sequences containing compound relations in a straightfor-
ward way. We define the cost of a sequence containing compound relations to
be identical with the cost of the corresponding de-normalized sequence. The
size and rank functions are defined analogously.
The following simple observation is central to the algorithms: every chain
can be decomposed into a sequence of adjacent maximal contradictory sub-
chains. For convenience, we often speak of chains instead of subchains and of
contradictory chains instead of maximal contradictory subchains. The mean-
ing should be clear from the context. Further, we note that the decomposi-
tion into adjacent maximal contradictory subchains is not unique. For exam-
ple, consider an optimal subchain r1 r2 r3 and a sequence u of preceding rela-
tions. If ranku (r1 ) > rankur1 (r2 ) > rankur1 r2 (r3 ) one can easily show that
both (r1 , (r2 , r3 )) and ((r1 , r2 ), r3 ) are contradictory subchains. Nevertheless,
this ambiguity is not important since in the following we are only interest-
ed in contradictory subchains which are optimal . In this case, the condition
Cu (xy) ≤ Cu (yx) is certainly true and can therefore be neglected. One can
show that for the case of optimal subchains the indeterministically defined nor-
malization process is well-defined, that is, if S is optimal, normalize(P,S) will
always terminate with a unique “flat” decomposition of S into maximal contra-
dictory subchains (flat means that we remove all but the outermost parenthesis,
e.g. (R1 R2 )(((R5 R4 )R3 )R6 ) becomes (R1 R2 )(R5 R4 R3 R6 )).
The next two lemmata and the conjecture show a possible way to overcome
the problem that if we consider cross products, we have an unconstrained or-
dering problem and the idea of Monma and Sidney as exploited in the IKKBZ
algorithm is no longer applicable. The next lemma is a direct consequence of
the normalization procedure.

Lemma 3.2.15 Let S = s1 . . . sm be an optimal chain consisting of the maxi-

mal contradictory subchains s1 , . . . , sm (as determined by the function normalize).
Then
rank(s1 ) ≤ ranks1 (s2 ) ≤ ranks1 s2 (s3 )
≤ · · · ≤ ranks1 ...sm−1 (sm ),
in other words, the (maximal) contradictory subchains in an optimal chain are
always sorted by ascending ranks.

The next result shows how to build an optimal sequence from two optimal
non-interconnected sequences.

Lemma 3.2.16 Let x and y be two optimal sequences of relations where x and
y are not interconnected. Then the sequence obtained by merging the maximal
contradictory subchains in x and y (as obtained by normalize) according to
their ascending rank is optimal.
88 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

Merging two sequences in the way described in Lemma 3.2.16 is a funda-

mental process. We henceforth refer to it by simply saying that we merge by
the ranks.
We strongly conjecture that the following generalization of Lemma 3.2.14
is true, although it is yet unproven. It uses the notion of optimal recursive
decomposable subchains defined in the next subsection.

Conjecture 3.2.2 Consider two sequences S and T containing exactly the re-
lations R1 ,. . . ,Rn . Let S = s1 . . . sk and T = t1 . . . tl be such that each of the
maximal contradictory subchains si , i = 1, . . . , k and tj , j = 1, . . . , l are optimal
recursively decomposable. Then S and T have equal costs.

The first algorithm

We first use a slightly modified cost function C 0 , which additionally respects
the size of the first relation in the sequence, i.e. C and C 0 relate via

C(s) + |nR |, if u =  and s = Rs0


0
Cu (s) =
Cu (s), otherwise

This cost function can be treated in a more elegant way than C. The new rank
function is now defined as ranku (s) := (Tu (s) − 1)/Cu0 (s). Note that the rank
function is now defined even if u =  and s is a single relation. The size function
remains unchanged. At the end of this subsection, we describe how our results
can be adapted to the original cost function C.
The rank of a contradictory chain depends on the relative position of the
relations that are directly connected to it. For example, the rank of the con-
tradictory subchain (R5 R3 R4 R2 ) depends on the position of the neighbouring
relations R1 and R6 relative to (R5 R3 R4 R2 ). That is, whether they appear be-
fore or after the sequence (R5 R3 R4 R2 ). Therefore, we introduce the following
fundamental definitions:

Definition 3.2.17 (neighbourhood) We call the set of relations that are di-
rectly connected to a subchain (with respect to the query graph G) the complete
neighbourhood of that subchain. A neighbourhood is a subset of the complete
neighbourhood. The complement of a neighbourhood u of a subchain s is defined
as v \ u, where v denotes the complete neighbourhood of s.

Note that the neighbourhood of a subchain s within a larger chain us is unique-

ly determined by the subsequence u of relations preceding it. For convenience,
we will often use sequences of preceding relations to specify neighbourhoods.
We henceforth denote a pair consisting of a connected sequence s and a neigh-
bourhood u by [s]u .

Definition 3.2.18 (contradictory subchain, extent) A contradictory sub-

chain [s]u is inductively defined as follows.

1. For a single relation s, [s]u is a contradictory subchain.

3.2. DETERMINISTIC ALGORITHMS 89

2. There is a decomposition s = vw such that (v, w) is a contradictory pair

with respect to the preceding subsequence u and both [v]u and [w]uv are
contradictory subchains themselves.

The extent of a contradictory chain [s]u is defined as the pair consisting of

the neighbourhood u and the set of relations occurring in s. Since contradicto-
ry subchains are connected, the set of occurring relations has always the form
{Ri , Ri+1 , . . . , Ri+l } for some 1 ≤ i ≤ n, 0 ≤ l ≤ n − i. An optimal contra-
dictory subchain to a given extent is a contradictory subchain with lowest cost
among all contradictory subchains of the same extent.

The number of different extents of contradictory subchains for a chain query

of n relations is 2n2 − 2n + 1. Each contradictory chain can be completely
recursively decomposed into adjacent pairs of connected subchains. Subchains
with this property are defined next (similar types of decompositions occur in
[374, 689]).

Definition 3.2.19 ((optimal) recursively decomposable subchain) A re-

cursively decomposable subchain [s]u is inductively defined as follows.

1. If s is a single relation, then [s]u is recursively decomposable.

2. There is a decomposition s = vw such that v is connected to w and both

[v]u and [w]uv are recursively decomposable subchains.

The extent of a recursively decomposable chain is defined in the same way as

for contradictory chains. Note that every contradictory subchain is recursively
decomposable. Consequently, the set of all contradictory subchains for a certain
extent is a subset of all recursively decomposable subchains of the same extent.

Example 4: Consider the sequence of relations

s = R2 R4 R3 R6 R5 R1 .

Using parentheses to indicate the recursive decompositions, we have the follow-

ing two possibilities
(((R2 (R4 R3 ))(R6 R5 ))R1 )
((R2 ((R4 R3 )(R6 R5 )))R1 )
The extent of the recursively decomposable subchain
R4 R3 R6 R5 of s is ({R2 }, {R3 , R4 , R5 , R6 }). 2
The number of different recursively decomposable chains involving the rela-
tions R1 , . . . , Rn is rn , where rn denotes the n-th Schröder number [689]. Hence,
the
P totaln−2number of recursively decomposable chains is rn + 2(n − 1)rn−1 +
4 n−2


i=1 i ri . It can be shown that
√
C(2 + 8)n
rn ≈
n3/2
90 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING
q √
where C = 1/2 2 π2−4 . Using Stirling’s formula for n! it is easy to show
that limn→∞ rn!n = 0. Thus, the probability of a random permutation to be
recursively decomposable strives to zero for large n.
An optimal recursively decomposable subchain to a given extent is a recur-
sively decomposable subchain with lowest cost among all recursively decompos-
able subchains of the same extent. There is an obvious dynamic programming
algorithm to compute optimal recursive decomposable subchains. It is not hard
to see that Bellman’s optimality principle [520, 179] holds and every optimal
recursively decomposable subchain can be decomposed into smaller optimal
recursively decomposable subchains.

Example 5: In order to compute an optimal recursively decomposable sub-

chain for the extent
({R2 , R7 }, {R3 , R4 , R5 , R6 })
the algorithm makes use of optimal recursively decomposable subchains for the
extents

({R2 }, {R3 }) ({R7 , R3 }, {R4 , R5 , R6 })

({R2 }, {R3 , R4 }) ({R7 , R4 }, {R5 , R6 })
({R2 }, {R3 , R4 , R5 }) ({R5 , R7 }, {R6 })
({R7 }, {R4 , R5 , R6 }) ({R2 , R4 }, {R3 })
({R7 }, {R5 , R6 ) ({R2 , R5 }, {R3 , R4 })
({R7 }, {R6 }) ({R2 , R6 }, {R3 , R4 , R5 })

which have been computed in earlier steps2 . A similar dynamic programming

algorithm can be used to determine optimal contradictory subchains. 2
Let E be the set of all possible extents. We define the following partial order
P = (E, ≺) on E. For all extents e1 , e2 ∈ E, we have e1 ≺ e2 if and only if
e1 can be obtained by splitting the extent e2 . For example, ({R7 }, {R5 , R6 }) ≺
({R2 , R7 }, {R3 , R4 , R5 , R6 }). The set of maximal extents M then corresponds
to a set of incomparable elements (antichain) in P such that for all extents e
enumerated so far, there is an extent e0 ∈ M with e ≺ e0 .
Now, since every optimal join sequence has a representation as a sequence of
contradictory subchains, we only have to determine this representation. Con-
sider a contradictory subchain c in an optimal join sequence s. What can we say
about c? Obviously, c has to be optimal with respect to the neighbourhood de-
fined by the relations preceding c in s. Unfortunately, identifying contradictory
subchains that are optimal sequences seems to be as hard as the whole problem
of optimizing chain queries. Therefore, we content ourselves with the following
weaker condition which may lead to multiple representations. Nevertheless, it
seems to be the strongest condition for which all subchains satisfying the con-
dition can be computed in polynomial time. The condition says that s should
be optimal both with respect to all contradictory chains of the same extent as s
and with respect to all recursively decomposable subchains of the same extent.
2
The splitting of extents induces a partial order on the set of extents.
3.2. DETERMINISTIC ALGORITHMS 91

So far it is not clear whether these conditions lead to multiple representations.

Therefore, we have no choice but to enumerate all possible representations and
select the one with minimal costs. Next we describe the first algorithm.
Algorithm Chain-I’:

1. Use dynamic programming to determine all optimal contradictory sub-

chains.
This step can be made faster by keeping track of the set M of all maximal
extents (with respect to the partial order induced by splitting extents).
2. Determine all optimal recursively decomposable subchains for all extents
included in some maximal extent in M .
3. Compare the results from steps 1 and 2 and retain only matching sub-
chains.
4. Sort the contradictory subchains according to their ranks.
5. Eliminate contradictory subchains that cannot be part of a solution.
6. Use backtracking to enumerate all sequences of rank-ordered optimal con-
tradictory subchains and keep track of the sequence with lowest cost.

In step 5 of the algorithm, we eliminate contradictory subchains that do not

contribute to a solution. Note that the contradictory subchains in an optimal
sequence are characterized by the following two conditions.

1. The extents of all contradictory subchains in the representation build a

partition of the set of all relations.

2. The neighbourhoods of all contradictory subchains are consistent with the

relations occurring at earlier and later positions in the sequence.

Note that any contradictory subchain occurring in the optimal sequence (except
at the first and last positions) necessarily has matching contradictory subchains
preceding and succeeding it in the list. In fact, every contradictory subchain X
occurring in the optimal join sequence must satisfy the following two conditions.

1. For every relation R in the neighbourhood of X, there exists a contra-

dictory subchain Y at an earlier position in the list which itself meets
condition 1, such that R occurs in Y , and Y can be followed by X.

2. For every relation R in the complementary neighbourhood of X, there

exists a contradictory subchain Y at a later position in the list which
itself meets condition 2, such that R occurs in the neighbourhood of Y ,
and X can be followed by Y .

Using these two conditions, we can eliminate “useless” contradictory chains

from the rank-ordered list by performing a reachability algorithm for each of
the DAGs defined by the conditions 1 and 2. In the last step of our algorithm,
backtracking is used to enumerate all representations. Suppose that at some
step of the algorithm we have determined an initial sequence of contradictory
subchains and have a rank-sorted list of the remaining possible contradictory
subchains. In addition to the two conditions mentioned above, another reacha-
bility algorithm can be applied to determine the set of reachable relations from
92 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

the list (with respect to the given prefix). With the use of this information, all
branches that do not lead to a complete join sequence can be pruned.
Let us analyze the worst case time complexity of the algorithm. The two
dynamic programming steps both iterate over O(n2 ) different extents, and each
extent gives rise to O(n) splittings. Moreover, for each extent one normalization
is necessary, which requires linear time (cost, size and rank can be computed in
constant time using recurrences). Therefore, the complexity of the two dynamic
programming steps is O(n4 ). Sorting O(n2 ) contradictory chains can be done
in time O(n2 log n). The step where all “useless” contradictory subchains are
eliminated, consists of two stages of a reachability algorithm which has com-
plexity O(n4 ). If conjecture 3.2.2 is true, the backtracking step requires linear
time, and the total complexity of the algorithm is O(n4 ). Otherwise, if con-
jecture 3.2.2 is false, the algorithm might exhibit exponential worst case time
complexity.
We now describe how to reduce the problem for our original cost function
C to the problem for the modified cost function C 0 . One difficulty with the
original cost function is that the ranks are defined only for subsequences of at
least two relations. Hence, for determining the first relation in our solution
we do not have sufficient information. An obvious solution to this problem
is to try every relation as starting relation, process each of the two resulting
chain queries separately and choose the chain with minimum costs. The new
complexity will increase by about a factor of n. This first approach is not
very efficient, since the dynamic programming computations overlap consider-
ably, e.g. if we perform dynamic programming on the two overlapping chains
R1 R2 R3 R4 R5 R6 and R2 R3 R4 R5 R6 R7 , for the intersecting chain R2 R3 R4 R5 R6
everything is computed twice. The cue is that we can perform the dynamic pro-
gramming calculations before we consider a particular starting relation. Hence,
the final algorithm can be sketched as follows:
Algorithm CHAIN-I:

1. Compute all optimal contradictory chains by dynamic programming (cor-

responds to the steps 1-4 of Algorithm I’)

2. For each starting relation Ri , perform the following steps:

(a) Let L1 be the result of applying steps 5 and 6 of Algorithm I’ to all

contradictory subchains whose extent (N, M ) satisfies Ri ∈ N and
M ⊆ {R1 , . . . , Ri }.
(b) Let L2 be the result of applying steps 5 and 6 of Algorithm I’ to all
contradictory subchains whose extent (N, M ) satisfies Ri ∈ N and
M ⊆ {Ri , . . . , Rn }.
(c) For all (l1 , l2 ) ∈ L1 × L2 , perform the following steps:
i. Let L be the result of merging l1 and l2 according to their ranks.
ii. Use Ri L to update the current-best join ordering.

Suppose that conjecture 3.2.2 is true, and we can replace the backtracking part
by a search for the first solution. Then the complexity of the step 1 is O(n4 ),
3.2. DETERMINISTIC ALGORITHMS 93

whereas the complexity of step 2 amounts to ni=1 (O(i2 ) + O(n − i)2 + O(n)) =
P
O(n3 ). Hence, the total complexity would be O(n4 ) in the worst case. Of
course, if our conjecture is false, the necessary backtracking step might lead to
an exponential worst case complexity.

The second algorithm

The second algorithm is much simpler than the first one but proves to be less
efficient in practice. Since the new algorithm is very similar to some parts of
the old one, we just point out the differences between both algorithms. The
new version of the algorithm works as follows.
Algorithm CHAIN-II’:
1. Use dynamic programming to compute an optimal recursive decomposable
chain for the whole set of relations {R1 , . . . , Rn }.

2. Normalize the resulting chain.

3. Reorder the contradictory subchains according to their ranks.

4. De-normalize the sequence.

Step 1 is identical to step 2 of our first algorithm. Note that Lemma 3.2.15
cannot be applied to the sequence in Step 2, since an optimal recursive de-
composable chain is not necessarily an optimal chain. Therefore, the question
arises whether Step 3 really makes sense. One can show that the partial order
defined by the precedence relation among the contradictory subchains has the
property that all elements along paths in the partial order are sorted by rank.
By computing a greedy topological ordering (greedy with respect to the ranks),
we obtain a sequence as requested in step 3.
Let us briefly analyze the worst case time complexity of the second algo-
rithm. The first step requires time O(n4 ), whereas the second step requires time
O(n2 ). The third step has complexity O(n log n). Hence, the total complexity
is O(n4 ).
Algorithm II’ is based on the cost function C 0 . We can now modify the
algorithm for the original cost function C as follows.
Algorithm CHAIN-II:
1. Compute all optimal recursive decomposable chains by dynamic program-
ming (corresponds to step 1 of Algorithm II’)

2. For each starting relation Ri , perform the following steps:

(a) Let L1 be the result of applying the steps 2 and 3 of Algorithm II’ to
all optimal recursive decomposable subchains whose extent (N, M )
satisfies Ri ∈ N and M ⊆ {R1 , . . . , Ri }.
(b) Let L2 be the result of applying the steps 2 and 3 of Algorithm II’ to
all optimal recursive decomposable subchains whose extent (N, M )
satisfies Ri N and M ⊆ {Ri , . . . , Rn }.
(c) Let L be the result of merging L1 and L2 according to their ranks.
 94 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

(d) De-normalize L.
(e) Use Ri L to update the current-best join ordering.

The complexity of Step 1 is O(n4 ), whereas the complexity of Step 2 amounts

to ni=1 (O(i2 ) + O(n − i)2 + O(n)) = O(n3 ). Hence, the time complexity of
P
Algorithm II is O(n4 ).
Summarizing, we are now left with one algorithm that produces the optimal
result but whose worst-case runtime behavior is unknown and one algorithm
with polynomial runtime but producing a result which has not been proven to
be optimal. Due to this lack of hard facts, Moerkotte and Scheufele ran about
700,000 experiments with random queries of sizes up to 30 relations and fewer
experiments for random queries with up to 300 relations to compare the results
of our algorithms. For n ≤ 15, they additionally compared the results with a
standard dynamic programming algorithm. Their findings can be summarized
as follows.
• All algorithms yielded identical results.

• Backtracking always led to exactly one sequence of contradictory chains.

• In the overwhelming majority of cases the first algorithm proved to be

faster than the second.
Whereas the run time of the second algorithm is mainly determined by the
number of relations in the query, the run time of the first also heavily depends
on the number of existing optimal contradictory subchains. In the worst case,
the first algorithm is slightly inferior to the second. Additionally, Hamalainen
reports on an independent implementation of the second algorithm [338]. He
could not find an example where the second algorithm did not produce the
optimal result either. We encourage the reader to prove that it produces the
EX optimal result.

3.2.8 Transformation-Based Approaches

The idea of transformation-based algorithms can be described as follows. Start-
ing from an arbitrary join tree, equivalences (such as commutativity and asso-
ciativity) are applied to it to derive a set of new join trees. For each of the
join trees, the equivalences are again applied to derive even more join trees.
This procedure is repeated until no new join tree can be derived. This proce-
dure exhaustively enumerates the set of all bushy trees. Furthermore, before an
equivalence is applied, it is difficult to see whether the resulting join tree has al-
ready been produced or not (see also Figure 2.6). Thus, this procedure is highly
inefficient. Hence, it does not play any role in practice. Nevertheless, we give
the pseudo-code for it, since it forms the basis for several of the following algo-
rithms. We split the exhaustive transformation approach into two algorithms.
One that applies all equivalences to a given join tree (ApplyTransformations)
and another that does the loop (ExhaustiveTransformation). A transforma-
tion is applied in a directed way. Thus, we reformulate commutativity and
associativity as rewrite rules using ; to indicate the direction.
3.2. DETERMINISTIC ALGORITHMS 95

The following table summarizes all rules commonly used in transformation-

based and randomized join ordering algorithms. The first three are directly
derived from the commutativity and associativity laws for the join. The other
rules are shortcuts used under special circumstances. For example, left associa-
tivity may turn a left-deep tree into a bushy tree. When only left-deep trees are
to be considered, we need a replacement for left associativity. This replacement
is called left join exchange.

R1 1 R2 ; R2 1 R1 Commutativity
(R1 1 R2 ) 1 R3 ; R1 1 (R2 1 R3 ) Right Associativity
R1 1 (R2 1 R3 ) ; (R1 1 R2 ) 1 R3 Left Associativity
(R1 1 R2 ) 1 R3 ; (R1 1 R3 ) 1 R2 Left Join Exchange
R1 1 (R2 1 R3 ) ; R2 1 (R1 1 R3 ) Right Join Exchange

Two more rules are often used to transform left-deep trees. The first opera-
tion (swap) exchanges two arbitrary relations in a left-deep tree. The second
operation (3Cycle) performs a cyclic rotation of three arbitrary relations in a
left-deep tree. To account for different join methods, a rule called join method
exchange is introduced.
The first rule set (RS-0) we are using contains the commutativity rule and
both associativity rules. Applying associativity can lead to cross products. RS-0
If we do not want to consider cross products, we only apply any of the two
associativity rules if the resulting expression does not contain a cross product.
It is easy to extend ApplyTransformations to cover this by extending the if
conditions with
and (ConsiderCrossProducts || connected(·))
where the argument of connected is the result of applying a transformation.

ExhaustiveTransformation({R1 , . . . , Rn })
Input: a set of relations
Output: an optimal join tree
Let T be an arbitrary join tree for all relations
Done = ∅; // contains all trees processed
ToDo = {T }; // contains all trees to be processed
while (!empty(ToDo)) {
Let T be an arbitrary tree in ToDo
ToDo \ = T ;
Done ∪ = T ;
Trees = ApplyTransformations(T );
for all T ∈ Trees do {
if (T 6∈ ToDo ∪ Done) {
ToDo + = T ;
}
}
}
96 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

return cheapest tree found in Done;

ApplyTransformations(T )
Input: join tree
Output: all trees derivable by associativity and commutativity
Trees = ∅;
Subtrees = all subtrees of T rooted at inner nodes
for all S ∈ Subtrees do {
if (S is of the form S1 1 S2 ) {
Trees + = S2 1 S1 ;
}
if (S is of the form (S1 1 S2 ) 1 S3 ) {
Trees + = S1 1 (S2 1 S3 );
}
if (S is of the form S1 1 (S2 1 S3 )) {
Trees + = (S1 1 S2 ) 1 S3 ;
}
}
return Trees;

Besides the problems mentioned above, this algorithm also has the problem
that the sharing of subtrees is a non-trivial task. In fact, we assume that
ApplyTransformations produces modified copies of T . To see how ExhaustiveTransformation
works, consider again Figure 2.6. Assume that the top-left join tree is the initial
join tree. Then, from this join tree ApplyTransformations produces all trees
reachable by some edge. All of these are then added to ToDo. The next call
to ApplyTransformations with any to the produced join trees will have the
initial join tree contained in Trees. The complete set of visited join trees after
this step is determined from the initial join tree by following at most two edges.
Let us reformulate the algorithm such that it uses a data structure similar
to dynamic programming or memoization in order to avoid duplicate work. For
any subset of relations, dynamic programming remembers the best join tree.
This does not quite suffice for the transformation-based approach. Instead, we
have to keep all join trees generated so far including those differing in the order
of the arguments or a join operator. However, subtrees can be shared. This
is done by keeping pointers into the data structure (see below). So, the dif-
ference between dynamic programming and the transformation-based approach
becomes smaller. The main remaining difference is that dynamic programming
only considers these join trees while with the transformation-based approach
we have to keep the considered join trees since other join trees (more beneficial)
might be generatable from them.
The data structure used for remembering trees is often called the MEMO
structure. For every subset of relations to be joined (except the empty set), a
class exists in the MEMO structure. Each class contains all the join trees that
join exactly the relations describing the class. Here is an example for join trees
containing three relations.
3.2. DETERMINISTIC ALGORITHMS 97

{R1 , R2 , R3 } {R1 , R2 } 1 R3 , R3 1 {R1 , R2 },

{R1 , R3 } 1 R2 , R2 1 {R1 , R3 },
{R2 , R3 } 1 R1 , R1 1 {R2 , R3 }
{R2 , R3 } {R2 } 1 {R3 }, {R3 } 1 {R2 }
{R1 , R3 } {R1 } 1 {R3 }, {R3 } 1 {R1 }
{R1 , R2 } {R1 } 1 {R2 }, {R2 } 1 {R1 }
{R3 } R3
{R2 } R2
{R1 } R1

Here, we used the set notation {. . .} as an argument to a join to denote a

reference to the class of join trees joining the relations contained in it.
We reformulate our transformation-based algorithm such that it fills in and
uses the MEMO structure [581]. In a first step, the MEMO structure is ini-
tialized by creating an arbitrary join tree for the class {R1 , . . . , Rn } and then
going down this join tree and creating an entry for every join encountered.
Then, we call ExploreClass on the root class comprising all relations to be
joined. ExploreClass then applies ApplyTransformations2 to every member
of the class it is called upon. ApplyTransformations2 then applies all rules to
generate alternatives.

ExhaustiveTransformation2(Query Graph G)
Input: a query specification for relations {R1 , . . . , Rn }.
Output: an optimal join tree
initialize MEMO structure
ExploreClass({R1 , . . . , Rn })
return best of class {R1 , . . . , Rn }

ExploreClass(C)
Input: a class C ⊆ {R1 , . . . , Rn }
Output: none, but has side-effect on MEMO-structure
while (not all join trees in C have been explored) {
choose an unexplored join tree T in C
ApplyTransformation2(T )
mark T as explored
}
return

ApplyTransformations2(T )
Input: a join tree of a class C
Output: none, but has side-effect on MEMO-structure
ExploreClass(left-child(T ));
ExploreClass(right-child(T ));
foreach transformation T and class member of child classes {
 98 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

foreach T 0 resulting from applying T to T {

if T 0 not in MEMO structure {
add T 0 to class C of MEMO structure
}
}
}
return

ApplyTransformations2 uses a set of transformations to be applied. We dis-

cuss now the effect of different transformation sets on the complexity of the
algorithm. Applying ExhaustiveTransformation2 with a rule set consisting
of Commutativity and Left and Right Associativity generates 4n −3n+1 +2n+2 −
n − 2 duplicates for n relations. Contrast this with the number of join trees
contained in a completely filled MEMO structure3 : 3n − 2n+1 + n + 1. This
clearly shows the problem.
The problem of generating the same join tree several times was considered
by Pellenkoft, Galindo-Legaria, and Kersten [581, 582, 583]. The solution lies in
parameterizing ExhaustiveTransformation2 by an appropriate set of transfor-
mations. The basic idea is to remember for every join operator which rules are
applicable to it. For example, after applying commutativity to a join operator,
we disable commutativity for it.
For acyclic queries, the following rule set guarantees that all bushy join
trees are generated, but no duplicates [583]. Thereby, cross products are not
considered. That is, a rule is only applicable if it does not result in a cross
product. This restricts the applicability of the above algorithm to connected
queries. We use Ci to denote some class of the MEMO structure. We call the
RS-1 following rule set RS-1:

T1 : Commutativity C1 10 C2 ; C2 11 C1
Disable all transformations T1 , T2 , and T3 for 11 .

T2 : Right Associativity (C1 10 C2 ) 11 C3 ; C1 12 (C2 13 C3 )

Disable transformations T2 and T3 for 12 and enable all rules for 13 .

T3 : Left associativity C1 10 (C2 11 C3 ) ; (C1 12 C2 ) 13 C3

Disable transformations T2 and T3 for 13 and enable all rules for 12 .

In order to be able to follow these rules, the procedure ApplyTransformations2

has to be enhanced such that it is able to keep track of the application history
of the rules for every join operator. The additional memory requirement is
neglectible, since a single bit for each rules suffices.
As an example, let us consider the chain query R1 −R2 −R3 −R4 . Figure 3.14
shows the MEMO structure. The first column gives the sets of the relations
identifying each class. We leave out the single relation classes assuming that
{Ri } has Ri as its only join tree which is marked as explored.
3
The difference to the according number for dynamic programming is due to the fact that
we have to keep alternatives generated by commutativity and that join trees for single relations
are counted.
3.2. DETERMINISTIC ALGORITHMS 99

Class Initialization Transformation Step

{R1 , R2 , R3 , R4 } {R1 , R2 } 1111 {R3 , R4 } {R3 , R4 } 1000 {R1 , R2 } 3
R1 1100 {R2 , R3 , R4 } 4
{R1 , R2 , R3 } 1100 R4 5
{R2 , R3 , R4 } 1000 R1 8
R4 1000 {R1 , R2 , R3 } 10

{R2 , R3 , R4 } R2 1111 {R3 , R4 } 4

{R3 , R4 } 1000 R2 6
{R2 , R3 } 1100 R4 6
R4 1000 {R2 , R3 } 7
{R1 , R3 , R4 }
{R1 , R2 , R4 }
{R1 , R2 , R3 } {R1 , R2 } 1111 R3 5
R3 1000 {R1 , R2 } 9
R1 1100 {R2 , R3 } 9
{R2 , R3 } 1000 R1 9
{R3 , R4 } R3 1111 R4 R4 1000 R3 2
{R2 , R4 }
{R2 , R3 }
{R1 , R4 }
{R1 , R3 }
{R1 , R2 } R1 1111 R2 R2 1000 R1 1

Figure 3.14: Example of rule transformations (RS-1)

The second column shows the initialization with an arbitrarily chosen join
tree. The third column is the one filled by the Apply Transformation2 proce-
dure. We apply the rule set RS-1, which consists of three transformations. Each
join is annotated with three bits, where the i-th bit indicates whether Ti is appli-
cable (1) or not (0). After initializing the MEMO structure, ExhaustiveTransformation2
calls ExploreClass for {R1 , R2 , R3 , R4 }. The only (unexplored) join tree is
{R1 , R2 } 1111 {R3 , R4 }, which will become the argument of ApplyTransformations2.
Next, ExploreClass is called on {R1 , R2 } and {R3 , R4 }. In both cases, T1 is
the only applicable rule, and the result is shown in the third column under steps
1 and 2. Now we have to apply all transformations on {R1 , R2 } 1111 {R3 , R4 }.
Commutativity T1 gives us {R3 , R4 } 1000 {R1 , R2 } (Step 3). For right associa-
tivity, we have two elements in class {R1 , R2 }. Substituting them and applying
T2 gives
1. (R1 1 R2 ) 1 {R3 , R4 } ; R1 1100 (R2 1111 {R3 , R4 })

2. (R2 1 R1 ) 1 {R3 , R4 } ; R2 1111 (R1 × {R3 , R4 })

The latter contains a cross product. This leaves us with the former as the result
of Step 4. The right argument of the top most join is R2 1111 {R3 , R4 }. Since
100 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

we do not find it in class {R2 , R3 , R4 }, we add it (4).

T3 is next.

1. {R1 , R2 } 1 (R3 1 R4 ) ; ({R1 , R2 } 1111 R3 ) 1100 R4

2. {R1 , R2 } 1 (R4 1 R3 ) ; ({R1 , R2 } × R4 ) 1100 R3

The latter contains a cross product. This leaves us with the former as the result
of Step 5. We also add {R1 , R2 } 1111 R3 . Now that {R1 , R2 } 1111 {R3 , R4 } is
completely explored, we turn to {R3 , R4 } 1000 {R1 , R2 }, but all transformations
are disabled here.
R1 1100 {R2 , R3 , R4 } is next. First, {R2 , R3 , R4 } has to be explored. The
only entry is R2 1111 {R3 , R4 }. Remember that {R3 , R4 } is already explored.
T2 is not applicable. The other two transformations give us

T1 {R3 , R4 } 1000 R2

T3 (R2 1000 R3 ) 1100 R4 and (R2 × R4 ) 1100 R3

Those join trees not exhibiting a cross product are added to the MEMO struc-
ture under 6. Applying commutativity to {R2 , R4 } 1100 R3 gives 7. Commuta-
tivity is the only rule enabled for R1 1100 {R2 , R3 , R4 }. Its application results
in 8.
{R1 , R2 , R3 } 1100 R4 is next. It is simple to explore the class {R1 , R2 , R3 }
with its only entry {R1 , R2 } 1111 R3 :

T1 R3 1000 {R1 , R2 }

T2 R1 1100 (R2 1111 R3 ) and R2 1100 (R1 × R3 )

Commutativity can still be applied to R1 1100 (R2 1111 R3 ). All the new entries
are numbered 9. Commutativity is the only rule enabled for {R1 , R2 , R3 } 1100
R4 Its application results in 10.
2
The next two sets of transformations were originally intended for generating
all bushy/left-deep trees for a clique query [582]. They can, however, also be
used to generate all bushy trees when cross products are considered. The rule
set RS-2 for bushy trees is

T1 : Commutativity C1 10 C2 ; C2 11 C1
Disable all transformations T1 , T2 , T3 , and T4 for 11 .

T2 : Right Associativity (C1 10 C2 ) 11 C3 ; C1 12 (C2 13 C3 )

Disable transformations T2 , T3 , and T4 for 12 .

T3 : Left Associativity C1 10 (C2 11 C3 ) ; (C1 12 C2 ) 13 C3

Disable transformations T2 , T3 and T4 for 13 .

T4 : Exchange (C1 10 C2 ) 11 (C3 12 C4 ) ; (C1 13 C3 ) 14 (C2 15 C4 )

Disable all transformations T1 , T2 , T3 , and T4 for 14 .
3.3. PROBABILISTIC ALGORITHMS 101

If we initialize the MEMO structure with left-deep trees, we can strip down
the above rule set to Commutativity and Left Associativity. The reason is an
observation made by Shapiro et al.: from a left-deep join tree we can generate
all bushy trees with only these two rules [688].
If we want to consider only left-deep trees, the following rule set RS-3 is
appropriate:
T1 Commutativity R1 10 R2 ; R2 11 R1
Here, the Ri are restricted to classes with exactly one relation. T1 is
disabled for 11 .
T2 Right Join Exchange (C1 10 C2 ) 11 C3 ; (C1 12 C3 ) 13 C2
Disable T2 for 13 .

3.3 Probabilistic Algorithms

3.3.1 Generating Random Left-Deep Join Trees with Cross Prod-
ucts
The basic idea of the algorithms in this section and the following sections is to
generate a set of randomly chosen join trees, evaluate their costs, and return
the best one. The problem with this approach lies in the random generation of
join trees: every join tree has to be generated with equal probability. Although
there are some advocates of the pure random approach [258, 259, 261, 257],
typically a random join tree or a set of random join trees is used in subsequent
algorithms like iterative improvement and simulated annealing.
Obviously, if we do not consider cross products the problem is really hard,
since the query graph plays an important role. So let us start with the simplest
case where random join trees are generated that might contain cross products
even for connected query graphs. Then, any join tree is a valid join tree.
The general idea behind all algorithms is the following. Assume that the
number of join trees in the considered search space is known to be N . Then,
instead of generating a random join tree directly, a bijective mapping from
the interval of non-negative integers [0, N [ to a join tree in the search space is
established. Then, a random join tree can be generated by (1) generating a
random number in [0, N [ and (2) mapping the number to the join tree. The
problem of bijectively mapping an interval of non-negative integers to elements
of a set is usually called unranking. The opposite mapping is called ranking.
Obviously, the crux in our case is the efficiency of the unranking problem.
We start with generating random left-deep join trees for n relations. This
problem is identical to generating random permutations. That is, we look for
a fast unranking algorithm that maps the non-negative integers in [0, n![ to
permutations. Let us consider permutations of the numbers {0, . . . , n − 1}.
A mapping between these numbers and relations is established easily, e.g. via
an array. The traditional approach to ranking/unranking of permutations is
to first define an ordering on the permutations and then find a ranking and
unranking algorithm relative to that ordering. For the lexicographic order, al-
gorithms require O(n2 ) time [479, 617]. More sophisticated algorithms separate
102 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

the ranking/unranking algorithms into two phases. For ranking, first the in-
version vector of the permutation is established. Then, ranking takes place for
the inversion vector. Unranking works in the opposite direction. The inver-
sion vector of a permutation π = π0 , . . . , πn−1 is defined to be the sequence
v = v0 , . . . , vn−1 , where vi is equal to the number of entries πj with πj > πi
and j < i. Inversion vectors uniquely determine a permutation [759]. However,
naive algorithms of this approach again require O(n2 ) time. Better algorithms
require O(n log n). Using an elaborated data structure, Dietz’ algorithm re-
quires O((n log n)/(log log n)) [208]. Other orders like the Steinhaus-Johnson-
Trotter order have been exploited for ranking/unranking but do not yield any
run-time advantage over the above mentioned algorithms (see [442, 617]).
Since it is not important for our problem that any order constraints are sat-
isfied for the ranking/unranking functions, we use the fastest possible algorithm
established by Myrvold and Ruskey [541]. It runs in O(n) which is also easily
seen to be a lower bound.
The algorithm is based on the standard algorithm to generate random per-
mutations [192, 214, 535]. An array π is initialized such that π[i] = i for
0 ≤ i ≤ n − 1. Then, the loop

for (k = n − 1; k >= 0; − − k) swap(π[k], π[random(k)]);

is executed where swap exchanges two elements and random(k) generates a

random number in [0, k]. This algorithm randomly picks any of the possible
permutations. Assume the random elements produced by the algorithm are
rn−1 , . . . , r0 where 0 ≤ ri ≤ i. Obviously, there are exactly n(n − 1)(n −
2) . . . 1 = n! such sequences and there is a one-to-one correspondence between
these sequences and the set of all permutations. We can thus unrank r ∈ [0, n![
by turning it into a unique sequence of values rn−1 , . . . , r0 . Note that after
executing the swap with rn−1 , every value in [0, n[ is possible at position π[n−1].
Further, π[n−1] is never touched again. Hence, we can unrank r as follows. We
first set rn−1 = r mod n and perform the swap. Then, we define r0 = br/nc
and iteratively unrank r0 to construct a permutation of n − 1 elements. The
following algorithm realizes this idea.

Unrank(n, r) {
Input: the number n of elements to be permuted
and the rank r of the permutation to be constructed
Output: a permutation π
for (i = 0; i < n; + + i) π[i] = i;
Unrank-Sub(n, r, π);
return π;
}
}

Unrank-Sub(n, r, π) {
for (i = n; i > 0; − − i) {
3.3. PROBABILISTIC ALGORITHMS 103

swap(π[i − 1], π[r mod i]);

r = br/ic;
}
}

3.3.2 Generating Random Join Trees with Cross Products

Next, we want to randomly construct bushy plans possibly containing cross
products. This is done in several steps:

1. Generate a random number b in [0, C(n − 1)[.

2. Unrank b to obtain a bushy tree with n − 1 inner nodes.

3. Generate a random number p in [0, n![.

4. Unrank p to obtain a permutation.

5. Attach the relations in order p from left to right as leaf nodes to the binary
tree obtained in Step 2.

The only step that we still have to discuss is Step 2. It is a little involved and we
can only try to bring across the general idea. For details, the reader is referred
to the literature [479, 480, 481].
Consider Figure 3.15. It contains all 14 possible trees with four inner nodes.
The trees are ordered according to the rank we will consider. The bottom-most
number below any tree is its rank in [0, 14[. While unranking, we do not generate
the trees directly, but an encoding of the tree instead. This encoding works as
follows. Any binary tree corresponds to a word in a Dyck language with one
pair of parenthesis. The alphabet hence consists of Σ = {0 (0 , 0 )0 }. For join trees
with n inner nodes, we use Dyck words of length 2n whose parenthesization is
correct. That is, for every 0 (0 , we have a subsequent 0 )0 . From a given join tree,
we obtain the Dyck word by a preorder traversal. Whenever we encounter an
inner node, we encode this with a 0 (0 . All but the last leaf nodes are encoded
by a 0 )0 . Appending all these 2n encodings gives us a Dyck word of length 2n.
Figure 3.15 shows directly below each tree its corresponding Dyck word. In the
line below, we simply changed the representation by substituting every 0 (0 by a
0 10 and every 0 )0 by a 0 00 . The encoding that will be generated by the unranking

algorithm is shown in the third line below each tree: we remember the places
(index in the bit-string) where we find a 0 10 .
In order to do the unranking, we need to do some counting. Therefor, we
map Dyck words to paths in a triangular grid. For n = 4 this grid is shown in
Figure 3.16. We always start at (0, 0) which means that we have not opened a
parenthesis. When we are at (i, j), opening a parenthesis corresponds to going
to (i + 1, j + 1) and closing a parenthesis to going to (i + 1, j − 1). We have
thus established a bijective mapping between Dyck words and paths in the grid.
Thus counting Dyck words corresponds to counting paths.
104 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

(((()))) ( ( ( )( ) ) ) ((())()) ((()))() (()(()))

11110000 11101000 11100100 11100010 11011000
1, 2, 3, 4 1, 2, 3, 5 1, 2, 3, 6 1, 2, 3, 7 1, 2, 4, 5
0 1 2 3 4

(()())) (()())() (())(()) (())()() ()((()))

11010100 11010010 11001100 11001010 10111000
1, 2, 4, 6 1, 2, 4, 7 1, 2, 5, 6 1, 2, 5, 7 1, 3, 4, 5
5 6 7 8 9

()(()()) ()(())() ()()(()) ()()()()

10110100 10110010 10101100 10101010
1, 3, 4, 6 1, 3, 4, 7 1, 3, 5, 6 1, 3, 5, 7
10 11 12 13

Figure 3.15: Encoding Trees

The number of different paths from (0, 0) to (i, j) can be computed by

 
j+1 i+1
p(i, j) =
i + 1 21 (i + j) + 1
These numbers are called the Ballot numbers [108]. The number of paths from
(i, j) to (2n, 0) can thus be computed as (see [480, 481]):
q(i, j) = p(2n − i, j)
3.3. PROBABILISTIC ALGORITHMS 105

4 1
[0,0]

3 4 1
[1,4[

2 9 3 1
[4,9[

1 14 5 2
[9,14[

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

Figure 3.16: Paths

Note the special case q(0, 0) = p(2n, 0) = C(n). In Figure 3.16, we annotated
nodes (i, j) by p(i, j). These numbers can be used to assign (sub-) intervals to
paths (Dyck words, trees). For example, if we are at (4, 4), there exists only
a single path to (2n, 0). Hence, the path that travels the edge (4, 4) → (5, 3)
has rank 0. From (3, 3) there are four paths to (2n, 0), one of which we already
considered. This leaves us with three paths that travel the edge (3, 3) → (4, 2).
The paths in this part as assigned ranks in the interval [1, 4[. Figure 3.16 shows
the intervals near the edges. For unranking, we can now proceed as follows.
Assume we have a rank r. We consider opening a parenthesis (go from (i, j) to
(i + 1, j + 1)) as long as the number of paths from that point does no longer
exceed our rank r. If it does, we close a parenthesis instead (go from (i, j) to
(i − 1, j + 1)). Assume, that we went upwards to (i, j) and then had to go down
to (i − 1, j + 1). We subtract the number of paths from (i + 1, j + 1) from our
rank r and proceed iteratively from (i − 1, j + 1) by going up as long as possible
and going down again. Remembering the number of parenthesis opened and
closed along our way results in the required encoding. The following algorithm
finalizes these ideas.

UnrankTree(n, r)
Input: a number of inner nodes n and a rank r ∈ [0, C(n − 1)]
Output: encoding of the inner leaves of a tree
lNoParOpen = 0;
lNoParClose = 0;
i = 1; // current encoding
j = 0; // current position in encoding array
while (j < n) {
k = q(lNoParOpen + lNoParClose + 1, lNoParOpen - lNoParClose + 1);
if (k ≤ r) {
r -= k;
106 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

++lNoParClose;
} else {
aTreeEncoding[j++] = i;
++lNoParOpen;
}
++i;
}

Given an array with the encoding of a tree, it is easy to construct the tree
from it. The following procedure does that.

TreeEncoding2Tree(n, aEncoding) {
Input: the number of internal nodes of the tree n
Output: root node of the result tree
root = new Node; /* root of the result tree */
curr = root; /* curr: current internal node whose subtrees are to be created */
i = 1; /* pointer to entry in encoding */
child = 0; /* 0 = left , 1 = right: next child whose subtree is to be created */
while (i < n) {
lDiff = aEncoding[i] - aEncoding[i − 1];
for (k = 1; k < lDif f ; + + k) {
if (child == 0) {
curr->addLeftLeaf();
child = 1;
} else {
curr->addRightLeaf();
while (curr->right() != 0) {
curr = curr->parent();
}
child = 1;
}
}
if (child == 0) {
curr->left(new Node(curr)); // curr becomes parent of new node
curr = curr->left();
++i;
child = 0;
} else {
curr->right(new Node(curr));
curr = curr->right();
++i;
child = 0;
}
}
while (curr != 0) {
3.3. PROBABILISTIC ALGORITHMS 107

curr->addLeftLeaf(); // addLeftLeaf adds leaf if no left-child exists

curr->addRightLeaf(); // analogous
curr = curr->parent();
}
return root;
}

3.3.3 Generating Random Join Trees without Cross Products

A general solution for randomly generating join trees without cross products is
not known. However, if we restrict ourselves to acyclic queries, we can apply
an algorithm developed by Galindo-Legaria, Pellenkoft, and Kersten [259, 258,
261]. For this algorithm to work, we have to assume that the query graph is
connected and acyclic.
For the rest of this section, we assume that G = (V, E) is the query graph
and |V | = n. That is, n relations are to be joined. No join tree contains a cross
product. With every node in a join tree, we associate a level . The root has
level 0. Its children have level 1, and so on. We further use lower-case letters
for relations.
For a given query graph G, we denote by TG the set of join trees for G.
v(k)
Let TG ⊆ TG be the subset of join trees where the leaf node (i.e. relation) v
occurs at level k. Some trivial observations follow. If the query graph consists
v(0)
of a single node (n = 1), then |TG | = |TG | = 1. If n > 1, the top node in
v(0)
the join tree is a join and not a relation. Hence, |TG | = 0. Obviously, the
v(k)
maximum level that can occur in any join tree is n − 1. Hence, |TG | = 0
if k ≥ n. Since the level at which a leaf node v occurs in some join tree is
v(k) v(i) v(j)
unique, we have TG = ∪nk=0 TG and TG ∩ TG = ∅ for i 6= j. This gives us
v(k)
|TG | = nk=0 |TG |.
P

The algorithm generates an unordered tree with n leaf nodes. If we wish

to have a random ordered tree, we have to pick one of the 2n−1 possibilities to
order the (n − 1) joins within the tree. We proceed as follows. We start with
some notation for lists, discuss how two lists can be merged, describe how a
specific merge can be specified, and count the number of possible merges. This
is important, since join trees will be described as lists of trees. Given a leaf
node v, we simply traverse the path from the root to v. Thereby, subtrees that
branch off can be collected into a list of trees. After these remarks, we start
developing the algorithm in several steps. First, we consider two operations
with which we can construct new join trees: leaf-insertion introduces a new
leaf node into a given tree and tree-merging merges two join trees. Since we
do not want to generate cross products in this section, we have to apply these
operations carefully. Therefor, we need a description of how to generate all
valid join trees for a given query graph. The central data structure for this
purpose is the standard decomposition graph (SDG). Hence, in the second step,
we define SDGs and introduce an algorithm that derives an SDG from a given
query graph. In the third step, we start counting. The fourth and final step
consists of the unranking algorithm. We do not discuss the ranking algorithm.
108 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

R1 S1 R1 R1 S1

R2 S2 S1 R2 R1

R2 S1 R2
v v
S2 S2 S2
R S
v v v
(R, S, [1, 1, 0]) (R, S, [2, 0, 0]) (R, S, [0, 2, 0])

Figure 3.17: Tree-merge

It can be found in [261].

We use the Prolog notation | to separate the first element of a list from its
tail. For example, the list ha|ti has a as its first element and a tail t. Assume
that P is a property of elements. A list l0 is the projection of a list L on P , if
L0 contains all elements of L satisfying the property P . Thereby, the order is
retained. A list L is a merge of two disjoint lists L1 and L2 if L contains all
elements from L1 and L2 and both are projections of L.
A merge of a list L1 with a list L2 whose respective lengths are l1 and l2
can be described by an array α = [α0 , . . . , αl2 ] of non-negative integers whose
sum is equal to l1 . The non-negative integer αi−1 gives the number of elements
of L1 which precede the i-th element of L2 in the merged list. We obtain the
merged list L by first taking α0 elements from L1 . Then, an element from L2
follows. Then α1 elements from L1 and the next element of L2 follow and so
on. Finally follow the last αl2 elements of L1 . Figure 3.17 illustrates possible
merges.
Compare list merges to the problem of non-negative (weak) integer com-
position [?]. There, we ask for the number of compositions of a non-negative
integer n into k non-negative integers αi with ki=1 αk = n. The answer is
P
n+k−1


k−1 [718]. Since we have to decompose l1 into l2 + 1 non-negative inte-
gers, the number of possible merges is M (l1 , l2 ) = l1 l+l 2


2
. The observation
M (l1 , l2 ) = M (l1 − 1, l2 ) + M (l1 , l2 − 1) allows us to construct an array of size
n ∗ n in O(n2 ) that materializes the values for M . This array will allow us to
rank list merges in O(l1 + l2 ).
The idea for establishing a bijection between [1, M (l1 , l2 )] and the possi-
ble αs is a general one and used for all subsequent algorithms of this section.
Assume that we want to rank the elements of some set S and S = ∪ni=0 Si is
partitioned into disjoint Si . If we want to rank x ∈ Sk , we first find the local
3.3. PROBABILISTIC ALGORITHMS 109

rank of x ∈ Sk . The rank of x is then defined as

k−1
X
|Si | + local-rank(x, Sk )
i=0

To unrank some number r ∈ [1, N ], we first find k such that

j
X
k = min(r ≤ |Si |)
j
i=0

Then, we proceed by unranking with the new local rank

k−1
X
0
r =r− |Si |
i=0

within Sk .
Accordingly, we partition the set of all possible merges into subsets. Each
subset is determined by α0 . For example, the set of possible merges of two
lists L1 and L2 with length l1 = l2 = 4 is partitioned into subsets with α0 = j
for 0 ≤ j ≤ 4. In each partition, we have M (j, l2 − 1) elements. To unrank
a number P r ∈ [1, M (l1 , l2 )], we first determine the partition by computing k =
j 0
minj r ≤ i=0 M (j, l2 − 1). Then, α0 = l1 − k. With the new rank r =
Pk
r − i=0 M (j, l2 − 1), we start iterating all over. The following table gives
the numbers for our example and can be used to understand the unranking
algorithm. The algorithm itself can be found in Figure 3.18.

k α0 (k, l2 − 1) M (k, l2 − 1) rank intervals

0 4 (0, 3) 1 [1, 1]
1 3 (1, 3) 4 [2, 5]
2 2 (2, 3) 10 [6, 15]
3 1 (3, 3) 20 [16, 35]
4 0 (4, 3) 35 [36, 70]

We now turn to the anchored list representation of join trees.

Definition 3.3.1 Let T be a join tree and v be a leaf of T . The anchored list
representation L of T is constructed as follows:

• If T consists of the single leaf node v, then L = hi.

• If T = (T1 1 T2 ) and without loss of generality v occurs in T2 , then

L = hT1 |L2 i, where L2 is the anchored list representation of T2 .

We then write T = (L, v).

v(k)
Observe that if T = (L, v) ∈ TG , then T ∈ TG ≺ |L| = k.
The operation leaf-insertion is illustrated in Figure 3.19. A new leaf v is
inserted into the tree at level k. Formally, it is defined as follows.
110 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

UnrankDecomposition(r, l1 , l2 )
Input: a rank r, two list sizes l1 and l2
Output: a merge specification α.
for (i = 0; i ≤ l2 ; + + i) {
alpha[i] = 0;
}
i = k = 0;
while (l1 > 0 && l2 > 0) {
m = M (k, l2 − 1);
if (r ≤ m) {
alpha[i + +] = l1 − k;
l1 = k;
k = 0;
− − l2 ;
} else {
r− = m;
+ + k;
}
}
alpha[i] = l1 ;
return alpha;

Figure 3.18: Algorithm UnrankDecomposition

T1 v T1 T1

T1 v T2
T2 T2
v
w T2 w w w

T (T, 1) (T, 2) (T, 3)

Figure 3.19: Leaf-insertion

Definition 3.3.2 Let G = (V, E) be a query graph, T a join tree of G. v ∈ V

be such that G0 = G|V \{v} is connected, (v, w) ∈ E, 1 ≤ k < n, and

T = (hT1 , . . . , Tk−1 , v, Tk+1 , . . . , Tn i, w) (3.10)

0
T = (hT1 , . . . , Tk−1 , Tk+1 , . . . , Tn i, w). (3.11)
3.3. PROBABILISTIC ALGORITHMS 111

e +e [0, 5, 5, 5, 3]
e c ∗c [0, 0, 2, 3]
a b c d
b d [0, 1, 1] +c [0, 1]
+c
a
[0, 1] +b d [1]

[1] a

Figure 3.20: A query graph, its tree, and its standard decomposition graph

Then we call (T 0 , k) an insertion pair on v and say that T is decomposed into

(or constructed from) the pair (T 0 , k) on v.
v(k)
Observe that leaf-insertion defines a bijective mapping between TG and inser-
w(i)
tion pairs (T 0 , k) on v, where T 0 is an element of the disjoint union ∪n−2
i=k−1 TG0 .
The operation tree-merging is illustrated in Figure 3.17. Two trees R =
(LR , w) and S = (LS , w) on a common leaf w are merged by merging their
anchored list representations.

Definition 3.3.3 Let G = (V, E) be a query graph, w ∈ V , T = (L, w) a

join tree of G, V1 , V2 ⊆ V such that G1 = G|V1 and G2 = G|V2 are connected,
V1 ∪ V2 = V , and V1 ∩ V2 = {w}. For i = 1, 2:

• Define the property Pi to be “every leaf of the subtree is in Vi ”,

• Let Li be the projection of L on Pi .

• Ti = (Li , w).

Let α be the integer composition such that L is the result of merging L1 and L2
on α. Then we call (T1 , T2 , α) a merge triplet. We say that T is decomposed
into (constructed from) (T1 , T2 , α) on V1 and V2 .

Observe that the tree-merging operation defines a bijective mapping between

w(k) w(i) w(k−i)
TG and merge triplets (T1 , T2 , α), where T1 ∈ TG1 , T2 ∈ TG2 , and α
specifies a merge of two lists of sizes i and k − i. Further, the number of these
i+(k−i)
k


merges (i.e. the number of possibilities for α) is k−i = i .
A standard decomposition graph of a query graph describes the possible
constructions of join trees. It is not unique (for n > 1) but anyone can be used
to construct all possible unordered join trees. For each of our two operations it
has one kind of inner nodes. A unary node labeled +v stands for leaf-insertion
of v. A binary node labeled ∗w stands for tree-merging its subtrees whose only
common leaf is w.
The standard decomposition graph of a query graph G = (V, E) is con-
structed in three steps:
112 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

1. pick an arbitrary node r ∈ V as its root node;

2. transform G into a tree G0 by directing all edges away from r;

3. call QG2SDG(G0 , r)

with

QG2SDG(G0 , r)
Input: a query tree G0 = (V, E) and its root r
Output: a standard query decomposition tree of G0
Let {w1 , . . . , wn } be the children of v;
switch (n) {
case 0: label v with "v";
case 1:
label v as "+v ";
QG2SDG(G0 , w1 );
otherwise:
label v as "∗v ";
create new nodes l, r with label +v ;
E \ = {(v, wi )|1 ≤ i ≤ n};
E ∪ = {(v, l), (v, r), (l, w1 )} ∪ {(r, wi )|2 ≤ i ≤ n};
QG2SDG(G0 , l);
QG2SDG(G0 , r);
}
return G0 ;

Note that QG2SDG transforms the original graph G0 into its SDG by side-effects.
Thereby, the n-ary tree is transformed into a binary tree similar to the procedure
described by Knuth [433, Chap 2.3.2]. Figure 3.20 shows a query graph G, its
tree G0 rooted at e, and its standard decomposition tree.
v(k)
For an efficient access to the number of join trees in some partition TG
in the unranking algorithm, we materialize these numbers. This is done in the
count array. The semantics of a count array [c0 , c1 , . . . , cn ] of a node u with
label ◦v (◦ ∈ {+, ∗}) of the SDG is that u can construct ci different trees in
which leaf v is at level i. Then, the total number of trees for a query can be
computed by summing up all the ci in the count array of the root node of the
decomposition tree.
To compute the count and an additional summand adornment of a node
labeled +v , we use the following lemma.

Lemma 3.3.4 Let G = (V, E) be a query graph with n nodes, v ∈ V such that
G0 = G|V \v is connected, (v, w) ∈ E, and 1 ≤ k < n. Then

v(k) w(i)
X
|TG |= |TG0 |
i≥k−1
3.3. PROBABILISTIC ALGORITHMS 113

This lemma follows from the observation made after the definition of the leaf-
insertion operation.
w(i)
The sets TG0 used in the summands of Lemma 3.3.4 directly correspond
v(k),i v(k),i
to subsets TG (k − 1 ≤ i ≤ n − 2) defined such that T ∈ TG if
v(k)
1. T ∈ TG ,

2. the insertion pair on v of T is (T 0 , k), and

w(i)
3. T 0 ∈ TG0 .
v(k),i w(i)
Further, |TG | = |TG0 |. For efficiency, we materialize the summands in an
array of arrays summands.
To compute the count and summand adornment of a node labeled ∗v , we use
the following lemma.

Lemma 3.3.5 Let G = (V, E) be a query graph, w ∈ V , T = (L, w) a join

tree of G, V1 , V2 ⊆ V such that G1 = G|V1 and G2 = G|V2 are connected,
V1 ∪ V2 = V , and V1 ∩ V2 = {v}. Then

v(k)
X k  v(i) v(k−i)
|TG | = |TG1 | |TG2 |
i
i

This lemma follows from the observation made after the definition of the tree-
merge operation.
w(i)
The sets TG0 used in the summands of Lemma 3.3.5 directly correspond
v(k),i v(k),i
to subsets TG (0 ≤ i ≤ k) defined such that T ∈ TG if
v(k)
1. T ∈ TG ,

2. the merge triplet on V1 and V2 of T is (T1 , T2 , α), and

v(i)
3. T1 ∈ TG1 .
v(k),i
v(i) v(k−i)
Further, |TG | = ki |TG1 | |TG2 |.
Before we come to the algorithm for computing the adornments count and
summands, let us make one observation that follows directly from the above
two lemmata. Assume a node v whose count array is [c1 , . . . , cP m ] and whose
summands is s = [s0 , . . . , sn ] with si = [si0 , . . . , sim ], then ci = m i
j=0 sj holds.
Figure 3.21 contains the algorithm to adorn SDG’s nodes with count and
summands. It has worst-case complexity O(n3 ). Figure 3.20 shows the count
adornment for the SDG. Looking at the count array of the root node, we see
that the total number of join trees for our example query graph is 18.
The algorithm UnrankLocalTreeNoCross called by UnrankTreeNoCross adorns
the standard decomposition graph with insert-at and merge-using annota-
tions. These can then be used to extract the join tree.
114 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

Adorn(v)
Input: a node v of the SDG
Output: v and nodes below are adorned by count and summands
Let {w1 , . . . , wn } be the children of v;
switch (n) {
case 0: count(v) := [1]; // no summands for v
case 1:
Adorn(w1 );
assume count(w1 ) = [c10 , . . . , c1m1 ];
count(v) = [0, c1 , . . . , cm1 +1 ] where ck = m 1
P 1
i=k−1 ci ;
summands(v) 0
= [s , . . . , s m 1 +1 ] where s = [s0 , . . . , skm1 +1 ] and
k k
 1
ci if 0 < k and k − 1 ≤ i
ski =
0 else
case 2:
Adorn(w1 );
Adorn(w2 );
assume count(w1 ) = [c10 , . . . , c1m1 ];
assume count(w2 ) = [c20 , . . . , c2m2 ];
count(v) = [c0 , . . . , cm1 +m2 ] where
ck = m
P 1 k
1 2 2
i=0 i ci ck−i ; // ci = 0 for i 6∈ {0, . . . , m2 }
0 m +m ] where sk = [sk0 , . . . , skm1 ] and
 k
1 2= [s , . . . , s
summands(v) 1 2

ski = i ci ck−i if 0 ≤ k − i ≤ m2
0 else
}

Figure 3.21: Algorithm Adorn

UnrankTreeNoCross(r,v)
Input: a rank r and the root v of the SDG
Output: adorned SDG
let count(v) = [x0 , . . . , xm ];
k := minj r ≤ ji=0 xi ; // efficiency: binary search on materialized sums.
P

r0 := r − k−1
P
i=0 xi ;
UnrankLocalTreeNoCross(v, r0 , k);

e(k)
The following table shows the intervals associated with the partitions TG for
the standard decomposition graph in Figure 3.20:

Partition Interval
e(1)
TG [1, 5]
e(2)
TG [6, 10]
e(3)
TG [11, 15]
e(4)
TG [16, 18]
3.3. PROBABILISTIC ALGORITHMS 115

The unranking procedure makes use of unranking decompositions and un-

ranking triples. For the latter and a given X, Y, Z, we need to assign each
member in
{(x, y, z)|1 ≤ x ≤ X, 1 ≤ y ≤ Y, 1 ≤ z ≤ Z}

a unique number in [1, XY Z] and base an unranking algorithm on this assign-

ment. We leave this as a simple exercise to the reader and call the function
UnrankTriplet(r, X, Y, Z). Here, r is the rank and X, Y , and Z are the upper
bounds for the numbers in the triplets. The code for unranking looks as follows:

UnrankingTreeNoCrossLocal(v, r, k)
Input: an SDG node v, a rank r, a number k identifying a partition
Output: adornments of the SDG as a side-effect
Let {w1 , . . . , wn } be the children of v
switch (n) {
case 0:
assert(r = 1 && k = 0);
// no additional adornment for v
case 1:
let count(v) = [c0 , . . . , cn ];
let summands(v) = [s0 , . . . , sn ];
assert(k ≤ n && r ≤ ck );
k1 = minj r ≤ ji=0 ski ;
P
P 1 −1 k
r1 = r − ki=0 si ;
insert-at(v) = k;
UnrankingTreeNoCrossLocal(w1 , r1 , k1 );
case 2:
let count(v) = [c0 , . . . , cn ];
let summands(v) = [s0 , . . . , sn ];
let count(w1 ) = [c10 , . . . , c1n1 ];
let count(w2 ) = [c20 , . . . , c2n2 ];
assert(k ≤ n && r ≤ ck );
k1 = minj r ≤ ji=0 ski ;
P
P 1 −1 k
q = r − ki=0 si ;
k2 = k − k1 ;
(r1 , r2 , a) = UnrankTriplet(q, c1k1 , c2k2 , ki );

α = UnrankDecomposition(a);
merge-using(v) = α;
UnrankingTreeNoCrossLocal(w1 , r1 , k1 );
UnrankingTreeNoCrossLocal(w2 , r2 , k2 );
}
116 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

3.3.4 Quick Pick

The QuickPick algorithm of Waas and Pellenkoft [784, 785] does not generate
random join trees in the strong sense but comes close to it and is far easier to
implement and more broadly applicable. The idea is to randomly select an edge
in the query graph and to construct a join tree corresponding to this edge.

QuickPick(Query Graph G)
Input: a query graph G = ({R1 , . . . , Rn }, E)
Output: a bushy join tree
BestTreeFound = any join tree
while stopping criterion not fulfilled {
E 0 = E;
Trees = {R1 , . . . , Rn };
while (|Trees| > 1) {
choose e ∈ E 0 ;
E 0 − = e;
if (e connects two relations in different subtrees T1 , T2 ∈ Trees) {
Trees -= T1 ;
Trees -= T2 ;
Trees += CreateJoinTree(T1 , T2 );
}
}
Tree = single tree contained in Trees;
if (cost(Tree) < cost(BestTreeFound)) {
BestTreeFound = Tree;
}
}
return BestTreeFound

3.3.5 Iterative Improvement

Swami and Gupta [747], Swami [746] and Ioannidis and Kang [385] applied the
idea of iterative improvement to join ordering [385]. The idea is to start from
a random plan and then to apply randomly selected transformations from a
rule set if they improve the current join tree, until not further improvement is
possible.

IterativeImprovementBase(Query Graph G)
Input: a query graph G = ({R1 , . . . , Rn }, E)
Output: a join tree
do {
JoinTree = random tree
JoinTree = IterativeImprovement(JoinTree)
3.3. PROBABILISTIC ALGORITHMS 117

if (cost(JoinTree) < cost(BestTree)) {

BestTree = JoinTree;
}
} while (time limit not exceeded)
return BestTree

IterativeImprovement(JoinTree)
Input: a join tree
Output: improved join tree
do {
JoinTree’ = randomly apply a transformation to JoinTree;
if (cost(JoinTree’) < cost(JoinTree)) {
JoinTree = JoinTree’;
}
} while (local minimum not reached)
return JoinTree

The number of variants of iterative improvements is large. The first parame-

ter is the used rule set. To restrict search to left-deep trees, a rule set consisting
of swap and 3cycle is appropriate [747]. If we consider bushy trees, a complete
set consisting of commutativity, associativity, left join exchange and right join
exchange makes sense. This rule set (proposed by Ioannidis and Kang) is ap-
propriate to explore the whole space of bushy join trees. A second parameter
is how to determine whether the local minimum has been reached. Considering
all possible neighbor states of a join tree is expensive. Therefor, a subset of size
k is sometimes considered. Then, for example, k can be limited to the number
of edges in the query graph [747].

3.3.6 Simulated Annealing

Iterative Improvement suffers from the drawback that it only applies a move
if it improves the current plan. This leads to the problem that one is often
stuck in a local minimum. Simulated annealing tries to avoid this problem by
allowing moves that result in more expensive plans [390, 385, 747]. However,
instead of considering every plan, only those whose cost increase does not exceed
a certain limit are considered. During time, this limit decreases. This general
idea is cast into the notion temperatures and probabilities of performing a
selected transformation. A generic formulation of simulated annealing could
look as follows:

SimulatedAnnealing(Query Graph G)
Input: a query graph G = ({R1 , . . . , Rn }, E)
Output: a join tree
BestTreeSoFar = random tree;
Tree = BestTreeSoFar;
118 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

do {
do {
Tree’ = apply random transformation to Tree;
if (cost(Tree’) < cost(Tree)) {
Tree = Tree’;
} else {
0
with probability e−(cost(T ree )−cost(T ree))/temperature
Tree = Tree’;
}
if (cost(Tree) < cost(BestTreeSoFar)) {
BestTreeSoFar = Tree’;
}
} while (equilibrium not reached)
reduce temperature;
} while (not frozen)
return BestTreeSoFar

Besides the rule set used, the initial temperature, the temperature reduc-
tion, and the definitions of equilibrium and frozen determine the algorithm’s
behavior. For each of them several alternatives have been proposed in the lit-
erature. The starting temperature can be calculated as follows: determine the
standard deviation σ of costs by sampling and multiply it with a constant val-
ue ([747] use 20). An alternative is to set the starting temperature twice the
cost of the first randomly selected join tree [385] or to determine the starting
temperature such that at least 40% of all possible transformations are accepted
[723].
For temperature reduction, we can apply the formula temp∗ = 0.975 [385]
λt
or max(0.5, e− σ ) [747].
The equilibrium is defined to be reached if for example the cost distribution
of the generated solutions is sufficiently stable [747], the number of iterations is
sixteen times the number of relations in the query [385], or number of iterations
is the same as the number of relations in the query [723].
We can establish frozenness if the difference between the maximum and
minimum costs among all accepted join trees at the current temperature equals
the maximum change in cost in any accepted move at the current temperature
[747], the current solution could not be improved in four outer loop iterations
and the temperature has been fallen below one [385], or the current solution
could not be improved in five outer loop iterations and less than two percent of
the generated moves were accepted [723].
Considering databases are used in mission critical applitions. Would you
bet your business on these numbers?

3.3.7 Tabu Search

Morzy, Matyasiak and Salza applied Tabu Search to join ordering [534]. The
general idea is that among all neighbors reachable via the transformations, only
3.3. PROBABILISTIC ALGORITHMS 119

the cheapest is considered even if its cost are higher than the costs of the current
join tree. In order to avoid running into cycles, a tabu set is maintained. It
contains the last join trees generated, and the algorithm is not allowed to visit
them again. This way, it can escape local minima, since eventually all nodes in
the valley of a local minimum will be in the tabu set. The stopping conditions
could be that there ws no improvement over the current best solution found
during the last given number of iterations or if the set neighbors minus the tabu
set is empty (in line (*)).
Tabu Search looks as follows:

TabuSearch(Query Graph)
Input: a query graph G = ({R1 , . . . , Rn }, E)
Output: a join tree
Tree = random join tree;
BestTreeSoFar = Tree;
TabuSet = ∅;
do {
Neighbors = all trees generated by applying a transformation to Tree;
Tree = cheapest in Neighbors \ TabuSet; (*)
if (cost(Tree) < cost(BestTreeSoFar)) {
BestTreeSoFar = Tree;
}
if(|TabuSet| > limit) remove oldest tree from TabuSet;
TabuSet += Tree;
} while (not stopping condition satisfied);
return BestTreeSoFar;

3.3.8 Genetic Algorithms

Genetic algorithms are inspired by evolution: only the fittest survives [281].
They work with a population that evolves from generation to generation. Suc-
cessors are generated by crossover and mutation. Further, a subset of the cur-
rent population (the fittest) are propagated to the next generation (selection).
The first generation is generated by a random generation process.
The problem is how to represent each individual in a population. The
following analogies are used:

• Chromosome ←→ string

• Gene ←→ character

In order to solve an optimization problem with genetic algorithms, an encoding

is needed as well as a specification for selection, crossover, and mutation.
Genetic algorithms for join ordering have been considered in [66, 723]. We
first introduce alternative encodings, then come to the selection process, and
finally discuss crossover and mutation.
120 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

Encodings We distinguish ordered list and ordinal number encodings. Both

encodings are used for left-deep and bushy trees. In all cases we assume that
the relations R1 , . . . , Rn are to be joined and use the index i to denote Ri .

1. Ordered List Encoding

(a) left-deep trees

A left-deep join tree is encoded by a permutation of 1, . . . , n. For
instance, (((R1 1 R4 ) 1 R2 ) 1 R3 ) is encoded as “1423”.
(b) bushy trees
Bennet, Ferris, and Ioannidis proposed the following encoding scheme
[66, 67]. A bushy join-tree without cartesian products is encoded as
an ordered list of the edges in the join graph. Therefore, we num-
ber the edges in the join graph. Then the join tree is encoded in a
bottom-up, left-to-right manner. See Figure 3.22 for an example.

2. Ordinal Number Encoding

(a) left-deep trees

A join tree is encoded by using a list of relations that is short-
ened whenever a join has been encoded. We start with the list
L = hR1 , . . . , Rn i. Then within L we find the index of first rela-
tion to be joined. Let this relation be Ri . Ri is the i-th relation
in L. Hence, the first character in the chromosome string is i. We
eliminate Ri from L. For every subsequent relation joined, we again
determine its index in L, remove it from L and append the index to
the chromosome string. For instance, starting with hR1 , R2 , R3 , R4 i,
the left-deep join tree (((R1 1 R4 ) 1 R2 ) 1 R3 ) is encoded as “1311”.
(b) bushy trees
Again, we start with the list L = hR1 , . . . , Rn i and encode a bushy
join tree in a bottom-up, left-to-right manner. Let Ri 1 Rj be
the first join in the join tree under this ordering. Then we look
up their positions in L and add them to the encoding. Next we
eliminate Ri and Rj from L and push Ri,j to the front of it. We
then proceed for the other joins by again selecting the next join
which now can be between relations and/or subtrees. We determine
their position within L, add these positions to the encoding, remove
them from L, and insert a composite relation into L such that the
new composite relation directly follows those already present. For
instance, starting with the list hR1 , R2 , R3 , R4 i, the bushy join tree
((R1 1 R2 ) 1 (R3 1 R4 )) is encoded as “12 23 12”.

The encoding is completed by adding join methods.

Crossover A crossover generates a new solution from two individuals. There-

fore, two partial solutions are combined. Obviously, its definition depends on
the encoding. Two kinds of crossovers are distinguished: the subsequence and
the subset exchange.
3.3. PROBABILISTIC ALGORITHMS 121

R2 1
1
R1 2
1 1 1243
R3

3
1 R3 R4 R5
4
R5 R4
R1 R2

Figure 3.22: A query graph, a join tree, and its encoding

The subsequence exchange for the ordered list encoding works as follows.
Assume two individuals with chromosomes u1 v1 w1 and u2 v2 w2 . From these we
generate u1 v10 w1 and u2 v20 w2 , where vi0 is a permutation of the relations in vi
such that the order of their appearence is the same as in u3−i v3−i w3−i . In order
to adapt the subsequence exchange operator to the ordinal number encoding,
we have to require that the vi are of equal length (|v1 | = |v2 |) and occur at the
same offset (|u1 | = |u2 |). We then simply swap the vi . That is, we generate
u1 v2 w1 and u2 v1 w2 .
The subset exchange is defined only for the ordered list encoding. Within
the two chromosomes, we find two subsequences of equal length comprising the
same set of relations. These sequences are then simply exchanged.

Mutation A mutation randomly alters a character in the encoding. If du-

plicates must not occur — as in the ordered list encoding — swapping two
characters is a perfect mutation.

Selection The probability of a join tree’s survival is determined by its rank

in the population. That is, we calculate the costs of the join trees encoded
for each member of the population. Then we sort the population according
to their associated costs and assign probabilities to each individual such that
the best solution in the population has the highest probability to survive and
so on. After probabilities have been assigned, we randomly select members of
the population taking these probabilities into account. That is, the higher the
probability of a member, the higher is its chance to survive.

Algorithm The genetic algorithm then works as follows. First, we create a

random population of a given size (say 128). We apply crossover and mutation
with a given rate, for example such that 65% of all members of a population
participate in crossover, and 5% of all members of a population are subject to
random mutation. Then we apply selection until we again have a population
of a given size. We stop after we have not seen an improvement within the
122 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

population for a fixed number of iterations (say 30).

3.4 Hybrid Algorithms

All the algorithms we have seen so far can be combined to result in new ap-
proaches to join ordering. Some of the numerous possibilities have been de-
scribed in the literature. We present them.

3.4.1 Two Phase Optimization

Two phase optimization combines Iterative Improvement with Simulated An-
nealing [385]. For a number of randomly generated initial trees, Iterative Im-
provement is used to find a local minimum. Then Simulated Annealing is start-
ed to find a better plan in the neighborhood of the local minima. The initial
temperature of Simulated Annealing can be lower as is its original variants.

3.4.2 AB-Algorithm
The AB-Algorithm was developed by Swami and Iyer [748, 749]. It builds on
the IKKBZ-Algorithm by resolving its limitations. First, if the query graph
is cyclic, a spanning tree is selected. Second, two different cost functions for
joins (join methods) are supported by the AB-Algorithm: nested loop join and
sort merge join. In order to make the sort merge join’s cost model fit the ASI
property, it is simplified. Third, join methods are assigned randomly before
IKKBZ is called. Afterwards, an iterative improvement phase follows. The
algorithm can be formulated as follows:

AB(Query Graph G)
Input: a query graph G = ({R1 , . . . , Rn }, E)
Output: a left-deep join tree
while (number of iterations ≤ n2 ) {
if G is cyclic take spanning tree of G
randomly attach a join method to each relation
JoinTree = result of IKKBZ
while (number of iterations ≤ n2 ) {
apply Iterative Improvement to JoinTree
}
}
return best tree found

3.4.3 Toured Simulated Annealing

Lanzelotte, Valduriez, and Zäit introduced toured simulated annealing as a
search strategy useful in distributed databases where the search space is even
3.5. ORDERING ORDER-PRESERVING JOINS 123

larger than in centralized systems [454]. The basic idea is that simulated an-
nealing is called n times with different initial join trees, if n is the number of
relations to be joined. Each join sequence in the set Solutions produced by
GreedyJoinOrdering-3 is used to start an independent run of simulated an-
nealing. As a result, the starting temperature can be decreased to 0.1 times
the cost of the initial plan.

3.4.4 GOO-II
GOO-II appends an Iterative Improvement step to the GOO-Algorithm.

3.4.5 Iterative Dynamic Programming

Iterative Dynamic Programming combines heuristics with dynamic program-
ming in order to overcome the deficiencies of both. It comes in two variants
[440, 696]. The first variant, IDP-1 (see Figure 3.23), first creates all join trees
which contain up to k relations where k is a parameter of the algorithm. After
this step, it selects the cheapest join tree comprising k relations, replaces it by
a new compound relation and starts all over again. The iteration stops, when
only one compound relation representing a join tree for all relations remains in
the ToDo list.
The second variant, IDP-2 (see Figure 3.24), works the other way round.
It first applies a greedy heuristics to build join trees of size up to k. To the
larger subtree it applies dynamic programming to improve it. The result of
the optimized outcome of the greedy algorithm is then encapsulated in a new
compound relation which replaces its constituent relations in the ToDo list. The
algorithm then iterates until only one entry remains in the ToDo list.
Obviously, from these two basic variants several others can be derived. A
systematic investigation of the basic algorithms and their variants is given by
Kossmann and Stocker [440]. It turns out that the most promising variants
exist for IDP-1.

3.5 Ordering Order-Preserving Joins

This section covers an algorithm for ordering order-preserving joins [528]. This
is important for XQuery and other languages that require order-preservation.
XQuery specifies that the result of a query is a sequence. If no unordered or
order by instruction is given, the order of the output sequence is determined
by the order of the input sequences given in the for clauses of the query. If
there are several entries in a for clause or several for clauses, order-preserving
join operators [155] can be a natural component for the evaluation of such a
query.
The order-preserving join operator is used in several algebras in the context
of

• semi-structured data and XML (e.g. SAL [63], XAL [249]),

• OLAP [711], and

124 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

IDP-1({R1 , . . . , Rn }, k)
Input: a set of relations to be joined, maximum block size k
Output: a join tree
for (i = 1; i <= n; ++i) {
BestTree({Ri }) = Ri ;
}
ToDo = {R1 , . . . , Rn };
while (|ToDo| > 1) {
k = min(k, |ToDo|);
for (i = 2; i < k; ++i) {
for all S ⊆ ToDo, |S| = i do {
for all O ⊂ S do {
BestTree(S) = CreateJoinTree(BestTree(S \ O), BestTree(O));
}
}
}
find V ⊂ ToDo, |V | = k
with cost(BestTree(V )) = min{cost(BestTree(W )) | W ⊂ ToDo, |W | = k};
generate new symbol T ;
BestTree({T }) = BestTree(V );
ToDo = (ToDo \ V ) ∪ {T };
for all O ⊂ V do delete(BestTree(O));
}
return BestTree({R1 , . . . , Rn });

Figure 3.23: Pseudo code for IDP-1

• time series data [466].

We give a polynomial algorithm that produces bushy trees for a sequence of

order-preserving joins and selections. These trees may contain cross products
even if the join graph is connected. However, we apply selections as early as
possible. The algorithm then produces the optimal plan among those who push
selections down. The cost function is a parameter of the algorithm, and we do
not need to restrict ourselves to those having the ASI property. Further, we
need no restriction on the join graph, i.e. the algorithm produces the optimal
plan even if the join graph is cyclic.
Before defining the order-preserving join, we need some preliminaries. The
above algebras work on sequences of sets of variable bindings, i.e. sequences of
unordered tuples where every attribute corresponds to a variable. (See Chap-
ter 7.3 for a general discussion.) Single tuples are constructed using the stan-
dard [·] brackets. Concatenation of tuples and functions is denoted by ◦. The
set of attributes defined for an expression e is defined as A(e). The set of
free variables of an expression e is defined as F(e). For sequences e, we use
3.5. ORDERING ORDER-PRESERVING JOINS 125

IDP-2({R1 , . . . , Rn }, k)
Input: a set of relations to be joined, maximum block size k
Output: a join tree
for (i = 1; i <= n; ++i) {
BestTree({Ri }) = Ri ;
}
ToDo = {R1 , . . . , Rn };
while (|ToDo| > 1) {
// apply greedy algorithm to select a good building block
B = ∅;
for all v ∈ ToDo, do {
B += BestTree({v});
}
do {
find L, R ∈ B
with cost(CreateJoinTree(L,R))
= min{cost(CreateJoinTree(L0 ,R0 )) | L0 , R0 ∈ B};
P = CreateJoinTree(L,R));
B = (B \ {L, R}) ∪ {P };
} while (P involves no more than k relations and |B| > 1);
// reoptimize the bigger of L and R,
// selected in the last iteration of the greedy loop
if (L involves more tables than R) {
ReOpRels = relations involved in L;
} else {
ReOpRels = relations involved in R;
}
P = DP-Bushy(ReOpRels);
generate new symbol T ;
BestTree({T }) = P ;
ToDo = (ToDo \ ReOpRels) ∪ {T };
for all O ⊂ V do delete(BestTree(O));
}
return BestTree({R1 , . . . , Rn });

Figure 3.24: Pseudocode for IDP-2

α(e) to denote the first element of a sequence. We identify single element se-
quences with elements. The function τ retrieves the tail of a sequence, and ⊕
concatenates two sequences. We denote the empty sequence by .
We define the algebraic operators recursively on their input sequences. The
order-preserving join operator is defined as the concatenation of an order-
preserving selection and an order-preserving cross product. For unary oper-
ators, if the input sequence is empty, the output sequence is also empty. For
126 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

binary operators, the output sequence is empty whenever the left operand rep-
resents an empty sequence.
The order-preserving join operator is based on the definition of an order-
preserving cross product operator defined as
ˆ ) ⊕ (τ (e )×e
ˆ 2 := (α(e1 )×e
e1 ×e 2 1 ˆ 2)

where 
ˆ :=  if e2 = 
e1 ×e2 ˆ
(e1 ◦ α(e2 )) ⊕ (e1 ×τ (e2 )) else
We are now prepared to define the join operation on ordered sequences:

e1 1̂p e2 := σ̂p (e1 ×e

ˆ 2)

where the order-preserving selection is defined as


  if e = 
σ̂p (e) := α(e) ⊕ σ̂p (τ (e)) if p(α(e))
σ̂p (τ (e)) else


As usual, selections can be reordered and pushed inside order-preserving

joins. Besides, the latter are associative. The following equivalences formalize
this.
σ̂p1 (σ̂p2 (e)) = σ̂p2 (σ̂p1 (e))
σ̂p1 (e1 1̂p2 e2 ) = σ̂p1 (e1 )1̂p2 e2 if F(p1 ) ⊆ A(e1 )
σ̂p1 (e1 1̂p2 e2 ) = e1 1̂p2 σ̂p1 (e2 ) if F(p1 ) ⊆ A(e2 )
e1 1̂p1 (e2 1̂p2 e3 ) = (e1 1̂p1 e2 )1̂p2 e3 if F(pi ) ⊆ A(ei ) ∪ A(ei+1 )

While being associative, the order-preserving join is not commutative, as the

following example illustrates. Given two tuple sequences R1 = h[a : 1], [a : 2]i
and R2 = h[b : 1], [b : 2]i, we have

R1 1̂true R2 = h[a : 1, b : 1], [a : 1, b : 2], [a : 2, b : 1], [a : 2, b : 2]i

R2 1̂true R1 = h[a : 1, b : 1], [a : 2, b : 1], [a : 1, b : 2], [a : 2, b : 2]i

Before introducing the algorithm, let us have a look at the size of the search
space. Since the order-preserving join is associative but not commutative, the
input to the algorithm must be a sequence of join operators or, likewise, a
sequence of relations to be joined. The output is then a fully parenthesized
expression. Given a sequence of n binary associative but not commutative
operators, the number of fully parenthesized expressions is (see [178])

1 if n = 1
P (n) = Pn−1
k=1 P (k)P (n − k) if n>1

We have that P (n)

1 2n

= C(n − 1), where 4C(n)
n
are the Catalan numbers defined
as C(n) = n+1 n . Since C(n) = Ω( n3/2 ), the search space is exponential in
size.
3.5. ORDERING ORDER-PRESERVING JOINS 127

applicable-predicates(R, P)

01 B=∅
02 foreach p ∈ P
03 IF (F(p) ⊆ A(R))
04 B+ = p
05 return B

Figure 3.25: Subroutine applicable-predicates

The algorithm is inspired by the dynamic programming algorithm for finding

optimal parenthesized expressions for matrix-chain multiplication [178]. The
differences are that we have to encapsulate the cost function and deal with
selections. We give a detailed example application of the algorithm below.
This example illustrates (1) the optimization potential, (2) that cross products
can be favorable, (3) how to plug in a cost function into the algorithm, and (4)
the algorithm itself.
The algorithm itself is broken up into several subroutines. The first is
applicable-predicates (see Fig. 3.25). Given a sequence of relations Ri , . . . , Rj
and a set of predicates, it retrieves those predicates applicable to the result of
the join of the relations. Since joins and selections can be reordered freely, the
only condition for a predicate to be applicable is that all its free variables are
bound by the given relations.
The second subroutine is the most important and intrigued. It fills several
arrays with values in a bottom-up manner. The third subroutine then builds
the query evaluation plan using the data in the arrays.
The subroutine construct-bushy-tree takes as input a sequence R1 , . . . , Rn
of relations to be joined and a set P of predicates to be applied. For every
possible subsequence Ri , . . . , Rj , the algorithm finds the best plan to join these
relations. Therefor, it determines some k such that the cheapest plan joins
the intermediate results for Ri , . . . , Rk and Rk+1 , . . . , Rj by its topmost join.
For this it is assumed that for all k the best plans for joining Ri , . . . , Rk and
Rk+1 , . . . , Rj are known. Instead of directly storing the best plan, we remember
(1) the costs of the best plan for Ri , . . . , Rj for all 1 ≤ i ≤ j ≤ n and (2) the
k where the split takes place. More specifically, the array c[i, j] contains the
costs of the best plan for joining Ri , . . . , Rj , and the array t[i, j] contains the
k such that this best plan joins Ri , . . . , Rk and Rk+1 , . . . , Rj with its topmost
join. For every sequence Ri , . . . , Rj , we also remember the set of predicates
that can be applied to it, excluding those that have been applied earlier. These
applicable predicates are contained in p[i, j]. Still, we are not done. All cost
functions we know use some kind of statistics on the argument relation(s) in
order to compute the costs of some operation. Since we want to be generic with
respect to the cost function, we encapsulate the computation of statistics and
costs within functions S0 , C0 , S1 , and C1 . The function S0 retrieves statistics
for base relations. The function C0 computes the costs of retrieving (part of) a
base relation. Both functions take a set of applicable predicates as an additional
128 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

construct-bushy-tree(R, P)

01 n = |R|
02 for i = 1 to n
03 B =applicable-predicates(Ri , P)
04 P =P \B
05 p[i, i] = B
06 s[i, i] = S0 (Ri , B)
07 c[i, i] = C0 (Ri , B)
08 for l = 2 to n
09 for i = 1 to n − l + 1
10 j =i+l−1
11 B = applicable-predicates(Ri...j , P)
12 P =P \B
13 p[i, j] = B
14 s[i, j] = S1 (s[i, j − 1], s[j, j], B)
15 c[i, j] = ∞
16 for k = i to j − 1
17 q = c[i, k] + c[k + 1, j] + C1 (s[i, k], s[k + 1, j], B)
18 IF (q < c[i,j])
19 c[i, j] = q
20 t[i, j] = k

Figure 3.26: Subroutine construct-bushy-tree

extract-plan(R, t, p)

01 return extract-subplan(R, t, p, 1, |R|)

extract-subplan(R, t, p, i, j)

01 IF (j > i)
02 X = extract-subplan(R, t, p, i, t[i, j])
03 Y = extract-subplan(R, t, p, t[i, j] + 1, j)
04 return X 1̂p[i,j] Y
05 else
06 return σ̂p[i,i] (Ri )

Figure 3.27: Subroutine extract-plan and its subroutine

argument. The function S1 computes the statistics for intermediate relations.

Since the result of joining some relations Ri , . . . , Rj may occur in many different
plans, we compute it only once and store it in the array s. C1 computes the
costs of joining two relations and applying a set of predicates. Below, we show
how concrete (simple) cost and statistics functions can look like.
Given the above, the algorithm (see Fig. 3.26) fills the arrays in a bottom-up
manner by first computing for every base relation the applicable predicates, the
3.5. ORDERING ORDER-PRESERVING JOINS 129

statistics of the result of applying the predicates to the base relation and the
costs for computing these intermediate results, i.e. for retrieving the relevant
part of the base relation and applying the predicates (lines 02-07). Note that
this is not really trivial if there are several index structures that can be applied.
Then computing C0 involves considering different access paths. Since this is an
issue orthogonal to join ordering, we do not detail on it.
After we have the costs and statistics for sequences of length one, we com-
pute the same information for sequences of length two, three, and so on until
n (loop starting at line 08). For every length, we iterate over all subsequences
of that length (loop starting at line 09). We compute the applicable predicates
and the statistics. In order to determine the minimal costs, we have to consider
every possible split point. This is done by iterating the split point k from i to
j − 1 (line 16). For every k, we compute the cost and remember the k that
resulted in the lowest costs (lines 17-20).
The last subroutine takes the relations, the split points (t), and the applica-
ble predicates (p) as its input and extracts the plan. The whole plan is extracted
by calling extract-plan. This is done by instructing extract-subplan to re-
trieve the plan for all relations. This subroutine first determines whether the
plan for a base relation or that of an intermediate result is to be constructed.
In both cases, we did a little cheating here to keep things simple. The plan we
construct for base relations does not take the above-mentioned index structures
into account but simply applies a selection to a base relation instead. Obvi-
ously, this can easily be corrected. We also give the join operator the whole
set of predicates that can be applied. That is, we do not distinguish between
join predicates and other predicates that are better suited for a selection sub-
sequently applied to a join. Again, this can easily be corrected.
Let us have a quick look at the complexity of the algorithm. Given n rela-
tions with m attributes in total and p predicates, we can implement applicable-predicates
in O(pm) by using a bit vector representation for attributes and free variables
and computing the attributes for each sequence Ri , . . . , Rj once upfront. The
latter takes O(n2 m).
The complexity of the routine construct-bushy-tree is determined by the
three nested loops. We assume that S1 and C1 can be computed in O(p), which
is quite reasonable. Then, we have O(n3 p) for the innermost loop, O(n2 ) calls to
applicable-predicates, which amounts to O(n2 pm), and O(n2 p) for calls of
S1 . Extracting the plan is linear in n. Hence, the total runtime of the algorithm
is O(n2 (n + m)p)
In order to illustrate the algorithm, we need to fix the functions S0 , S1 , C0
and C1 . We use the simple cost function Cout . As a consequence, the array s
simply stores cardinalities, and S0 has to extract the cardinality of a given base
relation and multiply it by the selectivities of the applicable predicates. S1 mul-
tiplies the input cardinalities with the selectivities of the applicable predicates.
We set C0 to zero and C1 to S1 . The former is justified by the fact that every
relation must be accessed exactly once and hence, the access costs are equal in
130 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

all plans. Summarizing, we define

Y
S0 (R, B) := |R| f (p)
p∈B
Y
S1 (x, y, B) := xy f (p)
p∈B
C0 (R, B) := 0
C1 (x, y, B) := S1 (x, y, B)

where B is a set of applicable predicates and for a single predicate p, f (p)

returns its selectivity.
We illustrate the algorithm by an example consisting of four relations R1 , . . . , R4
with cardinalities |R1 | = 200, |R2 | = 1, |R3 | = 1, |R4 | = 20. Besides, we have
three predicates pi,j with F(pi,j ) ⊆ A(Ri ) ∪ A(Rj ). They are p1,2 , p3,4 , and p1,4
with selectivities 1/2, 1/10, 1/5.
Let us first consider an example plan and its costs. The plan

((R1 1̂p1,2 R2 )1̂true R3 )1̂p1,4 ∧p3,4 R4

has the costs 240 = 100 + 100 + 40.

For our simple cost function, the algorithm construct-bushy-tree will fill
the array s with the initial values:

s
200
1
1
20

After initilization, the array c has 0 everywhere in its diagonal and the array p
empty sets.
For l = 2, the algorithm produces the following values:

l i j k s[i,j] q current c[i,j] current t[i,j]

2 1 2 1 100 100 100 1
2 2 3 2 1 1 1 2
2 3 4 3 2 2 2 3

For l = 3, the algorithm produces the following values:

l i j k s[i,j] q current c[i,j] current t[i,j]

3 1 3 1 200 101 101 1
3 1 3 2 200 200 101 1
3 2 4 2 2 4 4 2
3 2 4 3 2 3 3 3

For l = 4, the algorithm produces the following values:

3.6. CHARACTERIZING SEARCH SPACES 131

l i j k s[1,4] q current c[1,4] current t[1,4]

4 1 4 1 40 43 43 1
4 1 4 2 40 142 43 1
4 1 4 3 40 141 43 1
where for each k the value of q (in the following table denoted by qk ) is deter-
mined as follows:
q1 = c[1, 1] + c[2, 4] + 40 = 0 + 3 + 40 = 43
q2 = c[1, 2] + c[3, 4] + 40 = 100 + 2 + 40 = 142
q3 = c[1, 3] + c[4, 4] + 40 = 101 + 0 + 40 = 141

Collecting all the above t[i, j] values leaves us with the following array as
input for extract-plan:

i\j 1 2 3 4
1 1 1 1
2 2 3
3 3
4
The function extract-plan merely calls extract-subplan. For the latter,
we give the call hierarchy and the result produced:
000 extract-plan(. . ., 1, 4)
100 extract-plan(. . ., 1, 1)
200 extract-plan(. . ., 2, 4)
210 extract-plan(. . ., 2, 3)
211 extract-plan(. . ., 2, 2)
212 extract-plan(. . ., 3, 3)
210 return (R2 1̂true R3 )
220 extract-plan(. . ., 4, 4)
200 return ((R2 1̂true R3 )1̂p3,4 R4 )
000 return (R1 1̂p1,2 ∧p1,4 ((R2 1̂true R3 )1̂p3,4 R4 ))
The total cost of this plan is c[1, 4] = 43.

3.6 Characterizing Search Spaces

3.6.1 Complexity Thresholds
The complexity results presented in Section 3.1.6 show that most classes of join
ordering problems are NP-hard. However, it is quite clear that some instances
of the join ordering problem are simpler than others. For example, consider a
query graph which is a clique in n relations R1 , . . . , Rn . Further assume that
each Ri has cardinality 2i and all join selectivities are 1/2 (i.e. fi,j = 1/2 for
all 1 ≤ i, j ≤ n, i 6= j). Obviously, this problem is easy to optimize although
the query graph is clique. In this section we present some ideas on how the
complexity of instances of the join ordering problem is influenced by certain
parameters.
132 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

How can we judge the complexity of a single instance of a join ordering prob-
lem? Using standard complexity theory, for single problem instances we easily
derive an algorithm that works in Θ(1). Hence, we must define other complexity
measures. Consider our introductory join ordering problem. A simple greedy
algorithm that orders relations according to their cardinality produces an op-
timal solution for it. Hence, one possibility to define the problem complexity
would be how far a solution produced by typical heuristics for join ordering
differ from the optimal solution. Another possibility is to use randomized al-
gorithms like iterative improvement of simulated annealing and see how far the
plans generated by them deviate from the optimal plan. These approaches have
the problem that the results may depend on the chosen algorithm. This can
be avoided by using the following approach. For each join ordering problem
instance, we compute the fraction of good plans compared to all plans. There-
for, we need a measure of “good”. Typical examples thereof would be to say a
plan is “good” if it does not deviate more than 10% or a factor of two from the
optimal plan.
If these investigations were readily available, there are certain obvious ben-
efits [438]:

1. The designer of an optimizer can classify queries such that heuristics are
applied where they guarantee success; cases where they are bound to fail
can be avoided. Furthermore, taking into account the vastly different run
time of the different join ordering heuristics and probabilistic optimization
procedures, the designer of an optimizer can choose the method that
achieves a satisfactory result with the least effort.

2. The developer of search procedures and heuristics can use this knowl-
edge to design methods solving hard problems (as exemplified for graph
coloring problems [370]).

3. The investigator of different join ordering techniques is able to (1) con-

sciously design challenging benchmarks and (2) evaluate existing bench-
marks according to their degree of challenge.

The kind of investigation presented in this section first started in the context
of artificial intelligence where a paper by Cheeseman, Kanefsky, and Taylor
[138] spurred a whole new branch of research where the measures to judge
the complexity of problem instances was investigated for many different NP-
complete problems like satisfiability [138, 181, 277, 521], graph coloring [138],
Hamiltonian circuits [138], traveling salesman [138], and constraint satisfaction
[805].
We only present a small fraction of all possible investigations. The restric-
tions are that we do not consider all parameters that possibly influence the
problem complexity, we only consider left-deep trees, and we restrict ourselves
to the cost function Chj . The join graphs are randomly generated. Starting
with a circle, we randomly added edges until a clique is reached. The read-
er is advised to carry out his or her own experiments. Therefor, the following
pointer into the literature might be useful. Lanzelotte and Valduriez provide an
3.6. CHARACTERIZING SEARCH SPACES 133

object-oriented design for search strategies [452]. This allows easy modification
and even the exchange of the plan generator’s search strategy.

Search Space Analysis

The goal of this section is to determine the influence of the parameters on the
search space of left-deep join trees. More specifically, we are interested in how a
variation of the parameters changes the percentage of good solutions among all
solutions. The quality of a solution is measured by the factor its cost deviates
from the optimal permutation. For this, all permutations have to be gener-
ated and evaluated. The results of this experiment are shown in Figures 3.28
and 3.29. Each single curve accumulates the percentage of all permutations
deviating less than a certain factor (given as the label) from the optimum. The
accumulated percentages are given at the y-axes, the connectivity at the x-axes.
The connectivity is given by the number of edges in the join graph. The curves
within the figures are organized as follows. Figure 3.28 (3.29) shows varying
mean selectivity values (relation sizes) and variances where the mean selectivity
values (relation sizes) increase from top to bottom and the variances increase
from left to right.
Note that the more curves are visible and the lower their y-values, the harder
is the problem. We observe the following:

• all curves exhibit a minimum value at a certain connectivity

• which moves with increasing mean values to the right;
• increasing variances does not have an impact on the minimum connectiv-
ity,
• problems become less difficult with increasing mean values.

These findings can be explained as follows. With increasing connectivity,

the join ordering problem becomes more complex up to a certain point and
then less complex again. To see this, consider the following special though
illustrative case. Assume an almost equal distribution of the costs of all al-
ternatives between the worst case and optimal costs, equal relation sizes, and
equal selectivities. Then the optimization potential worst case/optimum is 1
for connectivity 0 and cliques. In between, there exists a connectivity exhibit-
ing the maximum optimization potential. This connectivity corresponds to the
minimum connectivity of Figures 3.28 and 3.29.
There is another factor which influences the complexity of a single problem
instance. Consider joining n relations. The problem becomes less complex
if after joining i < n relations the intermediate result becomes so small that
the accumulated costs of the subsequent n − i joins are small compared to the
costs of joining the first i relations. Hence, the ordering of the remaining n − i
relations does not have a big influence on the total costs. This is the case
for very small relations, small selectivities, or high connectivities. The greater
selectivities and relation sizes are, the more relations have to be joined to reach
this critical size of the intermediate result. If the connectivity is enlarged, this
critical size is reached earlier. Since the number of selectivities involved in the
134 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

first few joins is small regardless of the connectivity, there is a lower limit to the
number of joined relations required to arrive at the critical intermediate result
size. If the connectivity is larger, this point is reached earlier, but there exists
a lower limit on the connectivity where this point is reached. The reason for
this lower limit is that the number of selectivities involved in the joins remains
small for the first couple of relations, independent of their connectivity. These
lines of argument explain subsequent findings, too.
The reader should be aware of the fact that the number of relations joined is
quite small (10) in our experiments. Further, as observed by several researchers,
if the number of joins increases, the number of “good” plans decreases [257, 745].
That is, increasing the number of relations makes the join ordering problem
more difficult.

Figure 3.28: Impact of selectivity on the search space

Figure 3.29: Impact of relation sizes on the search space

Heuristics
For analyzing the influence of the parameters on the performance of heuristics,
we give the figures for four different heuristics. The first two are very simple.
The minSel heuristic selects those relations first of which incident join edges
exhibit the minimal selectivity. The recMinRel heuristic chooses those relations
first which result in the smallest intermediate relation.
We also analyzed the two advanced heuristics IKKBZ and RDC . The IKKBZ
heuristic [443] is based on an optimal join ordering procedure [377, 443] which
is applied to the minimal spanning tree of the join graph where the edges are
labeled by the selectivities. The family of RDC heuristics is based on the rela-
tional difference calculus as developed in [358]. Since our goal is not to bench-
mark different heuristics in order to determine the best one, we have chosen
the simplest variant of the family of RDC based heuristics. Here, the relations
are ordered according to a certain weight whose actual computation is—for
the purpose of this section—of no interest. The results of the experiments are
presented in Figure 3.30.
On a first glance, these figures look less regular than those presented so far.
This might be due to the non-stable behavior of the heuristics. Nevertheless,
we can extract the following observations. Many curves exhibit a peak at a
certain connectivity. Here, the heuristics perform worst. The peak connectivity
is dependent on the selectivity size but not as regular as in the previous curves.
Further, higher selectivities flatten the curves, that is, heuristics perform better
at higher selectivities.

Figure 3.30: Impact of parameters on the performance of heuristics

3.7. DISCUSSION 135

Probabilistic Optimization Procedures

Figure 3.31 shows four pictures corresponding to simulated annealing (SA),
iterative improvement (II), iterative improvement applied to the outcome of
the IKKBZ heuristic (IKKBZ/II) and the RDC heuristic (RDC/II) [358]. The
patterns shown in Figure 3.31 are very regular. All curves exhibit a peak
at a certain connectivity. The peak connectivities typically coincide with the
minimum connectivity of the search space analysis. Higher selectivities result
in flatter curves; the probabilistic procedures perform better. These findings
are absolutely coherent with the search space analysis. This is not surprising,
since the probabilistic procedures investigate systematically —although with
some random influence— a certain part of the search space.
Given a join ordering problem, we can describe its potential search space as
a graph. The set of nodes consists of the set of join trees. For every two join
trees a and b, we add an edge (a, b) if b can be reached from a by one of the
transformation rules used in the probabilistic procedure. Further, with every
node we can associate the cost its corresponding join tree.
Having in mind that the probabilistic algorithms are always in danger of
being stuck in a local minima, the following two properties of the search space
are of interest:

1. the cost distribution of local minima, and

2. the connection cost of low local minima.

Of course, if all local minima are of about the same cost, we do not have to
worry, otherwise we do. It would be very interesting to know the percentage of
local minima that are close to the global minima.
Concerning the second property, we first have to define the connection cost.
Let a and b be two nodes and P be the set of all paths from a to b. The
connection cost of a and b is then defined as minp∈P maxs∈p {cost(s)|s 6= a, s 6=
b}. Now, if the connection costs are high, we know that if we have to travel
from one local minima to another, there is at least one node we have to pass
which has high costs. Obviously, this is bad for our probabilistic procedures.
Ioannidis and Kang [386] call a search graph that is favorable with respect to
the two properties a well . Unfortunately, investigating these two properties
of real search spaces is rather difficult. However, Ioannidis and Kang, later
supported by Zhang, succeeded in characterizing cost wells in random graphs
[386, 387]. They also conclude that the search space comprising bushy trees is
better w.r.t. our two properties than the one for left-deep trees.

Figure 3.31: Impact of selectivities on probabilistic procedures

3.7 Discussion
Choose one of dynamic programming, memoization, permutations as the core
of your plan generation algorithm and extend it with the rest of book. ToDo
136 CHAPTER 3. JOIN ORDERING

3.8 Bibliography
ToDo: Oezsu, Meechan [563, 564]
Chapter 4

Database Items, Building

Blocks, and Access Paths

In this chapter we go down to the storage layer and discuss leaf nodes of query
execution plans and plan fragments. We briefly recap some notions, but reading
a book on database implementation might be helpful [347, 270]. Although
alternative storage technologies exist and are being developed [653], databases
are mostly stored on disks. Thus, we start out by introducing a simple disk
model to capture I/O costs. Then, we say some words about database buffers,
physical data organization, slotted pages and tuple identifiers (TIDs), physical
record layout, physical algebra, and the iterator concept. These are the basic
notions in order to start with the main purpose of this section: giving an
overview over the possibilities available to structure the low level parts of a
physical query evaluation plan. In order to calculate the I/O costs of these plan
fragments, a more sophisticated cost model for several kinds of disk accesses is
introduced.

4.1 Disk Drive

Figure 4.1 shows a top and a side view of a typical disk. A disk consists of
several platters that rotate around the spindle at a fixed speed. The platters
are coated with a magnetic material on at least one of their surfaces. All coated
sides are organized into the same pattern of concentric circles. One concentric
circle is called a track. All the tracks residing exactly underneath and above
each other form a cylinder. We assume that there is only one read/write head
for every coated surface.1 All tracks of a cylinder can be accessed with only
minor adjustments at the same time by their respective heads. By moving
the arm around the arm pivot, other cylinders can be accessed. Each track is
partitioned into sectors. Sectors have a disk specific (almost) fixed capacity of
512 B. The read and write granularity is a sector. Read and write accesses take
place while the sector passes under the head.
The top view of Figure 4.1 shows that the outer sectors are longer than the
1
This assumption is valid for most but not all disks.

137
138CHAPTER 4. DATABASE ITEMS, BUILDING BLOCKS, AND ACCESS PATHS

arm spindle
arm head
assembly sector track

platter
head
arm
arm
pivot

cylinder

a. side view b. top view

Figure 4.1: Disk drive assembly

inner sectors. The highest density (e.g. in bits per centimeter) at which bits
can be separated is fixed for a given disk. For storing 512 B, this results in a
minimum sector length which is used for the tracks of the innermost cylinder.
Thus, since sectors on outer tracks are longer, storage capacity is wasted there.
To overcome this problem, disks have a varying number of sectors per track.
(This is where the picture lies.) Therefore, the cylinders are organized into
zones. Every zone contains a fixed number of consecutive cylinders, each having
a fixed number of sectors per track. Between zones, the number of sectors per
track varies. Outer zones have more sectors per track than inner zones. Since
the platters rotate with a fixed angular speed, sectors of outer cylinders can be
read faster than sectors of inner cylinders. As a consequence, the throughput
for reading and writing outer cylinders is higher than for inner cylinders.
Assume that we sequentially read all the sectors of all tracks of some con-
secutive cylinders. After reading all sectors of some track, we must proceed to
the next track. If it is contained in the same cylinder, then we must (simply)
use another head: a head switch occurs. Due to calibration, this takes some
time. Thus, if all sectors start at the same angular position, we come too late
to read the first sector of the next track and have to wait. To avoid this, the
angular start positions of the sectors of tracks in the same cylinder are skewed
such that this track skew compensates for the head switch time. If the next
track is contained in another cylinder, the heads have to switch to the next
cylinder. Again, this takes time and we miss the first sector if all sectors of a
surface start at the same angular positions. Cylinder skew is used such that
the time needed for this switch does not make us miss to start reading the next
sector. In general, skewing works in only one direction.
A sector can be addressed by a triple containing its cylinder, head (surface),
and sector number. This triple is called the physical address of a sector. How-
ever, disks are accessed using logical addresses. These are called logical block
numbers (LBN) and are consecutive numbers starting with zero. The disk in-
ternally maps LBNs to physical addresses. This mapping is captured in the
following table:
4.1. DISK DRIVE 139

Host sends Controller Data transfer to host Status message to host

command decodes it

SCSI bus

Disk 1

Disk 2

Seek Rotational
Disk 3 latency
Data transfer off mechanism Time
Read service time for disk 1
Read service time for disk 2

Figure 4.2: Disk drive read request processing

cylinder track LBN number of sectors per track

0 0 0 573
1 573 573
... ... ... ...
5 2865 573
1 0 3438 573
... ... ... ...
15041 0 35841845 253
... ... ... ...
However, this ideal view is disturbed by the phenomenon of bad blocks. A
bad block is one with a defect and it cannot be read or written. After a block
with a certain LBN is detected to be bad, it is assigned to another sector. The
above mapping changes. In order to be able redirect LBNs, extra space on the
disk must exist. Hence, some cylinders, tracks, and sectors are reserved for this
purpose. They may be scattered all over the platters. Redirected blocks cause
hiccups during sequential read.
Building (see e.g. [546]) and modeling (see e.g. [504, 640, 701, 702, 763, 803])
disk drives is challenging. Whereas the former is not really important when
building query compiler, the latter is, as we have to attach costs to query eval-
uation plans. These costs reflect the amount of time we occupy the resource
disk. Since disks are relatively slow, they may become the bottleneck of a
database server. Modeling and minimizing disk access (time) is thus an im-
portant topic. Consider the case where we want to read a block from a SCSI
disk. Simplified, the following actions take place and take their time (see also
Fig. 4.2):
1. The host sends the SCSI command.

2. The disk controller decodes the command and calculates the physical
address.

3. During the seek the disk drive’s arm is positioned such that the accord-
 140CHAPTER 4. DATABASE ITEMS, BUILDING BLOCKS, AND ACCESS PATHS

ing head is correctly placed over the cylinder where the requested block
resides. This step consists of several phases.

(a) The disk controller accelerates the arm.

(b) For long seeks, the arm moves with maximum velocity (coast).
(c) The disk controller slows down the arm.
(d) The disk arm settles for the desired location. The settle times differ
for read and write requests. For reads, an aggressive strategy is used.
If, after all, it turns out that the block could not be read correctly,
we can just discard it. For writing, a more conservative strategy is
in order.

4. The disk has to wait until the sector where the requested block resides
comes under the head (rotation latency).

5. The disk reads the sector and transfers data to the host.

6. Finally, it sends a status message.

Note that the transfers for different read requests are interleaved. This is pos-
sible since the capacity of the SCSI bus is higher than the read throughput of
the disk. Also note that we did not mention the operating system delay and
congestions on the SCSI bus.
Disk drives apply several strategies to accelerate the above-mentioned round-
trip time and access patterns like sequential read. Among them are caching,
ToDo read-ahead, and command queuing. (discuss interleaving?)
The seek and rotation latency times highly depend on the head’s position
on the platter surface. Let us consider seek time. A good approximation of the
seek time where d cylinders have to be travelled is given by
 √
c1 + c2 d d <= c0
seektime(d) =
c3 + c4 d d > c0

where the constants ci are disk-specific. The constant c0 indicates the maximum
number of cylinders where no coast takes place: seeking over a distance of more
than c0 cylinders results in a phase where the disk arm moves with maximum
velocity.
For disk accesses, the database system must be able to estimate the time
they take to be executed. First of all, we need the parameters of the disk. It
is not too easy to get hold of them, but we can make use of several tools to
extract them from a given disk [209, 266, 752, 660, 815, 816]. However, then we
have a big problem: when calculating I/O costs, the query compiler has no idea
where the head will be when the query evaluation plan emits a certain read (or
write) command. Thus, we have to find another solution. In the following, we
will discuss a rather simplistic cost model that will serve us to get a feeling for
disk behavior. Later, we develop a more realistic model (Section 4.17).
The solution is rather trivial: we sum up all command sending and inter-
preting times as well the times for positioning (seek and rotation latency) which
4.1. DISK DRIVE 141

form by far the major part. Let us call the result latency time. Then, we assume
an average latency time. This, of course, may result in large errors for a single
request. However, on average, the error can be as “low” as 35% [640]. The next
parameter is the sustained read rate. The disk is assumed to be able to deliver
a certain amount of bytes per second while reading data stored consecutively.
Of course, considering multi-zone disks, we know that this is oversimplified,
but we are still in our simplistic model. Analogously, we have a sustained write
rate. For simplicity, we will assume that this is the same as the sustained read
rate. Last, the capacity is of some interest. A hypothetical disk (inspired by
disks available in 2004) then has the following parameters:

Model 2004
Parameter Value Abbreviated Name
capacity 180 GB Dcap
average latency time 5 ms Dlat
sustained read rate 100 MB/s Dsrr
sustained write rate 100 MB/s Dswr

The time a disk needs to read and transfer n bytes is then approximated by
Dlat + n/Dsrr . Again, this is overly simplistic: (1) due to head switches and
cylinder switches, long reads have lower throughput than short reads and (2)
multiple zones are not modelled correctly. However, let us use this very sim-
plistic model to get some feeling for disk costs.
Database management system developers distinguish between sequential
I/O and random I/O. For sequential I/O, there is only one positioning at the
beginning and then, we can assume that data is read with the sustained read
rate. For random I/O, one positioning for every unit of transfer—typically a
page of say 8 KB—is assumed. Let us illustrate the effect of positioning by a
small example. Assume that we want to read 100 MB of data stored consecu-
tively on a disk. Sequential read takes 5 ms plus 1 s. If we read in blocks of
8 KB where each block requires positioning then reading 100 MB takes 65 s.
Assume that we have a relation of about 100 MB in size, stored on a disk,
and we want to read it. Does it take 1 s or 65 s? If the blocks on which it is
stored are randomly scattered on disk and we access them in a random order,
65 s is a good approximation. So let us assume that it is stored on consecutive
blocks. Assume that we read in chunks of 8 KB. Then,

• other applications,

• other transactions, and

• other read operations of the same query evaluation plan

could move the head away from our reading position. (Congestion on the SCSI
bus may also be problem.) Again, we could be left with 65 s. Reading the
whole relation with one read request is a possibility but may pose problems
to the buffer manager. Fortunately, we can read in chunks much smaller than
100 MB. Consider Figure 4.3. If we read in chunks of 100 8 KB blocks we are
already pretty close to one second (within a factor of two).
142CHAPTER 4. DATABASE ITEMS, BUILDING BLOCKS, AND ACCESS PATHS

64

32

16

1
1 4 16 64

Figure 4.3: Time to read 100 MB from disk (depending on the number of 8 KB
blocks read at once)
4.1. DISK DRIVE 143

Note that the interleaving of actions does not necessarily mean a negative
impact. This depends on the point of view, i.e. what we want to optimize. If we
want to optimize response time for a single query, then obviously the impact of
concurrent actions is negative. If, however, we want to optimize resource (here:
disk) usage, concurrent actions might help. ToDo?
There are two important things to learn here. First, sequential read is much
faster than random read. Second, the runtime system should secure sequential
read. The latter point can be generalized: the runtime system of a database
management system has, as far as query execution is concerned, two equally
important tasks:

• allow for efficient query evaluation plans and

• allow for smooth, simple, and robust cost functions.

Typical measures on the database side are

• carefully chosen physical layout on disk

(e.g. cylinder or track-aligned extents [661, 662, 659], clustering),

• disk scheduling, multi-page requests

[195, 391, 669, 670, 677, 697, 727, 807, 814],

• (asynchronous) prefetching,

• piggy-back scans,

• buffering (e.g. multiple buffers, replacement strategy from [64] to [513]),

and last but not least

• efficient and robust algorithms for algebraic operators [294].

Let us take yet another look at it. 100 MB can be stored on 12800 8 KB
pages. Figure 4.4 shows the time to read n random pages. In our simplistic cost
model, reading 200 pages randomly costs about the same as reading 100 MB
sequentially. That is, reading 1/64th of 100 MB randomly takes as long as
reading the 100 MB sequentially. Let us denote by a the positioning time, s
the sustained read rate, p the page size, and d some amount of consecutively
stored bytes. Let us calculate the break-even point

n ∗ (a + p/s) = a + d/s
n = (a + d/s)/(a + p/s)
= (as + d)/(as + p)

a and s are disk parameters and, hence, fixed. For a fixed d, the break-even
point depends on the page size. This is illustrated in Figure 4.5. The x-axis is
the page size p in multiples of 1 K and the y-axis is (d/p)/n for d = 100 MB.
For sequential reads, the page size does not matter. (Be aware that our
simplistic model heavily underestimates sequential reads.) For random reads,
144CHAPTER 4. DATABASE ITEMS, BUILDING BLOCKS, AND ACCESS PATHS

2.5

1.5

0.5

0
0 100 200 30

Figure 4.4: Time needed to read n random pages

4.1. DISK DRIVE 145

512

256

128

64

32

16

8
1 2 4 8

Figure 4.5: Break-even point in fraction of total pages depending on page size
146CHAPTER 4. DATABASE ITEMS, BUILDING BLOCKS, AND ACCESS PATHS

as long as a single page is read, it matters neither: reading a single page of 1 KB

lasts 5.0097656 ms, for an 8 KB page the number is 5.0781250 ms. From all
this, we could draw the conclusion that the larger the page the better. However,
this is only true for the disk, not, e.g., for the buffer or the SCSI bus. If we need
to access only 500 B of a page, then the larger the page the higher the fraction
that is wasted. This is not as severe as it sounds. Other queries or transactions
might need other parts of the page during a single stay in the buffer. Let us
call the fraction of the page that is read by some transaction during a stay in
the buffer by utilization. Obviously, the higher the utilization the better is our
usage of the main memory in which the buffer resides. For smaller pages, the
utilization is typically higher than for larger pages. The frequency by which
pages are used is another factor. [314, 315].

Excursion. Consider the root page of a B-tree. It is accessed quite frequently

and most of its parts will be used, no matter how large it is. Hence, utilization
is always good. Thus, the larger the root page of a B-tree the better. On the
other hand, consider a leaf page of a B-tree that is much bigger than main
memory. During a single stay of it, only a small fraction of the page will be
used. That is, smaller leaf pages are typically better. By converting everything
to money instead of time, Gray and Graefe [314] as well as Lomet [489] come
to the conclusion that a page size between 8 and 16 KB was a good choice at
the end of the last century.
For the less simplistic model of disk access costs developed in Section 4.17,
we need to describe a disk drive by a set of parameters. These parameters are
summarized in Table 4.1.
Let us close this section by giving upper bounds on seek time and rotational
latency. Qyang proved the following theorem which gives a tight upper bound
of disk seek time if several cylinders of a consecutive range of cylinders have to
be visited [600].

Theorem 4.1.1 (Qyang) If the disk arm has to travel over a region of C
cylinders, it is positioned on the first of the C cylinders and has to stop at s − 1
of them, then sDseek (C/s) is an upper bound for the seek time.

The time required for s consecutive sectors in a track of zone i to pass by

the head is
Drot
Drot (s, i) = sDZscan (i) = s (4.1)
DZspt (i)
A trivial upper bound for the rotational delay is a full rotation.

4.2 Database Buffer

The database buffer
1. is a finite piece of memory,
2. typically supports a limited number of different page sizes (mostly one or
two),
4.3. PHYSICAL DATABASE ORGANIZATION 147

Dcyl total number of cylinders

Dtrack total number of tracks
Dsector total number of sectors
Dtpc number of tracks per cylinder (= number of surfaces)

Dcmd command interpretation time

Drot time for a full rotation
Drdsettle time for settle for read
Dwrsettle time for settle for write
Dhdswitch time for head switch

DZone total number of zones

DZcyl (i) number of cylinders in zone i
DZspt (i) number of sectors per track in zone i
DZspc (i) number of sectors per cylinder in zone i (= Dtpc DZspt (i))
DZscan (i) time to scan a sector in zone i (= Drot /DZspt (i))

Davgseek average seek costs

D c0 parameter for seek cost function
D c1 parameter for seek cost function
D c2 parameter for seek cost function
D c3 parameter for seek cost function
D c4 parameter for seek cost function

Dseek (d) cost of a seek

 of d cylinders
√
D c1 + D c2 d if d ≤ Dc0
Dseek (d) =
D c3 + D c4 d if d > Dc0
Drot (s, i) rotation cost for s sectors of zone i (= sDZscan (i))

Table 4.1: Disk drive parameters and elementary cost functions

3. is often fragmented into several buffer pools,

4. each having a replacement strategy (typically enhanced by hints).

Given the page identifier, the buffer frame is found by a hashtable lookup.
Accesses to the hash table and the buffer frame need to be synchronized. Before
accessing a page in the buffer, it must be fixed. These points account for the
fact that the costs of accessing a page in the buffer are, therefore, greater than
zero.

4.3 Physical Database Organization

We call everything that is stored in the database and relevant for answering
queries a database item. Let us exclude meta data. In a relational system,
a database item can be a relation, a fragment of a relation (if the relation is
horizontally or vertically fragmented), a segment, an index, a materialized view,
148CHAPTER 4. DATABASE ITEMS, BUILDING BLOCKS, AND ACCESS PATHS

or an index on a materialized view. In object-oriented databases, a database

item can be the extent of a class, a named object, an index and so forth. In
XML databases, a database item can be a named document, a collection of
documents, or an index. Access operations to database items form the leaves
of query evaluation plans.

Partition Relation
1 1

contains fragmented

N N
Segment N mapped M Fragment

1
N
consists of contains

N
Page

1
stores

N M
N represented 1 Tuple
Record

Figure 4.6: Physical organization of a relational database

The physical algebra implemented in the query execution engine of some

runtime systems allow to access database items. Since most database items
consist of several data items (tuples, objects, documents), these access oper-
ations produce a stream of data items. This kind of collection-valued access
operation is called a scan. Consider the simple query
select *
from Student

This query is valid only if the database item (relation) Student exists. It could
4.3. PHYSICAL DATABASE ORGANIZATION 149

be accessible via a relation scan operation rscan(Student). However, in

reality we have to consider the physical organization of the database.
Figure 4.6 gives an overview of how relations can be stored in a relational
database system. Physical database items can be found on the left-hand side,
logical database items on the right-hand side. A fraction of a physical disk is
a partition. It can be an operating system file or a raw partition. A partition
is organized into several segments. A segment consists of several pages. The
pages within a segment are typically accessible by a non-negative integer in
[0, n[, where n is the number of pages of the segment2 . Iterative access to all
pages of a segment is typically possible. The access is called a scan. As there
are several types of segments (e.g. data segments, index segments), several kinds
of scans exist. Within a page, physical records are stored. Each physical record
represents a (part of a) tuple of a fragment of a relation.
Fragments are mapped to segments and relations are partitioned into frag-
ments. In the simplest and most common organization, every relation has only
one fragment with a one-to-one mapping to segments, and for every tuple there
exists exactly one record representing only this tuple. Hence, both of relation-
ships mapped and represented are one-to-one. However, this organization does
not scale well. A relation could be larger than a disk. Even if a large relation,
say 180 GB fits on a disk, scanning it takes half an hour (Model 2004). Hori-
zontal partitioning and allocation of the fragments on several disks reduces the
scan time by allowing for parallelism. Vertical partitioning is another means of
reducing I/O [176]. Here, a tuple is represented by several physical records, each
one containing a subset of the tuple’s attributes. Since the relationship mapped
is N:M, tuples from different relations can be stored in the same segment. Fur-
thermore, in distributed database systems some fragments might be stored re-
dundantly at different locations to improve access times [112, 439, 601, 565].
Some systems support clustering of tuples of different relations. For exam-
ple, department tuples can be clustered with employee tuples such that those
employees belonging to the department are close together and close to their
department tuple. Such an organization speeds up join processing.
To estimate costs, we need a model of a segment. We assume an extent-
based implementation. That is, a segment consists of several extents3 . Each
extent occupies consecutive sectors on disk. For simplicity, we assume that
whole cylinders belong to a segment. Then, we can model segments as follows.
Each segment consists of a sequence of extents. Each extent is stored on con-
secutive cylinders. Cylinders are exclusively assigned to a segment. We then
describe each extent j as a pair (Fj , Lj ) where Fj is the first and Lj the last
cylinder of a consecutive sequence of cylinders. A segment can then be described
by a sequence of such pairs. We assume that these pairs are sorted in ascending
order. In such a description, an extent may include a zone boundary. Since cost
functions are dependent on the zone, we break up cylinder ranges that are not
contained in a single zone. The result can be described by a sequence of triples

2
This might not be true. Alternatively, the pages of a partition can be consecutively
numbered.
3
Extents are not shown in Fig. 4.6. They can be included between Partitions and Segments.
150CHAPTER 4. DATABASE ITEMS, BUILDING BLOCKS, AND ACCESS PATHS

273 2
273 827

827 1

Figure 4.7: Slotted pages and TIDs

(Fi , Li , zi ) where Fi and Li mark a range of consecutive cylinders in a zone zi .

Although the zi ’s can be inferred from the cylinder numbers, we include them
for clarity. Also of interest are the total number of sectors in a segment and the
number of cylinders Scpe (i) in an extent i. Summarizing, we describe a segment
by the parameter given in Table 4.2.

Sext number of extents in the segment

total number of sectors in the segment (= Si=1
P ext
Ssec Scpe (i)DZspc (Szone (i)))
Sfirst (i) first cylinder in extent i
Slast (i) last cylinder in extent i
Scpe (i) number of cylinders in extent i (= Slast (i) − Sfirst (i) + 1)
Szone (i) zone of extent i

Table 4.2: Segment parameters

4.4 Slotted Page and Tuple Identifier (TID)

Let us briefly review slotted pages and the concept of tuple identifiers (TIDs)
(see Figure 4.7) [37, 36, 490, 734]. Sometimes, record identifer or row identifier
(RID) is used in the literature. A TID consists of (at least) two parts. The
first part identifies a page, the second part a slot on a slotted page. The slot
contains—among other things, e.g. the record’s size—a (relative) pointer to the
actual record. This way, the record can be moved within the page without
invalidating its TID. When a record grows beyond the available space, it is
moved to another page and leaves a forward pointer (again consisting of a page
and a slot identifier) in its original position. This happened to the TID [273, 1]
in Figure 4.7. If the record has to be moved again, the forward pointer is
adjusted. This way, at most two page accesses are needed to retrieve a record,
given its TID. For evaluating the costs of record accesses, we will assume that
4.5. PHYSICAL RECORD LAYOUTS 151

273 2
273 827

827 1

Figure 4.8: Various physical record layouts

the fraction of moved records is known.

4.5 Physical Record Layouts

A physical record represents a tuple, object, or some other logical entity or
fraction thereof. In case it represents a tuple, it consists of several fields, each
representing the value of an attribute. These values can be integers, floating
point numbers, or strings. In case of object-oriented or object-relational sys-
tems, the values can also be of a complex type. Tuple identifiers are also possible
as attribute values [622]. This can, for example, speed up join processing.
In any case, we can distinguish between types whose values all exhibit the
same fixed length and those whose values may vary in length. In a physical
record, the values of fixed-length attributes are concatenated and the offset
from the beginning of the record to the value of some selected attribute can
be inferred from the types of the values preceding it. This differs for values
of varying length. Here, several encodings are possible. Some simple ones are
depicted in Figure 4.8. The topmost record encodes varying length values as a
sequence of pairs of the form [size, value]. This encoding has the disadvantage
that access to an attribute of varying length is linear in the number of those
preceding it. This disadvantage is avoided in the solution presented in the
middle. Instead of storing the sizes of the individual values, there is an array
containing relative offsets into the physical record. They point to the start of
the values. The length of the values can be inferred from these offsets and,
in case of the last value, from the total length of the physical record, which is
typically stored in its slot. Access to a value of varying size is now simplified to
an indirect memory access plus some length calculations. Although this might
152CHAPTER 4. DATABASE ITEMS, BUILDING BLOCKS, AND ACCESS PATHS

be cheaper than the first solution, there is still a non-negligible cost associated
with an attribute access.
The third physical record layout can be used to represent compressed at-
tribute values and even compressed length information for parts of varying size.
Note that if fixed size fields are compressed, their length becomes varying. Ac-
cess to an attribute now means decompressing length/offset information and
decompressing the value itself. The former is quite cheap: it boils down to an
indirect memory access with some offset taken from a matrix [799]. The cost
of the latter depends on the compression scheme used. It should be clear that
accessing an attribute value now is even more expensive. To make the costs of
an attribute access explicit was the sole purpose of this small section.
Remark Westmann et al. discuss an efficient implementation of compres-
sion and evaluate its performance [799]. Yiannis and Zobel report on experi-
ments with several compression techniques used to speed up the sort operator.
For some of them, the CPU usage is twice as large [?].

4.6 Physical Algebra (Iterator Concept)

Physical algebraic operators are mostly implemented as iterators. This means
that they support the the interface operations open, next, and close. With
open, the stream of items (e.g. tuples) is initialized. With next, the next item
on the stream is fetched. When no more items are available, e.g. next returns
false, close can be called to clean up things. The iterator concept is explained
in many text books (e.g. [270, 347, 413]) and the query processing survey by
Graefe [294]. This basic iterator concept has been extended to better cope
with nested evaluation by Westmann in his thesis [797], Westmann et al. [799],
and Graefe [298]. The two main issues are separation of storage allocation and
initialization, and batched processing. The former splits open into resource
allocation, initialization of the operator, and initialization of the iterator.

4.7 Simple Scan

Let us come back to the scan operations. A logical operation for scanning rela-
tions (which could be called rscan) is rarely supported by relational database
management systems. Instead, they provide (physical) scans on segments. Since
a (data) segment is sometimes called file, the correct plan for the above query
is often denoted by fscan(Student). Several assumptions must hold: the
Student relation is not fragmented, it is stored in a single segment, the name
of this segment is the same as the relation name, and no tuples from other
relations are stored in this segment. Until otherwise stated, we will assume
that relations are not partitioned, are stored in a single segment and that the
segment can be inferred from the relation’s name. Instead of fscan(Student),
we could then simply use Student to denote leaf nodes in a query execution
plan. If we want to use a variable that is bound subsequently to each tuple in
a relation, the query
select *
4.8. SCAN AND ATTRIBUTE ACCESS 153

from Student

can be expressed as Student[s] instead of Student. In this notation, the output

stream contains tuples having a single attribute s bound to a tuple. Physically,
s will not hold the whole tuple but, for example, a pointer into the buffer where
the tuple can be found. An alternative is a pointer to a slot of a slotted page
contained in the buffer.
A simple scan is an example for a building block . In general, a building
block is something that is used as a bottommost operator in a query evaluation
plan. Hence, every leaf node of a query evaluation plan is a building block or
a part thereof. This is not really a sharp definition, but is sometimes useful
to describe the behavior of a query compiler: after their determination, it will
leave building blocks untouched even if reorderings are hypothetically possible.
Although a building block can be more than a leaf node (scan) of a query
evaluation plan, it will never include more than a single database item. As
soon as more database items are involved, we use the notion of access path, a
term which will become more precise later on when we discuss index usage.
The disk access costs for a simple scan can be derived from the considera-
tions in Section 4.1 and Section 4.17.

4.8 Scan and Attribute Access

Strictly speaking, a plan like σage>30 (Student[s]) is invalid, since the tuple
stream produced by Student[s] contains tuples with a single attribute s. We
have a choice. Either we assume that attribute access takes place implicitly, or
we make it explicit. Whether this makes sense or not depends on the database
management system for which we generate plans. Let us discuss the advantages
of explicit attribute retrieval. Assume s.age retrieves the age of a student.
Then we can write σs.age>30 (Student[s]), where there is some non-neglectable
cost for s.age. The expression σs.age>30∧s.age<40 (Student[s]) executes s.age
twice. This is a bad idea. Instead, we would like to retrieve it once and reuse
it later.
This purpose is well-served by the map operator (χ). It adds new attributes
to a given tuple and is defined as

χa1 :e1 ,...,an :en (e) := {t ◦ [a1 : c1 , . . . , an : cn ]|t ∈ e, ci = ei (t) ∀ (1 ≤ i ≤ n)}

where ◦ denotes tuple concatenation and the ai must not be in A(e). (Remem-
ber that A(e) is the set of attributes produced by e.) Every input tuple t is
extended by new attributes ai , whose values are computed by evaluating the
expression ei , in which free variables (attributes) are bound to the attributes
(variables) provided by t.
The above problem can now be solved by

σage>30∧age<40 (χage:s.age (Student[s])).

154CHAPTER 4. DATABASE ITEMS, BUILDING BLOCKS, AND ACCESS PATHS

In general, it is beneficial to load attributes as late as possible. The latest point

at which all attributes must be read from the page is typically just before a
pipeline breaker4 .
To see why this is useful, consider the simple query

select name
from Student
where age > 30

The plan
Πn (χn:s.name (σa>30 (χa:s.age (Student[s]))))

makes use of this feature, while

Πn (σa>30 (χn:s.name,a:s.age (Student[s])))

does not. In the first plan the name attribute is only accessed for those students
with age over 30. Hence, it should be cheaper to evaluate. If the database
management system does not support this selective access mechanism, we often
find the scan enhanced by a list of attributes that is projected and included in
the resulting tuple stream.
In order to avoid copying attributes from their storage representation to
some main memory representation, some database management systems apply
another mechanism. They support the evaluation of some predicates directly
on the storage representation. These are boolean expressions consisting of sim-
ple predicates of the form Aθc for attributes A, comparison operators θ, and
constants c. Instead of a constant, c could also be the value of some attribute
or expression thereof given that it can be evaluated before the access to A.
Predicates evaluable on the disk representation are called SARGable where
SARG is an acronym for search argument. Note that SARGable predicates
may also be good for index lookups. Then they are called index SARGable.
In case they can not be evaluated by an index, they are called data SARGable
[672, 750, 275].
Since relation or segment scans can evaluate predicates, we have to extend
our notation for scans. Let I be a database item like a relation or segment.
Then, I[v; p] scans I, binds each item in I successively to v and returns only
those items for which p holds. I[v; p] is equivalent to σp (I[v]), but cheaper to
evaluate. If p is a conjunction of predicates, the conjuncts should be ordered
such that the attribute access cost reductions described above are reflected
(for details see Chapter ??). Syntactically, we express this by separating the
predicates by a comma as in Student[s; age > 30, name like ‘%m%0 ]. If we want
to make a distinction between SARGable and non-SARGable predicates, we
write I[v; ps ; pr ], with ps being the SARGable predicate and pr a non-SARGable
predicate. Additional extensions like a projection list are also possible.
4
The page on which the physical record resides must be fixed until all attributes are loaded.
Hence, an earlier point in time might be preferable.
4.9. TEMPORAL RELATIONS 155

4.9 Temporal Relations

Scanning a temporal relation or segment also makes sense. Whenever the result
of some (partial) query evaluation plan is used more than once, it might be
worthwhile to materialize it in some temporary relation. For this purpose, a
tmp operator evaluates its argument expression and stores the result relation in
a temporary segment. Consider the following example query.

select e.name, d.name

from Emp e, Dept d
where e.age > 30 and e.age < 40 and e.dno = d.dno

It can be evaluated by

Dept[d] 1nl
e.dno=d.dno σe.age>30∧e.age<40 (Emp[d]).

Since the inner (right) argument of the nested-loop join is evaluated several
times (once for each department), materialization may pay off. The plan then
looks like

Dept[d] 1nl
e.dno=d.dno Tmp(σe.age>30∧e.age<40 (Emp[d])).

If we choose to factorize and materialize a common subexpression, the query

evaluation plan becomes a DAG. Alternatively, we could write a small “pro-
gram” that has some statements materializing some expressions which are then
used later on. The last expression in a program determines its result. For our
example, the program looks as follows.

1. Rtmp = σe.age>30∧e.age<40 (Emp[d]);

2. Dept[d] 1nl
e.dno=d.dno Rtmp [e]

The disk costs of writing and reading temporary relations can be calculated
using the considerations of Section 4.1.

4.10 Table Functions

A table function is a function that returns a relation [495]. An example is
Primes(int from, int to), which returns all primes between from and to,
e.g. via a sieve-method. It can be used in any place where a relation name can
occur. The query

select *
from TABLE(Primes(1,100)) as p

returns all primes between 1 and 100. The attribute names of the resulting
relation are specified in the declaration of the table function. Let us assume
that for Primes a single attribute prime is specified. Note that table func-
tions may take parameters. This does not pose any problems, as long as we
 156CHAPTER 4. DATABASE ITEMS, BUILDING BLOCKS, AND ACCESS PATHS

know that Primes is a table function and we translate the above query into
Primes(1, 100)[p]. Although this looks exactly like a table scan, the implemen-
tation and cost calculations are different.
Consider the following query where we extract the years in which we expect
a special celebration of Anton’s birthday.

select *
from Friends f,
TABLE(Primes(
CURRENT YEAR, EXTRACT(YEAR FROM f.birthday) + 100)) as p
where f.name = ‘Anton’

The result of the table function depends on our friend Anton. Hence, a join
is no solution. Instead, we have to introduce a new kind of join, the d-join
where the d stands for dependent. It is defined as

R < S >= {t ◦ s|t ∈ T, s ∈ S(t)}.

The above query can now be evaluted as

χb:EXT RACT Y EAR(f.birthday)+100 (σf.name=‘Anton0 (Friends[f ])) < Primes(c, b)[p] >

where we assume that some global entity c holds the value of CURRENT YEAR.
Let us do the above query for all friends. We just have to drop the where
clause. Obviously, this results in many redundant computations of primes. At
the SQL level, using the birthday of the youngest friend is beneficial:

select *
from Friends f,
TABLE(Primes(
CURRENT YEAR, (select max(birthday) from Friends) + 100)) as p
where p.prime ≥ f.birthday

At the algebraic level, this kind of optimizations will be considered in Section ??.
Things can get even more involved if table functions can consume and pro-
ToDo? duce relations, i.e. arguments and results can be relations.
Little can be said about the disk costs of table functions. They can be zero
if the function is implemented such that it does not access any disks (files stored
there), but it can also be very expensive if large files are scanned each time it is
called. One possibility is to let the database administrator specify the numbers
the query optimizer needs. However, since parameters are involved, this is
not really an easy task. Another possibility is to measure the table function’s
behavior whenever it is executed, and learn about its resource consumption.

4.11 Indexes
There exists a plethora of different index structures. In the context of relational
database management systems, the most versatile and robust index is the B-
tree or variants/improvements thereof (e.g. []). It is implemented in almost
4.11. INDEXES 157

Figure 4.9: Clustered vs. non-clustered index

every commercial database management system. Some support hash-indexes

(e.g. []). Other data models or specific applications need specialized indexes.
There exist special index structures for indexing path expressions in object-
oriented databases (e.g. []) and XML databases (e.g. []). Special purpose indexes
include join indexes (e.g. [345, 772]) multi-dimensional indexes (e.g. []), variant
(projection) indexes [551], small materialized aggregates [527], bitmap indexes
[], and temporal indexes (e.g. []). We cannot discuss all indexes and their
exploitations for efficient query evaluation. This fills more than a single book.
Instead, we concentrate on B-tree indexes. In general, a B-tree can be used
to index several relations. We only discuss cases where B-trees index a single
relation.
The search key (or key for short) of an index is the sequence of attributes
of the indexed relation over which the index is defined. A key is a simple key if
it consists of a single attribute. Otherwise, it is a complex key. Each entry in
the B-tree’s leaf page consists of pairs containing the key values and a sequence
of tuple identifiers (typically sorted by increasing page number). Every tuple
with a TID in this list satisfies the condition that its indexed attribute’s values
are equal to the key values. If for every sequence of key values there is at most
one such tuple, we have a unique index, otherwise a non-unique index .
The leaf entries may contain values from additional (non-key) attributes.
Then we call the index attribute data added and the additional attributes data
attributes. If the index contains all attributes of the indexed relation—in its
key or data attributes—storing the relation is no longer necessary. The result is
an index-only relation. In this case, the concept of tuple identifiers is normally
no longer used since tuples can now be moved frequently, e.g. due to a leaf page
split. This has two consequences. First, the data part does not longer contain
the TID. Second, other indexes on the index-only relation cannot have tuple
identifiers in their data part either. Instead, they use the key of the index-only
relation to uniquely reference a tuple. For this to work, we must have a unique
index.
B-trees can be either clustered or non-clustered indexes. In a clustered index,
the tuple identifiers in the list of leaf pages are ordered according to their page
158CHAPTER 4. DATABASE ITEMS, BUILDING BLOCKS, AND ACCESS PATHS

numbers. Otherwise, it is a non-clustered index5 . Figure 4.9 illustrates this.

Range queries result in sequential access for clustered indexes and in random
access for non-clustered indexes.

4.12 Single Index Access Path

4.12.1 Simple Key, No Data Attributes
Consider the exact match query
select name
from Emp
where eno = 1077

If there exists a unique index on the key attribute eno, we can first access the
index to retrieve the TID of the employee tuple satisfying eno = 1077. Another
page access yields the tuple itself which constitutes the result of the query. Let
Empeno be the index on eno, then we can descend the B-tree, using 1077 as the
search key. A predicate that can be used to descend the B-tree or, in general,
governing search within an index structure, is called an index sargable predicate.
For the example query, the index scan, denoted as Empeno [x; eno = 1077],
retrieves a single leaf node entry with attributes eno and TID. Similar to the
regular scan, we assume x to be a variable holding a pointer to this index
entry. We use the notations x.eno and x.TID to access these attributes. To
dereference the TID, we use the map (χ) operator and a dereference function
deref (or ∗ for short). It turns a TID into a pointer in the buffer area. This of
course requires the page to be loaded, if it is not in the buffer yet. The complete
plan for the query is
Πname (χe:∗(x.TID),name:e.name (Empeno [x; eno = 1077]))
where we computed several new attributes with one χ operator. Note that
they are dependent on previously computed attributes and, hence, the order of
evaluation does matter.
We can make the dependency of the map operator more explicit by applying
a d-join. Denote by 2 an operator that returns a single empty tuple. Then
Πname (Empeno [x; eno = 1077] < χe:∗(x.TID),name:e.name (2) >)
is equivalent to the former plan. Joins and indexes will be discussed in Sec-
tion 4.14.
A range query like
select name
from Emp
where age ≥ 25 and age ≤ 35

5
Of course, any degree of clusteredness may occur and has to be taken into account in cost
calculations.
4.12. SINGLE INDEX ACCESS PATH 159

specifies a range for the indexed attribute. It is evaluated by an index scan

with start and stop conditions. In our case, the start condition is age ≥ 25,
and the stop condition is age ≤ 35. The start condition is used to retrieve the
first tuple satisfying it by searching within the B-tree. In our case, 25 is used to
descend from the root to the leaf page containing the key 25. Then, all records
with keys larger than 25 within the page are searched. Since entries in B-tree
pages are sorted on key values, this is very efficient. If we are done with the
leaf page that contains 25 and the stop key has not been found yet, we proceed
to the next leaf page. This is possible since leaf pages of B-trees tend to be
chained. Then all records of the next leaf page are scanned and so on until we
find the stop key. The complete plan then is
Πname (χe:∗(x.TID),name:e.name (Empage [x; 25 ≤ age; age ≤ 35]))
If the index on age is non-clustered, this plan results in random I/O. We
can turn random I/O into sequential I/O by sorting the result of the index scan
on its TID attribute before dereferencing it6 . This results in the following plan:
Πname (χe:∗(TID),name:e.name (SortTID (Empage [x; 25 ≤ age; age ≤ 35; TID])))
Here, we explicitly included the TID attribute of the index into the projection
list.
Consider a similar query which demands the output to be sorted:
select name, age
from Emp
where age ≥ 25 and age ≤ 35
order by age
Since an index scan on a B-tree outputs its result ordered on the indexed at-
tribute, the following plan produces the perfect result:
Πname,age (χe:∗(x.TID),name:e.name (Empage [x; 25 ≤ age; age ≤ 35]))
On a clustered index this is most probably the best plan. On a non-clustered
index, random I/O disturbs the picture. We avoid that by sorting the result of
the index scan on the TID attribute and, after accessing the tuples, restore the
order on age as in the following plan:
Πname,age (Sortage (χe:∗(TID),name:e.name (SortTID (Empage [x; 25 ≤ age; age ≤ 35; TID]))))
An alternative to this plan is not to sort on the original indexed attribute (age
in our example), but to introduce a new attribute that holds the rank in the
sequence derived from the index scan. This leads to the plan
Πname,age (
Sortrank (
χe:∗(TID),name:e.name (
SortTID (
χrank:counter++ (
Empage [x; 25 ≤ age; age ≤ 35; TID])))))
6
This might not be necessary, if Emp fits main memory. Then, preferably asynchronous I/O
should be used.
160CHAPTER 4. DATABASE ITEMS, BUILDING BLOCKS, AND ACCESS PATHS

This alternative might turn out to be more efficient since sorting on an attribute
with a dense domain can be implemented efficiently. (We admit that in the
above example this is not worth considering.) There is another important
application of this technique: XQuery often demands output in document order.
If this order is destroyed during processing, it must at the latest be restored
when the output it produced [507]. Depending on the implementation (i.e. the
representation of document nodes or their identifiers), this might turn out to
be a very expensive operation.
The fact that index scans on B-trees return their result ordered on the
indexed attributes is also very useful if a merge-join on the same attributes (or
a prefix thereof, see Chapter 23 for further details) occurs. An example follows
later on.
Some predicates are not index SARGable, but can still be evaluated with
the index as in the following query
select name
from Emp
where age ≥ 25 and age ≤ 35 and age 6= 30

The predicate age 6= 30 is an example of a residual predicate. We can once

more extend the index scan and compile the query into

Πname (χt:x.TID,e:∗t,name:e.name (Empage [x; 25 ≤ age; age ≤ 35; age 6= 30]))

Some index scan implementations allow exclusive bounds for start and stop
conditions. With them, the query
select name
from Emp
where age > 25 and age < 35

can be evaluated using

Πname (χt:x.TID,e:∗t,name:e.name (Empage [x; 25 < age; age < 35]))

If this is not the case, two residual predicates must be used as in

Πname (χt:x.TID,e:∗t,name:e.name (Empage [x; 25 ≤ age; age ≤ 35; age 6= 25, age 6= 35]))

Especially for predicates on strings, this might be expensive.

Start and stop conditions are optional. To evaluate
select name
from Emp
where age ≥ 60
we use age ≥ 60 as the start condition to find the leaf page containing the key
60. From there on, we scan all the leaf pages “to the right”.
If we have no start condition, as in
4.12. SINGLE INDEX ACCESS PATH 161

select name
from Emp
where age ≤ 20

we descend the B-tree to the “leftmost” page, i.e. the page containing the
smallest key value, and then proceed scanning leaf pages until we encounter the
key 20.
Having neither a start nor stop condition is also quite useful. The query

select count(*)
from Emp

can be evaluated by counting the entries in the leaf pages of a B-tree. Since
a B-tree typically occupies far fewer pages than the original relation, we have
a viable alternative to a relation scan. The same applies to the aggregate
functions sum and avg. The other aggregate functions min and max can be
evaluated much more efficiently by descending to the leftmost or rightmost leaf
page of a B-tree. This can be used to answer queries like

select min/max(salary)
from Emp

much more efficiently than by a relation scan. Consider the query

select name
from Emp
where salary = (select max(salary)
from Emp)

It can be evaluated by first computing the maximum salary and then retrieving
the employees earning this salary. This requires two descendants into the B-
tree, while obviously one is sufficient. Depending on the implementation of the
index (scan), we might be able to perform this optimization.
Further, the result of an index scan, whether it uses start and/or stop con-
ditions or not, is always sorted on the key. This property can be useful for
queries with no predicates. If we have neither a start nor a stop condition, the
resulting scan is called full index scan. As an example consider the query

select salary
from Emp
order by salary

which is perfectly answered by the following full index scan:

Empsalary

So far, we have only seen indexes on numerical attributes.

162CHAPTER 4. DATABASE ITEMS, BUILDING BLOCKS, AND ACCESS PATHS

select name, salary

from Emp
where name ≥ ’Maaa’
gives rise to a start condition 0 Maaa0 ≤ name. From the query
select name, salary
from Emp
where name like ’M%’
we can deduce the start condition 0 M0 ≤ name.
To express all the different alternatives of index usage, we need a powerful
(and runtime system dependent) index scan expression. Let us first summarize
what we can specify for an index scan:
1. the name of the variable for index entries (or pointers to them),

2. the start condition,

3. the stop condition,

4. a residual predicate, and

5. a projection list.
A projection list has entries of the form a : x.b for attribute names a and b and
x being the name of the variable for the index entry. a : x.a is also allowed and
often abbreviated as a. We also often summarize start and stop conditions into
a single expression like in 25 ≤ age ≤ 35.
For a full index specification, we list all items in the subscript of the index
name separated by a semicolon. Still, we need some extensions to express the
queries with aggregation. Let a and b be attribute names, then we allow entries
of the form b : aggr(a) in the projection list and start/stop conditions of the
form min/max(a). The latter tells us to minimize/maximize the value of the
indexed attribute a. Only a complete enumeration gives us the full details. On
the other hand, extracting start and stop conditions and residual predicates
from a given boolean expression is rather simple. Hence, we often summarize
these three under a single predicate. This is especially useful when talking
about index scans in general. If we have a full index scan, we leave out the
predicate. We use a star ‘*’ as an abbreviated projection list that projects all
attributes of the index. (So far, these are the key attribute and the TID.) If
the projection list is empty, we assume that only the variable/attribute holding
the pointer to the index entry is projected.
Using this notation, we can express some plan fragments. These fragments
are complete plans for the above queries, except that the final projection is not
present. As an example, consider the following fragment:

χe:∗TID,name:e.name (Empsalary [x; TID, salary])

All the plan fragments seen so far are examples of access paths. An access
path is a plan fragment with building blocks concerning a single database item.
4.12. SINGLE INDEX ACCESS PATH 163

Hence, every building block is an access path. The above plans touch two
database items: a relation and an index on some attribute of that relation.
If we say that an index concerns the relation it indexes, such a fragment is an
access path. For relational systems, the most general case of an access path uses
several indexes to retrieve the tuples of a single relation. We will see examples
of these more complex access paths in the following section. An access to the
original relation is not always necessary. A query that can be answered solely
by accessing indexes is called an index only query.
A query with in like
select name
from Emp
where age in {28, 29, 31, 32}
can be evaluated by taking the minimum and the maximum found in the left-
hand side of in as the start and stop conditions. We further need to construct
a residual predicate. The residual predicate can be represented either as age =
28 ∨ age = 29 ∨ age = 31 ∨ age = 32 or as age 6= 30.
An alternative is to use a d-join. Consider the example query
select name
from Emp
where salary in {1111, 11111, 111111}
Here, the numbers are far apart and separate index accesses might make sense.
Therefore, let us create a temporary relation Sal equal to {[s : 1111], [s :
11111], [s : 111111]}. When using it, the access path becomes

Sal[S] < χe:∗TID,name:e.name (Empsalary [x; salary = S.s; TID]) >

Some B-tree implementations allow efficient searches for multiple ranges and
implement gap skipping [31, 32, 144, 275, 276, 407, 467]. Gap skipping, some-
times also called zig-zag skipping, continues the search for keys in a new key
range from the latest position visited. The implementation details vary but
the main idea of it is that after one range has been completely scanned, the
current (leaf) page is checked for its highest key. If it is not smaller than the
lower bound of the next range, the search continues in the current page. If it
is smaller than the lower bound of the next range, alternative implementations
are described in the literature. The simplest is to start a new search from the
root for the lower bound. Another alternative uses parent pointers to go up a
page as long as the highest key of the current page is smaller than the lower
bound of the next range. If this is no longer the case, the search continues
downwards again.
Gap skipping gives even more opportunities for index scans and allows effi-
cient implementations of various index nested loop join strategies.

4.12.2 Complex Keys and Data Attributes

In general, an index can have a complex key comprised of the key attributes
k1 , . . . , kn and the data attributes d1 , . . . , dm . One possibility is to use a full
164CHAPTER 4. DATABASE ITEMS, BUILDING BLOCKS, AND ACCESS PATHS

index scan on such an index. Having more attributes in the index makes it
more probable that queries are index-only.
Besides a full index scan, the index can be descended to directly search for
the desired tuple(s). Let us take a closer look at this possibility.
If the search predicate is of the form

k1 = c1 ∧ k2 = c2 ∧ . . . ∧ kj = cj

for some constants ci and some j <= n, we can generate the start and stop
condition
k1 = c1 ∧ . . . ∧ kj = cj .
This simple approach is only possible if the search predicates define values for
all search key attributes, starting from the first search key and then for all
keys up to the j-th search key with no key attribute unspecified in between.
Predicates concerning the other key attributes after the first non-specified key
attribute and the additional data attributes only allow for residual predicates.
This condition is often not necessary for multi-dimensional index structures,
whose discussion is beyond the book.
With ranges things become more complex and highly dependent on the
implementation of the facilities of the B-tree. Consider a query predicate re-
stricting key values as follows

k1 = c1 ∧ k2 ≥ c2 ∧ k3 = c3

Obviously, we can generate the start condition k1 = c1 ∧ k2 ≥ c2 and the stop

condition k1 = c1 . Here, we neglected the condition on k3 which becomes a
residual predicate. However, with some care we can extend the start condition
to k1 = c1 ∧ k2 ≥ c2 ∧ k3 = c3 : we only have to keep k3 = c3 as a residual
predicate, since for k2 values larger than c2 , values different from c3 can occur
for k3 .
If closed ranges are specified for a prefix of the key attributes as in

a1 ≤ k1 ≤ b1 ∧ . . . ∧ aj ≤ kj ≤ bj

we can generate the start key k1 = a1 ∧ . . . ∧ kj = aj , the stop key k1 =

b1 ∧ . . . ∧ kj = bj , and

a2 ≤ k2 ≤ b2 ∧ . . . ∧ aj ≤ kj ≤ bj

as the residual predicate. If for some search key attribute kj the lower bound aj
is not specified, the start condition cannot contain kj and any kj+i . If for some
search key attribute kj the upper bound bj is not specified, the stop condition
cannot contain kj and any kj+i .
Two further enhancements of the B-tree functionality possibly allow for
alternative start/stop conditions:

• The B-tree implementation allows to specify the order (ascending or de-

scending) for each key attribute individually.
4.13. MULTI INDEX ACCESS PATH 165

• The B-tree implementation implements forward and backward scans (e.g.

implemented in Rdb [31]).

So far, we are only able to exploit query predicates which specify value
ranges for a prefix of all key attributes. Consider querying a person on his/her
height and his/her hair color: haircolor = ’blond’ and height between
180 and 190. If we have an index on sex, haircolor, height, this index
cannot be used by means of the techniques described so far. However, since
there are only the two values male and female available for sex, we can rewrite
the query predicate to (sex = ’m’ and haircolor = ’blond’ and height
between 180 and 190) or (sex = ’f’ and haircolor = ’blond’ and height
between 180 and 190) and use two accesses to the index. This approach works
fine for attributes with a small domain and is described by Antoshenkov [32].
(See also the previous section for gap skipping.) Since the possible values for
key attributes may not be known to the query optimizer, Antoshenkov goes
one step further and shifts the construction of search ranges to index scan time.
Therefore, the index can be provided with a complex boolean expression which
is then refined (rewritten) as soon as search key values become known. Search
ranges are then generated dynamically, and gap skipping is applied to skip the
intervals between the qualifying ranges during the index scan.

4.13 Multi Index Access Path

We wish to buy a used digital camera and state the following query:

select *
from Camera
where megapixel > 5 and distortion < 0.05
and noise < 0.01
and zoomMin < 35 and zoomMax > 105

We assume that on every attribute used in the where clause there exists an
index. Since the predicates are conjunctively connected, we can use a technique
called index and-ing. Every index scan returns a set (list) of tuple identifiers.
These sets/lists are then intersected. This operation is also called And merge
[485]. Using index and-ing, a possible plan is

((((
Cameramegapixel [c; megapixel > 5; TID]
∩
Cameradistortion [c; distortion < 0.05; TID])
∩
Cameranoise [c; noise < 0.01; TID])
∩
CamerazoomMin [c; zoomMin < 35; TID])
∩
CamerazoomMax [c; zoomMax > 105; TID])
 166CHAPTER 4. DATABASE ITEMS, BUILDING BLOCKS, AND ACCESS PATHS

This results in a set of tuple identifiers that only needs to be dereferenced to

access the according Camera tuples and produce the final result.
Since the costs of the expression clearly depend on the costs of the index
scans and the size of the intermediate TID sets, two questions arise:
• In which order do we intersect the TID sets resulting from the index
scans?
• Do we really apply all indexes before dereferencing the tuple identifiers?
The answer to the latter question is clearly “no”, if the next index scan is
more expensive than accessing the records in the current TID list. It can be
shown that the indexes in the cascade of intersections are ordered on increasing
(fi − 1)/ci terms, where fi is the selectivity of the index and ci its access
EX cost. Further, we can stop as soon as accessing the original tuples in the base
relation becomes cheaper than intersecting with another index and subsequently
accessing the base relation.
Index or-ing is used to process disjunctive predicates. Here, we take the
union of the TID sets to produce a set of TIDs containing references to all
qualifying tuples. Note that duplicates must be eliminated during the process-
ing of the union. This operation is also called Or merge [485]. Consider the
query
select *
from Emp
where yearsOfEmployment ≥ 30
or age ≥ 65
This query can be answered by constructing a TID set using the expression
EmpyearsOfEmployment [c; yearsOfEmployment ≥ 30; TID]∪Empage [c; age ≥ 65; TID]
and then dereferencing the list of tuple identifiers. Again, the index accessing
can be ordered for better performance. Given a general boolean expression
in and and or, constructing the optimal access path using index and-ing and
or-ing is a challenging task that will be discussed in Chapter ??. This task
is even more challenging, if some simple predicates occur more than once in
the complex boolean expression and factorization has to be taken into account.
This issue was first discussed by Chaudhuri, Ganesan and Saragawi [123]. We
will come back to this in Chapter ??.
The names index and-ing and or-ing become clear if bitmap indexes are
considered. Then the bitwise and and or operations can be used to efficiently
ToDo compute the intersection and union.

Excursion on bitmap indexes. 2

There are even more possibilities to work with TID sets. Consider the query
select *
from Emp
where yearsOfEmployment 6= 10
and age ≥ 65
4.14. INDEXES AND JOINS 167

This query can be evaluated by scanning the index on age and then eliminating
all employees with yearsOfEmployment = 10:

Empage [c; age ≥ 65; TID]\ EmpyearsOfEmployment [c; yearsOfEmployment 6= 10; TID]

Let us call the application of set difference on index scan results index differ-
encing.
Some predicates might not be very restrictive in the sense that more than
half the index has to be scanned. By negating these predicates and using
index differencing, we can make sure that at most half of the index needs to be
scanned. As an example consider the query

select *
from Emp
where yearsOfEmployment ≤ 5
and age ≤ 65

Assume that most of our employees’ age is below 65. Then

EmpyearsOfEmployment [c; yearsOfEmployment ≤ 5; TID] \ Empage [c; age > 65; TID]

could be more efficient than

EmpyearsOfEmployment [c; yearsOfEmployment ≤ 5; TID] ∩ Empage [c; age ≤ 65; TID]

4.14 Indexes and Joins

There are two issues when discussing indexes and joins. The first is that indexes
can be used to speed up join processing. The second is that index accesses can
be expressed as joins. We discuss both of these issues, starting with the latter.
In our examples, we used the map operation to (implicitly) access the re-
lation by dereferencing the tuple identifiers. We can make the implicit access
explicit by exchanging the map operator by a d-join or even a join. Then, for
example,

χe:∗TID,name:e.name (Empsalary [x; 25 ≤ age ≤ 35; TID])

becomes

Empsalary [x; 25 ≤ age ≤ 35; TID] < χe:∗TID,name:e.name (2) >

where 2 returns a single empty tuple. Assume that every tuple contains an
attribute TID containing its TID. This attribute does not have to be stored
explicitly but can be derived. Then, we have the following alternative access
path for the join (ignoring projections):

Empsalary [x; 25 ≤ age ≤ 35] 1x.TID=e.TID Emp[e]

 168CHAPTER 4. DATABASE ITEMS, BUILDING BLOCKS, AND ACCESS PATHS

For the join operator, the pointer-based join implementation developed in the
context of object-oriented databases may be the most efficient way to evaluate
the access path [695]. Obviously, sorting the result of the index scan on the
tuple identifiers can speed up processing since it turns random into sequential
I/O. However, this destroys the order on the key which might itself be useful
later on during query processing or required by the query7 . Sorting the tuple
ToDo identifiers was proposed by, e.g., Yao [836], Makinouchi, Tezuka, Kitakami, and
Adachi in the context of RDB/V1 [496]. The different variants (whether or not
and where to sort, join order) can now be transparently determined by the plan
generator: no special treatment is necessary. Further, the join predicates can
not only be on the tuple identifiers but also on key attributes. This often allows
to join with other than the indexed relations (or their indexes) before accessing
the relation.
Rosenthal and Reiner proposed to use joins to represent access paths with
indexes [629]. This approach is very elegant since no special treatment for index
processing is required. However, if there are many relations and indexes, the
search space might become very large, as every index increases the number
of joins to be performed. This is why Mohan, Haderle, Wang, and Cheng
abondoned this approach and sketched a heuristics which determines an access
path in case multiple indexes on a single table exist [532].
The query

select name,age
from Person
where name like ’R%’ and age between 40 and 50

is an index only query (assuming indexes on name and age) and can be trans-
lated to

Πname,age (
Empage [a; 40 ≤ age ≤ 50; TIDa, age]
1TIDa=TIDn
Empname [n; name ≥0 R0 ; name ≤0 R0 ; TIDn, name])

Let us now discuss the former of the two issues mentioned in the section’s
introduction. The query

select *
from Emp e, Dept d
where e.name = ‘Maier’ and e.dno = d.dno

can be directly translated to

σe.name=0 Maier0 (Emp[e]) 1e.dno=d.dno Dept[d]

7
Restoring the order may be cheaper than typical sorting since tuples can be numbered
before the first sort on tuple identifiers, and this dense numbering leads to efficient sort
algorithms.
4.14. INDEXES AND JOINS 169

If there are indexes on Emp.name and Dept.dno, we can replace σe.name=0 Maier0 (Emp[e])
by an index scan as we have seen previously:

χe:∗(x.T ID),A(Emp):e.∗ (Empname [x; name = ‘Maier0 ])

Here, A(Emp) : t.∗ abbreviates access to all Emp attributes. This especially
includes dno:t.dno. (Strictly speaking, we do not have to access the name
attribute, since its value is already known.)
As we have also seen, an alternative is to use a d-join instead:

Empname [x; name = ‘Maier0 ] < χt:∗(x.T ID),A(e)t.∗ (2) >

Let us abbreviate Empname [x; name = ‘Maier0 ] by Ei and χt:∗(x.T ID),A(e)t.∗ (2) by
Ea .
Now, for any e.dno, we can use the index on Dept.dno to access the ac-
cording department tuple:

Ei < Ea >< Deptdno [y; y.dno = dno] >

Note that the inner expression Deptdno [y; y.dno = dno] contains the free variable
dno, which is bound by Ea . Dereferencing the TID of the department results
in the following algebraic modelling which models a complete index nested loop
join:

Ei < Ea >< Deptdno [y; y.dno = dno; dTID : y.TID] >< χu:∗dTID,A(Dept)u.∗ (2) >

Let us abbreviate Deptdno [y; y.dno = dno; dTID : y.TID] by Di and χu:∗dTID,A(Dept)u.∗ (2)
by Da . Fully abbreviated, the expression then becomes

Ei < Ea >< Di >< Da >

Several optimizations can possibly be applied to this expression. Sorting

the outer of a d-join is useful under several circumstances since it may

• turn random I/O into sequential I/O and/or

• avoid reading the same page twice.

In our example expression,

• we can sort the result of expression Ei on TID in order to turn random

I/O into sequential I/O, if there are many employees named “Maier”.

• we can sort the result of the expression Ei < Ea > on dno for two reasons:

– If there are duplicates for dno, i.e. there are many employees named
“Maier” in each department, then this guarantees that no index page
(of the index Dept.dno) has to be read more than once.
– If additionally Dept.dno is a clustered index or Dept is an index-only
table contained in Dept.dno, then large parts of the random I/O can
be turned into sequential I/O.
 170CHAPTER 4. DATABASE ITEMS, BUILDING BLOCKS, AND ACCESS PATHS

– If the result of the inner is materialized (see below), then only one
result needs to be stored. Note that sorting is not necessary, but
grouping would suffice to avoid duplicate work.

• We can sort the result of the expression Ei < Ea >< Di > on dTID for
the same reasons as mentioned above for sorting the result of Ei on TID.

EX The reader is advised to explicitly write down the alternatives. Another exercise
is to give plan alternatives for the different cases of DB2’s Hybrid Join [275]
which can now be decomposed into primitives like relation scan, index scan,
d-join, sorting, TID dereferencing, and access to a unique index (see below).
Let us take a closer look at materializating the result of the inner of the d-
join. IBM’s DB2 for MVS considers temping (i.e. creating a temporary relation)
the inner if it is an index access [275]. Graefe provides a general discussion
on the subject [298]. Let us start with the above example. Typically, many
employees will work in a single department and possibly several of them are
called “Maier”. For everyone of them, we can be sure that there exists at most
one department. Let us assume that referential integrity has been specified.
Then, there exists exactly one department for every employee. We have to find
a way to rewrite the expression

Ei < Ea >< Deptdno [y; y.dno = dno; dTID : y.TID] >

such that the mapping dno−−→dTID is explicitly materialized (or, as one could
also say, cached ). For this purpose, Hellerstein and Naughton introduced a
modified version of the map operator that materializes its result [355]. Let us
denote this operator by χmat . The advantage of using this operator is that it
is quite general and can be used for different purposes (see e.g. [88], Chap. ??,
Chap. ??). Since the map operator extends a given input tuple by some at-
tribute values, which must be computed by an expression, we need one to
express the access to a unique index. For our example, we write

IdxAccDept
dno [y; y.dno = dno]

to express the lookup of a single (unique) entry in the index on Dept.dno. We

assume that the result is a (pointer to the) tuple containing the key attributes
and all data attributes including the TID of some tuple. Then, we have to
perform a further attribute access (dereferenciation) if we are interested in only
one of the attributes.
Now, we can rewrite the above expression to

Ei < Ea >< χmat

dT ID:(IdxAccDept [y;y.dno=dno]).TID
(2) >
dno

If we further assume that the outer (Ei < Ea >) is sorted on dno, then
it suffices to remember only the TID for the latest dno. We define the map
operator χmat,1 to do exactly this. A more efficient plan could thus be

Sortdno (Ei < Ea >) < χmat,1 (2) >

dT ID:(IdxAccDept
dno [y;y.dno=dno]).TID
4.14. INDEXES AND JOINS 171

where, strictly speaking, sorting is not necessary: grouping would suffice.

Consider a general expression of the form e1 < e2 >. The free variables
used in e2 must be a subset of the variables (attributes) produced by e1 , i.e.
F(e2 ) ⊆ A(e1 ). Even if e1 does not contain duplicates, the projection of e1 on
F(e2 ) may contain duplicates. If so, materialization could pay off. However, in
general, for every binding of the variables F(e2 ), the expression e2 may produce
several tuples. This means that using χmat is not sufficient. Consider the query

select *
from Emp e, Wine w
where e.yearOfBirth = w.year

If we have no indexes, we can answer this query by a simple join where we only
have to decide the join method and which of the relations becomes the outer and
which the inner. Assume we have only wines from a few years. (Alternatively,
some selection could have been applied.) Then it might make sense to consider
the following alternative:

Wine[w] < σe.yearOfBirth=w.year (Emp[e]) >

However, the relation Emp is scanned once for each Wine tuple. Hence, it might
make sense to materialize the result of the inner for every year value of Wine
if we have only a few year values. In other words, if we have many duplicates
for the year attribute of Wine, materialization may pay off since then we have
to scan Emp only once for each year value of Wine. To achieve caching of the
inner, in case every binding of its free variables possibly results in many tuples,
requires a new operator. Let us call this operator memox and denote it by
M [298, 88]. For the free variables of its only argument, it remembers the set
of result tuples produced by its argument expression and does not evaluate it
again if it is already cached. Using memox, the above plan becomes

Wine[w] < M(σe.yearOfBirth=w.year (Emp[e])) >

It should be clear that for more complex inners, the memox operator can be
applied at all branches, giving rise to numerous caching strategies. Analogously
to the materializing map operator, we are able to restrict the materialization
to the results for a single binding for the free variables if the outer is sorted (or
grouped) on the free variables:

Sortw.yearOfBirth (Wine[w]) < M1 (σe.yearOfBirth=w.year (Emp[e])) >

Things can become even more efficient if there is an index on Emp.yearOfBirth:

Sortw.yearOfBirth (Wine[w])
< M1 (EmpyearOfBirth [x; x.yearOfBirth = w.year] < χe:∗(x.TID),A(Emp):∗e (2) >) >

So far we have seen different operators which materialize values: Tmp, M,

and χmat . The latter in two variants. As an exercise, the reader is advised to
discuss the differences between them. EX
 172CHAPTER 4. DATABASE ITEMS, BUILDING BLOCKS, AND ACCESS PATHS

Assume, we have indexes on both Emp.yearOfBirth and Wine.year. Be-

sides the possibilities to use either Emp or Wine as the outer, we now also have
the possibility to perform a join on the indexes before accessing the actual Emp
and Wine tuples. Since the index scan produces its output ordered on the key
attributes, a simple merge join suffices (and we are back at the latter):

merge
EmpyearOfBirth [x] 1x.yearOfBirth=y.year Wineyear [y]

This example makes clear that the order provided by an index scan can be used
to speed up join processing. After evaluating this plan fragment, we have to
access the actual Emp and Wine tuples. We can consider zero, one, or two sorts
EX on their respective tuple identifiers. If the join is sufficiently selective, one of
these alternatives may prove more sufficient than the ones we have considered
so far.

4.15 Remarks on Access Path Generation

A last kind of optimization we briefly want to mention is sideways information
passing. Consider a simple join between two relations: R 1R.a=S.b S. If we
decide to perform a sort merge join or a hash join, we can implement it by first
sorting/partitioning R before looking at S. While doing so, we can remember
the minimum and maximum value of R.a and use these as a restriction on S
such that fewer tuples of S have to be sorted/partitioned. In case we perform a
blockwise nested loop join, after the first scan of S we know the minimum and
maximum value of S.b and can use these to restrict R.
If the number of distinct values of R.a is small, we could also decide to
remember all these values and evaluate perform a semi-join before the actual
join. Algebraically, this could be expressed as

R 1R.a=S.b (S<S.b=R.a ΠR.a (R))

An alternative is to use a bitmap to represent the projection of R on a.

The semi-join technique should be well-known from distributed database
systems. In deductive database systems, this kind of optimization often carries
the attribute magic. We will more deeply discuss this issue in Chapter ??.
The following problem is not discussed in the book. Assume that we have
fully partitioned a relation vertically into a set of files which are chronologically
ordered. Then, the attribute ai of the j-th tuple can be found at the j-th
position of the i-th file. This organizion is called partitioned transposed file [49].
(Compare this with variant (projection) indexes [551] and small materialized
aggregates [527].) The problem is to find an access strategy to all the attribute
required by the query given a collection of restriction on some of the relation’s
attributes. This problem has been discussed in depth by Batory [49]. Full
vertical partitioning is also used as the organizing principle of Monet []. Lately,
it also gained some interest in the US [].
4.16. COUNTING THE NUMBER OF ACCESSES 173

4.16 Counting the Number of Accesses

4.16.1 Counting the Number of Direct Accesses
After the index scan, we have a set of (distinct) tuple identifiers for which we
have to access the original tuples. The question we would like to answer is:

How many pages do we have to read?

Let R be the relation for which we have to retrieve the tuples. Then we use the
following abbreviations

N |R| number of tuples in the relation R

m ||R|| number of pages on which tuples of R are stored
B N/m number of tuples per page (blocking factor )
k number of (distinct) TIDs for which tuples have to be retrieved

We assume that the tuples are uniformly distributed among the m pages. Then,
each page stores B = N/m tuples. B is called blocking factor .
Let us consider some borderline cases. If k > N − N/m or m = 1, then all
pages are accessed. If k = 1 then exactly one page is accessed. The answer to
the general question will be expressed in terms of buckets (pages in the above
case) and items contained therein (tuples in the above case). Later on, we will
also use extents, cylinders, or tracks as buckets and tracks or sectors/blocks as
items.
We assume that a bucket contains items. The total number of items will be
N and the number of requested items will be k. The above question can then
be reformulated to how many buckets contain at least one of the k requested
items, i.e. how many qualifying buckets exist. We start out by investigating
the case where the items are uniformly distributed among the buckets. Two
subcases will be distinguished:

1. k distinct items are requested

2. k non-distinct items are requested.

We then discuss the case where the items are non-uniformly distributed.
In any case, the underlying access model is random access. For example,
given a tuple identifier, we can directly access the page storing the tuple. Other
access models are possible. The one we will subsequently investigate is sequen-
tial access where the buckets have to be scanned sequentially in order to find
the requested items. After that, we are prepared to develop a model for disk
access costs.
Throughout this section, we will further assume that
the probability that
1 N
we request a set with k items is N for all of the k possibilities to select
(k)
8
a k-set. We often make use of established equalities for binomial coefficients.
For convenience, the most frequently used equalities are listed in Appendix D.
8
A k-set is a set with cardinality k.
174CHAPTER 4. DATABASE ITEMS, BUILDING BLOCKS, AND ACCESS PATHS

Selecting k distinct items

Our first theorem was discovered independently by Waters [792] and Yao [833].
We formulate it in terms of buckets containing items. We say a bucket qualifies
if it contains at least one of the k items we are looking for.
Theorem 4.16.1 (Waters/Yao) Consider m buckets with n items each. Then
there is a total of N = nm items. If we randomly select k distinct items from
all items, then the number of qualifying buckets is
N,m
Yn (k) = m ∗ YnN (k) (4.2)
where YnN (k) is the probability that a bucket contains at least one item. This
probability is equal to

N [1 − p] k ≤N −n
Yn (k) =
1 k >N −n
where p is the probability that a bucket contains none of the k items. The
following alternative expressions can be used to calculate p:
N −n


k
p = N

(4.3)
k
k−1
Y N −n−i
= (4.4)
N −i
i=0
n−1
Y N −k−i
= (4.5)
N −i
i=0

The second expression (4.4) is due to Yao, the third (4.5) is due to Waters.
Palvia and March proved both formulas to be equal [568] (see also [35]). The
fraction m = N/n may not be an integer. For these cases, it is advisable to
have a Gamma-function based implementation of binomial coeffcients at hand
(see [597] for details).
Depending on k and n, either the expression of Yao or the one of Waters is
faster to compute. After the proof of the above formulas and the discussion of
some special cases, we will give several approximations for p.

Proof The total number of possibilities to pick the k items from all N items is
N


k . The number of possibilities to pick k items from all items not contained in
a fixed single bucket is N k−n . Hence, the probability p that a bucket does not

qualify is p = N k−n / Nk . Using this result, we can do the following calculation

N −n


k
p = N


k
(N − n)! k!(N − k)!
=
k!((N − n) − k)! N !
k−1
Y N −n−i
=
N −i
i=0
4.16. COUNTING THE NUMBER OF ACCESSES 175

which proves the second expression. The third follows from

N −n


k
p = N


k
(N − n)! k!(N − k)!
=
k!((N − n) − k)! N !
(N − n)! (N − k)!
=
N ! ((N − k) − n)!
n−1
Y N −k−i
=
N −i
i=0

2
Let us list some special cases:

If then YmN (k) =

n=1 k/N
n=N 1
k=0 0
k=1 B/N = (N/m)N = 1/m
k=N 1

We examine a slight generalization of the first case in more detail. Let N items
be distributed over N buckets such that every bucket contains exactly one item.
Further let us be interested in a subset of m buckets (1 ≤ m ≤ N ). If we pick
k items, then the number of buckets within the subset of size m that qualify is

k
mY1N (k) = m (4.6)
N
In order to see that the two sides are equal, we perform the following calculation:
N −1


Y1N (k) = (1 − k
N

)
k
(N −1)!
k!((N −1)−k)!
= (1 − N!
)
k!(N −k)!
(N − 1)!k!(N − k)!
= (1 − )
N !k!((N − 1) − k)!
N −k
= (1 − )
N
N N −k
= ( − )
N N
N −N +k
=
N
k
=
N
176CHAPTER 4. DATABASE ITEMS, BUILDING BLOCKS, AND ACCESS PATHS

Since the computation of YnN (k) can be quite expensive, several approxima-
tions have been developed. The first one was given by Waters [791, 792]:

p ≈ (1 − k/N )n

This approximation (also described elsewhere [271, 568]) turns out to be pretty
good. However, below we will see even better approximations.
N,m
For Y n (k) Whang, Wiederhold, and Sagalowicz gave the following ap-
proximation for faster calculation [802]:

m ∗ [ (1 − (1 − 1/m)k )+
(1/(m2 b) ∗ k(k − 1)/2 ∗ (1 − 1/m)k−1 )+
(1.5/(m3 p4 ) ∗ k(k − 1)(2k − 1)/6 ∗ (1 − 1/m)k−1 ) ]

A rough estimate is presented by Bernstein, Goodman, Wong, Reeve, and Roth-

nie [69]:
if k < m

 k 2
N,m k+m m
Y n (k) ≈ if ≤ k < 2m
 2 2
m if 2m ≤ k
An interesting and useful result was derived by Dihr and Saharia [207]. They
give two formulas and show that they are lower and upper bounds to Water
and Yao’s formula. The upper and lower bounds for p are

k
plower = (1 − )n
N − n−1
2
k k
pupper = ((1 − ) ∗ (1 − ))n/2
N N −n+1
for n = N/m. Dihr and Saharia claim that the maximal difference resulting
from the use of the lower and the upper bound to compute the number of page
accesses is 0.224—far less than a single page access.

Selecting k non-distinct items

So far, we assumed that we retrieve k distinct items. We could ask the same
question for k non-distinct items. This question demands a different urn mod-
el. In urn model terminology, the former case is an urn model with a non-
replacement assumption, while the latter case is one with a replacement as-
sumption. (Deeper insight into urn models is given by Drmota, Gardy, and
Gittenberger [213].)
Before presenting a theorem discovered by Cheung [148], we repeat a the-
orem from basic combinatorics.
We know that the number of subsets of size
k of a set with N elements is Nk . The following lemma gives us the number
of k-multisets9 (see, e.g. [718]). The
 number
 of k-multisets taken from a set S
N
with |S| elements is denoted by .
k
9
A k-multiset is a multiset with k elements.
4.16. COUNTING THE NUMBER OF ACCESSES 177

Lemma 4.16.2 Let S be a set with |S| = N elements. Then, the number of
multisets with cardinality k containing only elements from S is
   
N N +k−1
=
k k

For a proof we just note that there is a bijection between the k-multisets and
the k-subsets of a N + k − 1-set. We can go from a multiset to a set by f with
f ({x1 ≤ . . . ≤ xk }) = {x1 + 0 < x2 + 1 < . . . < xk + (k − 1)} and from a set to a
multiset via g with g({x1 < . . . < xk }) = {x1 − 0 < x2 − 1 < . . . < xk − (k − 1)}.

Theorem 4.16.3 (Cheung) Consider m buckets with n items each. Then

there is a total of N = nm items. If we randomly select k not necessarily
distinct items from all items, then the number of qualifying buckets is

N,m
Cheungn (k) = m ∗ CheungN
n (k) (4.7)

where
CheungN
n (k) = [1 − p̃] (4.8)

with the following equivalent expressions for p̃:

N −n+k−1


k
p̃ = N +k−1

(4.9)
k
k−1
Y N −n+i
= (4.10)
N +i
i=0
n−1
Y N −1−i
= (4.11)
N −1+k−i
i=0

Eq. 4.9 follows from the observation that the probability that some bucket
(N −n+k−1
k )
does not contain any of the k possibly duplicate items is N +k−1 . Eq. 4.10
( k )
follows from

N −n+k−1


k
p̃ = N +k−1


k
(N − n + k − 1)! k!((N + k − 1) − k)!
=
k!((N − n + k − 1) − k)! (N + k − 1)!
(N − n − 1 + k)! (N − 1)!
=
(N − n − 1)! (N − 1 + k)!
k−1
Y N −n+i
=
N +i
i=0
178CHAPTER 4. DATABASE ITEMS, BUILDING BLOCKS, AND ACCESS PATHS

Eq. 4.11 follows from

N −n+k−1


k
p̃ = N +k−1


k
(N − n + k − 1)! k!((N + k − 1) − k)!
=
k!((N − n + k − 1) − k)! (N + k − 1)!
(N + k − 1 − n)! (N − 1)!
=
(N + k − 1)! (N − 1 − n)!
n−1
Y N −n+i
=
N +k−n+i
i=0
n−1
Y N −1−i
=
N −1+k−i
i=0

2
Cardenas discovered a formula that can be used to approximate p̃ [102]:

(1 − n/N )k

As Cheung pointed out, we can use the theorem to derive the number of
distinct items accessed contained in a k-multiset.

Corollary 4.16.4 Let S be a k-multiset containing elements from an N -set T .

Then the number of distinct items contained in S is

Nk
D(N, k) = (4.12)
N +k−1
if the elements in T occur with the same probability in S.

We apply the theorem for the specialQ0 case where every bucket contains exactly
N −1−i −1
one item (n = 1). In this case, i=0 N −1+k−i = NN−1+k . And the number of
N −1 N −1+k−N +1
qualifying buckets is N (1 − N −1+k ) = N ( N −1+k ) = N N +k−1 k
. 2
N


Another way to achieve this formula is the following. There are l pos-
sibilities to pick l different elements out of the N elements in T . In order to
build a k-multiset with l different elements, we mustadditionally choose n − l
N

l
elements from the l elements. Thus, we have l possibilities to
n−l
 
N
build a k-multiset. The total number of multisets is . Thus we may
l
conclude that  
N

l
min(N,k) l
X n−l
D(N, k) = l  
l=1
N
l
which can be simplified to the above.
4.16. COUNTING THE NUMBER OF ACCESSES 179

A useful application of this formula is to calculate the size of a projection

[148]. Another use is that calculating the number of distinct values contained
in a multiset allows us to shift from the model with replacement to a model
without replacement. However, there is a difference between
N,m N,m
Yn (Distinct(N, k)) ≈ Cheungn (k)

even when computing Y with Eq. 4.5. Nonetheless, for n ≥ 5, the error is
less than two percent. One of the problems when calculating the result of the
left-hand side is that the number of distinct items is not necessarily an integer.
To solve this problem, we can implement all our formulas using the Gamma-
function. But even then a small difference remains.
The approximation given in Theorem 4.16.3 is not too accurate. A better
approximation can be calculated from the probability distribution. Denote by
p(D(N, k) = j) the probability that the number of distinct values if we randomly
select k items with replacement from N given items equals j. Then
  X  
N k j
p(D(N, k) = j) = j(−1) ((j − l)/N )k
j l
l=0

and thus
min(N,k)   X  
X N j
D(N, k) = j j(−1)k ((j − l)/N )k
j l
j=1 l=0

This formula is quite intense to calculate. We can derive a very good approx-
imation by the following reasoning. We draw k elements from the set T with
|T | = N elements. Every element from T can be drawn at most k times. We
produce N buckets, one for each element of T . In each bucket, we insert k
copies of the according element from t. Then, a sequence of draws from T
with duplicates can be represented by a sequence of draws without duplicate
by mapping them to different copies. Thus, the first occurrence is mapped to
the first element in the according bucket, the second one to the second copy
and so on. Then, we can apply formula by Waters and Yao to calculate the
number of buckets (and hence elements of T ) hit:
N k,k
D(N, k) = Y N (k)

Since the approximation is quite accurate and we already know how to efficiently
calculate this formula, this is our method of choice.

Non-Uniform Distribution of Items

In the previous sections, we assumed that

1. every page contains the same number of records, and

2. every record is accessed with the same probability.

180CHAPTER 4. DATABASE ITEMS, BUILDING BLOCKS, AND ACCESS PATHS

We now turn to relax the first assumption. Christodoulakis models the distri-
bution by m numbers ni (for 1 ≤ i ≤ m) if there are m buckets. Each ni equals
the number of records in some bucket i [151]. Luk proposes Zipfian record
distribution [492]. However, Ijbema and Blanken say that Water and Yao’s
formula is still better, as Luk’s formula results in too low values [379]. They all
come up with the same general formula presented below. Vander Zander, Tay-
lor, and Bitton [843] discuss the problem of correlated attributes which results
in some clusteredness. Zahorjan, Bell, and Sevcik discuss the problem where
every item is assigned its own access probability [842]. That is, they relax the
second assumption. We will come back to these issues in Section ??.
We still assume that every item is accessed with the same probability.
However, we relax the first assumption. The following formula derived by
Christodoulakis [151], Luk [492], and Ijbema and Blanken [379] is a simple
application of Waters’s and Yao’s formula to a more general case.

Theorem 4.16.5 (Yao/Waters/Christodoulakis) Assume a set of m buck-

ets. Each
Pm bucket contains nj > 0 items (1 ≤ j ≤ m). The total number of items
is N = j=1 nj . If we look up k distinct items, then the probability that bucket
j qualifies is
N −nj
WnNj (k, j) = [1 − k
N

] (= YnNj (k)) (4.13)
k
and the expected number of qualifying buckets is
m
N,m X
W nj (k) := WnNj (k, j) (4.14)
j=1

Note that the product formulation in Eq. 4.5 of Theorem 4.16.1 results in a
more efficient computation. We make a note of this in the following corollary.

Corollary 4.16.6 Assume a set of m buckets. Each bucket contains nj > 0

items (1 ≤ j ≤ m). The total number of items is N = m
P
j=1 j . If we look up
n
k distinct items, then the expected number of qualifying buckets is
m
N,m X
W nj (k) = (1 − pj ) (4.15)
j=1

with ( Q
nj −1 N −k−i
i=0 N −i k ≤ nj
pj = (4.16)
0 N − nj < k ≤ N

If we compute the pj after we have sorted the nj in ascending order, we can use
the fact that
nj+1 −1
Y N −k−i
pj+1 = pj ∗ .
N −i
i=nj

We can also use the theorem to calculate the number of qualifying buckets
in case the distribution is given by a histogram.
4.16. COUNTING THE NUMBER OF ACCESSES 181

Corollary 4.16.7 For 1 ≤ i ≤ L let there PL be li buckets containing ni items.

Then the total number of buckets is m = i=1 li , and the total number of items
in all buckets is N = L
P
i=1 li ni . For k randomly selected items, the number of
qualifying buckets is

L
N,m X
W nj (k) = li YnNj (k) (4.17)
i=1

Last in this section, let us calculate the probability distribution for the
number of qualifying items within a bucket. The probability that x ≤ nj items
in a bucket j qualify can be calculated
as follows. The number of possibilities
nj
to select x items in bucket nj is x . The number of possibilites to draw the
−nj

remaining k − x items from the other buckets is Nk−x . The total number
of possibilities to distribute k items over the buckets is Nk . This shows the

following:

Theorem 4.16.8 Assume a set of m buckets. Each bucket Pm contains nj > 0

items (1 ≤ j ≤ m). The total number of items is N = j=1 nj . If we look up
k distinct items, the probability that x items in bucket j qualify is

nj

N −nj

x
XnNj (k, x) = N

k−x (4.18)
k

Further, the expected number of qualifying items in bucket j is

min(k,nj )
N,m X
X nj (k) = xXnNj (k, x) (4.19)
x=0

In standard statistics books the probability distribution XnNj (k, x) is called hy-
pergeometric distribution.
Let us consider the case where all nj are equal to n. Then we can calculate
the average number of qualifying items in a bucket. With y := min(k, n) we
182CHAPTER 4. DATABASE ITEMS, BUILDING BLOCKS, AND ACCESS PATHS

have
min(k,n)
N,m X
X nj (k) = xXnN (k, x)
x=0
min(k,n)
X
= xXnN (k, x)
x=1
y   
1 X n N −n
= N
x
k−x


k x=1
x
y    
1 X x n N −n
= N k−x


k x=1
1 x
y    
1 X n n−1 N −n
= N x−1 k−x


k x=1
1
n X

y−1   
1 n−1 N −n
= N 0 + x (k − 1) − x


k x=0
n

 
1 n−1+N −n
= N 0+k−1


k
n

 
1 N −1
= N k−1


k
k k
= n =
N m
Let us consider the even more special case where every bucket contains a
single item. That is, N = m and ni = 1. The probability that a bucket contains
a qualifying item reduces to
1

N −1

x k−1
X1N (k, x) = N


k
N −1


k−1
= N


k
k k
= (= )
N m
Since x can then only be zero or one, the average number of qualifying items a
bucket contains is also Nk .
The formulas presented in this section can be used to estimate the number
of block/page accesses in case of random direct accesses. As we will see next,
other kinds of accesses occur and need different estimates.

4.16.2 Counting the Number of Sequential Accesses

Vector of Bits
When estimating seek costs, we need to calculate the probability distribution
for the distance between two subsequent qualifying cylinders. We model the
4.16. COUNTING THE NUMBER OF ACCESSES 183

situation as a bitvector of length B with b bits set to 1. Then B corresponds

to the number of cylinders and a 1 indicates that a cylinder qualifies.

Theorem 4.16.9 Assume a bitvector of length B. Within it b ones are uni-

formly distributed. The remaining B − b bits are zero. Then the probability
distribution of the number j of zeros

1. between two consecutive ones,

2. before the first one, and

3. after the last one

is given by

B−j−1


b−1
BbB (j) = B

(4.20)
b

A more general theorem (see Theorem 4.16.13) was first presented by Yao [834].
The above formulation is due to Christodoulakis [152].
To see why the formula holds, consider the total number of bitvectors having
a one in position i followed by j zeros followed by a one. This number is B−j−2


b−2
.
We can chose B − j − 1 positions for i. The total number of bitvectors is Bb
and each bitvector has b − 1 sequences of the form that a one is followed by a
sequence of zeros is followed by a one. Hence,

B−j−2


(B − j − 1)
BbB (j) = B

b−2
(b − 1) b
B−j−1


b−1
= B


b

Part 1. of the theorem follows. To prove part 2., we count the number of
bitvectors that start with j zeros before the first one. There are B − j − 1
positions
left for the remaining b−1 ones. Hence, the number of these bitvectors
is B−j−1
b−1 and part 2 follows. Part 3 follows by symmetry.
184CHAPTER 4. DATABASE ITEMS, BUILDING BLOCKS, AND ACCESS PATHS

We can derive a less expensive way to evaluate the formula for BbB (j) as
follows. For j = 0, we have BbB (0) = Bb . If j > 0, then

B−j−1


b−1
BbB (j) = B


b
(B−j−1)!
(b−1)!((B−j−1)−(b−1))!
= B!
b!(B−b)!
(B − j − 1)! b!(B − b)!
=
(b − 1)!((B − j − 1) − (b − 1))! B!
(B − j − 1)! (B − b)!
= b
((B − j − 1) − (b − 1))! B!
(B − j − 1)! (B − b)!
= b
(B − j − b)! B!
b (B − j)! (B − b)!
=
B − j (B − b − j)! B!
j−1
b Y b
= (1 − )
B−j B−i
i=0

This formula is useful when BbB (j) occurs in sums over j because we can compute
the product incrementally.

Corollary 4.16.10 Using the terminology of Theorem 4.16.9, the expected val-
ue for the number of zeros

1. before the first one,

2. between two successive ones, and

3. after the last one

is

B−b
B X B−b
Bb = jBbB (j) = (4.21)
b+1
j=0
4.16. COUNTING THE NUMBER OF ACCESSES 185

Let us calculate:
B−b   B−b  
X B−j−1 X B−j−1
j = (B − (B − j))
b−1 b−1
j=0 j=0
B−b
X  B−b  
B−j−1 X B−j−1
= B − (B − j)
b−1 b−1
j=0 j=0
B−b
X  B−b
X 
b−1+j B−j
= B −b
b−1 b
j=0 j=0
B−b
X  B−b
X 
b−1+j b+j
= B −b
j b
j=0 j=0
   
(b − 1) + (B − b) + 1 b + (B − b) + 1
= B −b
(b − 1) + 1 b+1
   
B B+1
= B −b
b b+1
 
B+1 B
= (B − b )
b+1 b

With
B+1 B(b + 1) − (Bb + b)
B−b =
b+1 b+1
B−b
=
b+1

the claim follows.

Corollary 4.16.11 Using the terminology of Theorem 4.16.9, the expected to-
tal number of bits from the first bit to the last one, both included, is

Bb + b
B tot (B, b) = (4.22)
b+1

To see this, we subtract from B the average expected number of zeros between
the last one and the last bit:
B−b B(b + 1) B − b
B− = −
b+1 b+1 b+1
Bb + B − B + b
=
b+1
Bb + b
=
b+1

An early approximation of this formula was discovered by Kollias [435].

 186CHAPTER 4. DATABASE ITEMS, BUILDING BLOCKS, AND ACCESS PATHS

Corollary 4.16.12 Using the terminology of Theorem 4.16.9, the number of

bits from the first one and the last one, both included, is

Bb − B + 2b
B 1-span (B, b) = (4.23)
b+1
We have two possibilities to argue here. The first subtracts from B the number
of zeros at the beginning and the end:

B−b
B 1-span (B, b) = B − 2
b+1
Bb + B − 2B + 2b
=
b+1
Bb − B + 2b
=
b+1
The other possibility is to add the number of zeros between the first and the
last one and the number of ones:
B
B 1-span (B, b) = (b − 1)B b + b
B − b b(b + 1
= (b − 1) +
b+1 b+1
Bb − b2 − B + b + b2 + b
=
b+1
Bb − B + 2b
=
b+1
The number of bits from the first bit to the last one including both . . . The
EX or Cor? distance between the first and the last one . . .
Let us have a look at some possible applications of these formulas. If we
look up one record in an array of B records and we search sequentially, how
many array entries do we have to examine on average if the search is successful?
In [502] we find these formulas used for the following scenario. Let a file
consist of B consecutive cylinders. We search for k different keys, all of which
occur in the file. These k keys are distributed over b different cylinders. Of
course, we can stop as soon as we have found the last key. What is the expected
total distance the disk head has to travel if it is placed on the first cylinder of
the file at the beginning of the search?
Another interpretation of these formulas can be found in [369, 503]. Assume
we have an array consisting of B different entries. We sequentially go through
all entries of the array until we have found all the records for b different keys.
We assume that the B entries in the array and the b keys are sorted. Further,
all b keys occur in the array. On the average, how many comparisons do we
need to find all keys?

Vector of Buckets
A more general scenario is as follows. Consider a sequence of m buckets con-
taining ni items each. Yao [834] developed the following theorem.
4.16. COUNTING THE NUMBER OF ACCESSES 187

Theorem 4.16.13 (Yao) Consider a sequence of m buckets. For 1 ≤P i ≤ m,

m
Pi of items in a bucket i. Then there is a total of N = i=1 ni
let ni be the number
items. Let ti = l=0 ni be the number of items in the first i buckets. If the
buckets are searched sequentially, then the number of buckets that have to be
examined until k distinct items have been found is
tj

− tj−1


N,m k k
Cni (k, j) = N

(4.24)
k

Thus, the expected number of buckets that need to be examined in order to

retrieve k distinct items is
m Pm tj−1

N,m X j=1
C ni (k) = N,m
jCni (k, j) = m − N

k (4.25)
j=1 k

Applications of this formula can be found in [151, 152, 502, 504, 763]. Manolopou-
los and Kollias describe the analogue for the replacement model [502].
Lang, Driscoll, and Jou discovered a general theorem which allows us to
estimate the expected number of block accesses for sequential search.

Theorem 4.16.14 (Lang/Driscoll/Jou) Consider a sequence of N items.

For a batched search of k items, the expected number of accessed items is
N
X −1
A(N, k) = N − Prob[Y ≤ i] (4.26)
i=1

where Y is a random variable for the last item in the sequence that occurs among
the k items searched.

proof? ?
With the help of this theorem, it is quite easy to derive many average
sequential accesses for different models. Cor or EX?

4.16.3 Pointers into the Literature

Segments containing records can be organized differently. Records can be placed
randomly in the segment, they can be ordered according to some key, or the
segment is organized as a tree. Accordingly, the segment is called random,
sequential, or tree-structure. From a segment, records are to be retrieved for
a given bag of k keys. The general question then is: how many pages do we
have to access? The answer depends on whether we assume the replacement
or non-replacement model. Six cases occur. For sequential and tree-structured
segments, it also makes sense to distinguish between successful, partially (un-)
successful, and (totally) unsuccessfull searches. These notions capture the dif-
ferent possibilities where for all, some, none of the k keys records are found.
The following table provides some entry points into the literature. It is rough-
ly organized around the above categories. (Remember that we discussed the
random file organization at length in Section 4.16.1.)
188CHAPTER 4. DATABASE ITEMS, BUILDING BLOCKS, AND ACCESS PATHS

non-replacement replacement
random [148, 151, 492, 585, 802, 833] [102, 151, 568, 585]
sequential [56, 151, 449, 504, 568, 567, 700, 834] [151, 449, 504, 700]
tree-structured [449, 448, 504, 567, 589] [449, 448, 504, 700]

4.17 Disk Drive Costs for N Uniform Accesses

The goal of this section is to derive estimates for the costs (time) for retrieving
N cache-missed sectors of a segment S from disk. We assume that the N sectors
are read in their physical order on disk. This can be enforced by the DBMS,
by the operating system’s disk scheduling policy (SCAN policy), or by the disk
drive controller.
Remembering the description of disk drives, the total costs can be described
as
Cdisk = Ccmd + Cseek + Csettle + Crot + Cheadswitch (4.27)
For brevity, we omitted the parameter N and the parameters describing the
segment and the disk drive on which the segment resides. Subsequently, we
devote a (sometimes tiny) section to each summand. Before that, we have to
calculate the number of qualifying cylinders, tracks, and sectors. These numbers
will be used later on.

4.17.1 Number of Qualifying Cylinders, Tracks, and Sectors

If N sectors are to be retrieved, we have to find the number of cylinders qual-
ifying in an extent i. Let Ssec denote the total number of sectors our segment
contains and Scpe (i) = Li −Fi +1 be the number of cylinders of the extent. If the
N sectors we want to retrieve are uniformly distributed among the Ssec sectors
of the segment, the number of cylinders that qualifies in (Fi , Li , zi ) is Scpe (i)
times 1 minus the probability that a cylinder does not qualify. The probability
that a cylinder does not qualify can be computed by deviding the total num-
ber of possibilities to chose the N sectors from sectors outside the cylinder by
the total number of possibilities to chose N sectors from all Ssec sectors of the
segment. Hence, the number of qualifying cylinders in the considered extent is:
Ssec −DZspc (i)

Ssec N
Qc (i) = Scpe (i)YDZspc (i)
(N ) = Scpe (i)(1 − Ssec

) (4.28)
N

We could also have used Theorem 4.16.13.

Let us also calculate the number of qualifying tracks in a partion i. It
can be calculated by Scpe (i)Dtpc (1 − Prob(a track does not qualify)). The
probability that a track does not qualify can be computed by dividing the
number of ways to pick N sectors from sectors not belonging to a track divided
by the number of possible ways to pick N sectors from all sectors.
Ssec −DZspt (i)

Ssec N
Qt (i) = Scpe (i)Dtpc YD Zspt (i)
(N ) = Scpe (i)Dtpc (1 − Ssec

) (4.29)
N
4.17. DISK DRIVE COSTS FOR N UNIFORM ACCESSES 189

Just for fun, we calculate the number of qualifying sectors of an extent in

zone i. It can be approximated by
N
Qs (i) = Scpe (i)DZspc (i) (4.30)
Ssec
Since all Scpe (i) cylinders are in the same zone, they have the same number of
sectors per track, and we could also use Waters/Yao to approximate the number
of qualifying cylinders by
Scpe (i)D
Zspc (Szone (i)),Scpe (i)
Qc (i) = Y DZspc (Szone (i)) (Qs (i)) (4.31)

This is a good approximation, as long as Qs (i) is not too small (e.g. > 4).

4.17.2 Command Costs

The command costs Ccmd are easy to compute. Every read of a sector requires
the execution of a command. Hence

Ccmd = N Dcmd

estimates the total command costs.

4.17.3 Seek Costs

We give different alternative possibilities to estimate seek costs. We start with
an upper bound by exploring Theorem 4.1.1. The first cylinder we have to visit
requires a random seek with cost Davgseek . (Well this does not really give us an
upper bound. For a true upper bound we should use Dseek (Dcyl − 1).) After
that, we have to visit the remaining Qc (i)−1 qualifying cylinders. The segment
spans a total of Slast (Sext ) − Sfirst (1) + 1 cylinders. Let us assume that the first
qualifying cylinder is the first cylinder and the last qualifying cylinder is the
last cylinder of the segment. Then applying Theorem 4.1.1 gives us the upper
bound
Slast (Sext ) − Sfirst (1) + 1
Cseek (i) ≤ (Qc (i) − 1)Dseek ( )
Qc (i) − 1
after we have found the first qualifying cylinder.
We can be a little more precise by splitting the seek costs into two com-
ponents. The first component Cseekgap expresses the costs of finding the first
qualifying cylinder and jumping from the last qualifying cylinder of extent i to
the first qualifying cylinder of extent i + 1. The second component Cseekext (i)
calculates the seek costs within an extent i. Figure 4.10 illustrates the situation.
The total seek costs then are
Sext
X
Cseek (i) = Cseekgap + Cseekext (i)
i=1

Since there is no estimate in the literature for Cseekgap , we have to calculate it

ourselves. After we have done so, we present several alternatives to calculate
Cseekext (i).
190CHAPTER 4. DATABASE ITEMS, BUILDING BLOCKS, AND ACCESS PATHS

seek ∆gap
... ...

...

|{z} |{z} |{z}

Ξ Ξ Ξ

| {z } | {z } | {z }
Scpe Scpe Scpe

The upper path illustrates Cseekgap , the lower braces indicate those parts for
which Cseekext is responsible.

Figure 4.10: Illustration of seek cost estimate

The average seek cost for reaching the first qualifying cylinder is Davgseek .
How far are we now within the first extent? We use Corollary 4.16.10 to derive
that the number of non-qualifying cylinders preceding the first qualifying one
in some extent i is
Scpe (i) Scpe (i) − Qc (i)
B Qc (i) = .
Qc (i) + 1
The same is found for the number of non-qualifying cylinders following the
last qualifying cylinder. Hence, for every gap between the last and the first
qualifying cylinder of two extents i and i + 1, the disk arm has to travel the
distance
Scpe (i) Scpe (i+1)
∆gap (i) := B Qc (i) + Sfirst (i + 1) − Slast (i) − 1 + B Qc (i+1)

Using this, we get

Sext
X −1
Cseekgap = Davgseek + Dseek (∆gap (i))
i=1

Let us turn to Cseekext (i). We first need the number of cylinders between
the first and the last qualifying cylinder, both included, in extent i. It can be
calculated using Corollary 4.16.12:

Ξext (i) = B 1-span (Scpe (i), Qc (i))

Hence, Ξ(i) is the minimal span of an extent that contains all qualifying cylin-
ders.
Using Ξ(i) and Theorem 4.1.1, we can derive an upper bound for Cseekext (i):

Ξ(i)
Cseekext (i) ≤ (Qc (i) − 1)Dseek ( ) (4.32)
Qc (i) − 1
4.17. DISK DRIVE COSTS FOR N UNIFORM ACCESSES 191

Alternatively, we could formulate this as

Scpe (i)
Cseekext (i) ≤ (Qc (i) − 1)Dseek (B Qc (i) ) (4.33)

by applying Corollary 4.16.10.

A seemingly more precise estimate for the expected seek cost within the
qualifying cylinders of an extent is derived by using Theorem 4.16.9:
Scpe (i)−Qc (i)
S (i)
X
Cseekext (i) = Qc (i) Dseek (j + 1)BQcpe
c (i)
(j) (4.34)
j=0

There are many more estimates for seek times. Older ones rely on a linear
disk model but also consider different disk scan policies. A good entry point is
the work by Theorey and Pinkerton [756, 757].

4.17.4 Settle Costs

The average settle cost is easy to calculate. For every qualifying cylinder, one
head settlement takes place:

Csettle (i) = Qc (i)Drdsettle (4.35)

4.17.5 Rotational Delay Costs

Let us turn to the rotational delay. For some given track in zone i, we want to
read the Qt (i) qualifying sectors contained in it. On average, we would expect
that the read head is ready to start reading in the middle of some sector of a
track. If so, we have to wait for 21 DZscan (Szone (i)) before the first whole sector
occurs under the read head. However, due to track and cylinder skew, this
event does not occur after a head switch or a cylinder switch. Instead of being
overly precise here, we ignore this half sector pass by time and assume that we EX
are always at the beginning of a sector. This is also justified by the fact that
we model the head switch time explicitly.
Assume that the head is ready to read at the beginning of some sector
of some track. Then, in front of us is a — cyclic, which does not matter —
bitvector of qualifying and non-qualifying sectors. We can use Corollary 4.16.11
to estimate the total number of qualifying and non-qualifying sectors that have
to pass under the head until all qualifying sectors have been seen. The total
rotational delay for the tracks of zone i is

Crot (i) = Qt (i) DZscan (Szone (i)) B tot (DZspt (Szone (i)), Qspt (i)) (4.36)
Ssec ,D (Szone (i))
where Qspt (i) = W 1 Zspt
(N ) = DZspt (Szone (i)) SNsec is the expected
number of qualifying sectors per track in extent i. In case Qspt (i) < 1, we set
Qspt (i) := 1.
A more precise model is derived as follows. We sum up for all j the product
of (1) the probability that j sectors in a track qualify and (2) the average number
of sectors that have to be read if j sectors qualify. This gives us the number of
192CHAPTER 4. DATABASE ITEMS, BUILDING BLOCKS, AND ACCESS PATHS

sectors that have to pass the head in order to read all qualifying sectors. We
only need to multiply this number by the time to scan a single sector and the
number of qualifying tracks. We can estimate (1) using Theorem 4.16.8. For
(2) we again use Corollary 4.16.11.

Crot (i) = Scpe (i) Dtpc DZscan (Szone (i))

min(N,DZspt (Szone (i)))
X
· XDSsec
Zspt (Szone (i))
(N, j) B tot (DZspt (Szone (i)),
(4.37)
j)
j=1

Another approach is taken by Triantafillou, Christodoulakis, and Georgiadis

[763]. They split the total rotational delay into two components. The first
component (Crotpass ) measures the time needed to skip unqualifying sectors and
the second (Crotread ) that for (scanning and transferring) the qualifying sectors
to the host.
Let us deal with the first component. Assume that j sectors of a track in
extent i qualify. The expected position on a track where the head is ready to
read is the middle between two qualifying sectors. Since the expected number of
sectors between two qualifying sectors is DZspt (Szone (i))/j, the expected number
of sectors scanned before the first qualifying sector comes under the head is
DZspt (Szone (i))
2j . The expected positions of j qualifying sectors on the same track
is such that the number of non-qualifying sectors between two successively
qualifying sectors is the same. Hence, after having read a qualifying sector,
DZspt (Szone (i))
j unqualifying sectors must pass by until the next qualifying sector
shows up. The total number of unqualifying sectors to be passed if j sectors
qualify in a track of zone i is

DZspt (Szone (i)) DZspt (Szone (i)) − j

Ns (j, i) = + (j − 1) (4.38)
2j j

Using again Theorem 4.16.8, the expected rotational delay for the unquali-
fying sectors then is

Crotpass (i) = Scpe (i) Dtpc DZscan (Szone (i))

min(N,DZspt (Szone (i)))
X
· XDSsec
Zspt (Szone (i))
(N, j)Ns (j, i) (4.39)
j=1

We have to sum up this number for all extents and then add the time needed
to scan the N sectors. Hence
Sext
X
Crot = Crotpass (i) + Crotread (i)
i=1

where the total transfer cost for the qualifying sectors of an extent can be
estimated as
Crotread (i) = Qs (i) DZscan (Szone (i))
4.17. DISK DRIVE COSTS FOR N UNIFORM ACCESSES 193

4.17.6 Head Switch Costs

The average head switch cost is equal to the average number of head switches
that occur times the average head switch cost. The average number of head
switch is equal to the number of tracks that qualify minus the number of cylin-
ders that qualify since a head switch does not occur for the first track of each
cylinder. Summarizing

Sext
X
Cheadswitch = (Qt (i) − Qc (i)) Dhdswitch (4.40)
i=1

where Qt is the average number of tracks qualifying in an extent.

4.17.7 Discussion
The disk drive cost model derived depends on many parameters. The first bunch
of parameters concerns the disk drive itself. These parameters can (and must
be) extracted from disk drives by using (micro-) benchmarking techniques [266,
752, 517, 660]. The second bunch of parameters concerns the layout of a segment
on disk. The database system is responsible for providing these parameters.
The closer it is to the disk, the easier these parameters are extracted. Building
a runtime system atop the operating system’s file system is obviously a bad
idea from the cost model perspective. If instead the storage manager of the
runtime system implements cylinder aligned extents (or at least track aligned
extents) using a raw I/O interface, the cost model will be easier to develop and
much more precise. Again, providing reliable cost models is one of the most
important tasks of the runtime system.
We have neglected many problems in our disk access model: partially filled
cylinders, pages larger than a block, disk drive’s cache, remapping of bad blocks,
non-uniformly distributed accesses, clusteredness, and so on. Whereas the first
two items are easy to fix, the rest is not so easy. In general, database systems
ignore the disk drive cache. The justifying argument is that the database buffer
is much larger than the disk drive’s cache and, hence, it is very unlikely that we
read a page that is not in the database buffer but in the disk cache. However,
this argument falls short for non-random accesses. Nevertheless, we will ignore
the issue in this book. The interested reader is referred to Shriver’s thesis for
disk cache modeling [701].
Remapping of bad sectors to other sectors really prevents the development
of a precise cost model for disk accesses. Modelling disk drives becomes already
a nightmare since a nice partitioning of the disk into zones is no longer possible
since some sectors, tracks and even cylinders are reserved for the remapping. So
even if no remapping takes place (which is very unlikely), having homogeneous
zones of hundreds of cylinders is a dream that will never come true. The
result is that we do not have dozens of homogeneous zones but hundreds (if
not thousands) of zones of medium homogeneity. These should be reduced to
a model of dozens of homogeneous zones such that the error does not become
too large. The remaining issues will be discussed later in the book. EX
 194CHAPTER 4. DATABASE ITEMS, BUILDING BLOCKS, AND ACCESS PATHS

There is even more to say about our cost model. A very practical issue
arises if the number of qualifying cylinders is small. Then for some extent i,
the expected number of qualifying cylinders could be Qc (i) = 0.38. For some
of our formulas this is a big problem. As a consequence, special cases for small
EX N , small Qc , small Qt have to be developed and implemented.
Another issue is the performance of the cost model itself. The query com-
piler might evaluate the cost model’s formulas thousands or millions of times.
Hence, they should be fast to evaluate.
So far, we can adequately model the costs of N disk accesses. Some questions
remain. For example, how do we derive the number N of pages we have to
access? Do we really need to fetch all N pages from disk or will we find some
of them in the buffer? If yes, how many? Further, CPU costs are also an
important issue. Deriving a cost model for CPU costs is even more tedious
than modelling disk drive costs. The only choice available is to benchmark all
parts of a system and then derive a cost model using the extracted parameters.
To give examples of parameters to be extracted: we need the CPU costs for
accessing a page present in the buffer, for accessing a page absent in the buffer,
for a next call of an algebraic operator, for executing an integer addition, and
so on. Again, this cannot be done without tools [42, 210, 353, 394, 584].
The bottom line is that a cost model does not have to be accurate, but must
lead to correct decisions. In that sense, it must be accurate at the break even
points between plan alternatives. Let us illustrate this point by means of our
motivating example. If we know that the index returns a single tuple, it is quite
likely that the sequential scan is much more expensive. The same might be true
for 2, 3, 4, and 5 tuples. Hence, an accurate model for small N is not really
necessary. However, as we come close to the costs of a sequential scan, both the
cost model for the sequential scan and the one for the index-based access must
be correct since the product of their errors is the factor a bad choice is off the
best choice. This is a crucial point, since it is easy to underestimate sequential
access costs by a factor of 2-3 and overestimate random access cost by a factor
of 2-5.

4.18 Concluding Remarks

Learned:
Open Cost: I/O costs: non-uniform stuff, CPU costs: nothing done
Wrong cardinality estimates: Open, leads to dynamic qo

4.19 Bibliography
ToDo:

• CPU Costs for B-tree search within inner and leaf pages [446]

• Index/Relations: only joins between building blocks [629]

4.19. BIBLIOGRAPHY 195

• RDB/V1: predicate push down (views), 2 phase optimization (local: tra-

ditional, global: sharing of tables), five categories for predicates, nested
loops evaluation for nested correlated subqueries, use of transitivity of
equality, conjunctive normal form, use of min/max value of join column
to reduce join cardinality by adding another selection to the other relation
(min(a) <= b <= max(a)) for join predicate a=b.

• K accesses to unique index: how many page faults if buffer has size b?
[642]

• buffer mgmt: [220]

• buffer mgmt: [699]

• buffer mgmt: [450]

• buffer mgmt: [643, 644]

• buffer mgmt: [92]

• buffer mgmt: [150]

• structured, semi-structured, unstructured data: [284] cited in Dono76

• B-trees and their improvements [182]

• Vertical partitioning: [224, 505, 49]

• Horizontal and vertical partitioning: [111]

• set oriented disk access to large complex objects [796, 795], assembly
operator: [412],

• large objects: [77, 103, 464]

196CHAPTER 4. DATABASE ITEMS, BUILDING BLOCKS, AND ACCESS PATHS
 Part II

Foundations

197
Chapter 5

Logic, Null, and Boolean

Expressions

5.1 Two-valued logic

The Boolean algebra with its operations not (¬), and (∧), and or (∨) is well-
known. The truth tables for these operations is given in Figure 5.1.

5.2 NULL values and three valued logic

Many database management systems (in particular all SQL based relational
systems) support a concept of undefined or unknown values, commonly called
NULL values. These NULL values represent the fact that an attribute value
is unknown, and consequently the result of operations on this attribute can be
unknown, too.
As a consequence, NULL values induce a three valued logic, as illustrated by
the truth table on the left-hand side of Figure ??: When comparing two values
x and y for equality, the result is true if both values are not NULL and x = y
(using standard equality), false if both values are not NULL and not x = y,
and unknown (⊥) if any of the two values is NULL, as then no comparison is
possible. These three possible outcomes (true, false, and ⊥) propagate through
logical operators, and induce a three-valued logic, as shown in Figure 5.5.
While the three-valued logic correctly captures the uncertainty caused by
NULL values, and a result of ⊥ can be reported back to the user as boolean
NULL, it is often necessary to convert three-valued logic results into two-valued
logic. For the special case of equality comparisons it is sometimes useful to in-

¬ true false ∨ true false ∧ true false

false true true true true true true false
false true false false false false

Figure 5.1: Truth tables for two-valued logic

199
200 CHAPTER 5. LOGIC, NULL, AND BOOLEAN EXPRESSIONS

¬true =⇒ false
¬false =⇒ true

p∨p =⇒ p p∧p =⇒ p
p ∨ ¬p =⇒ true p ∧ ¬p =⇒ false
p1 ∨ (p1 ∧ p2 ) =⇒ p1 p1 ∧ (p1 ∨ p2 ) =⇒ p1
p ∨ false =⇒ p p ∧ true =⇒ p
p ∨ true =⇒ true p ∨ false =⇒ false

Figure 5.2: Simplification Rules

terpret NULL as a distinct value (for example when eliminating duplicates)

N U LL
and use the NULL aware equality = (right-hand column of Figure 5.4). In
general three-valued expressions are usually converted into two-valued expres-
sions by considering ⊥ as true-interpreted or false-interpreted (Figure 5.6). An
example for false-interpreted ⊥ values are where clauses, which must evaluate
to true to produce a tuple, while check conditions are true-interpreted.

5.3 Simplifying Boolean Expressions

5.4 Optimizing Boolean Expressions

5.5 Bibliography
NULL-values: [637, 469, 638, 470]
5.5. BIBLIOGRAPHY 201

Commutativity
p1 ∨ p2 ⇐⇒ p2 ∨ p1 p1 ∧ p2 ⇐⇒ p2 ∧ p1
∃e1 ∃e2 p ⇐⇒ ∃e2 ∃e1 p ∀e1 ∀e2 p ⇐⇒ ∀e2 ∀e1 p

Associativity
(p1 ∨ p2 ) ∨ p3 ⇐⇒ p1 ∨ (p2 ∨ p3 ) (p1 ∧ p2 ) ∧ p3 ⇐⇒ p1 ∧ (p2 ∧ p3 )

Distributivity
p1 ∨ (p2 ∧ p3 ) ⇐⇒ (p1 ∨ p2 ) ∧ (p1 ∨ p3 ) p1 ∧ (p2 ∨ p3 ) ⇐⇒ (p1 ∧ p2 ) ∨ (p1 ∧ p3 )
∃e (p1 ∨ p2 ) ⇐⇒ (∃e p1 ) ∨ (∃ p2 ) ∀e (p1 ∧ p2 ) ⇐⇒ (∀e p1 ) ∧ (∀e p2 )

Idempotency
p∨p ⇐⇒ p p∧p ⇐⇒ p
p ∨ ¬p ⇐⇒ true p ∧ ¬p ⇐⇒ false
p1 ∨ (p1 ∧ p2 ) ⇐⇒ p1 p1 ∧ (p1 ∨ p2 ) ⇐⇒ p1
p ∨ false ⇐⇒ p p ∧ true ⇐⇒ p
p ∨ true ⇐⇒ true p ∧ false ⇐⇒ false

De Morgan
¬(p1 ∨ p2 ) ⇐⇒ ¬(p1 ) ∧ ¬(p2 ) ¬(p1 ∧ p2 ) ⇐⇒ ¬(p1 ) ∨ ¬(p2 )

Negation of Quantifiers

¬(∀e p) ⇐⇒ ∃e(¬p) ¬(∃e p) ⇐⇒ ∀e (¬p)

Elimination of Negation

¬(¬(p)) ⇐⇒ p ¬t1 θt2 =⇒ t1 θt2

Conditioned Distributivity(F(p1 ) ∩ A(e) = ∅)

p1 ∨ (∀e p2 ) ⇐⇒ ∀e (p1 ∨ p2 ) p1 ∧ (∃e p2 ) ⇐⇒ ∃e (p1 ∧ p2 )


∃e(p1 ∨ p2 ) if e 6= {}
p1 ∨ (∃e p2 ) ⇐⇒
p if e = {}
 1
∀e(p1 ∧ p2 ) if e 6= {}
p1 ∧ (∀e p2 ) ⇐⇒
p1 if e = {}

Figure 5.3: Laws for two-valued logic

N U LL
x=y x = y
x is N U LL x not N U LL x is N U LL x not N U LL
y is N U LL ⊥ ⊥ y is N U LL true false
y not N U LL ⊥ x=y y not N U LL false x=y

Figure 5.4: Comparison functions in the presence of NULL values

202 CHAPTER 5. LOGIC, NULL, AND BOOLEAN EXPRESSIONS

¬ true false ⊥ ∨ true false ⊥ ∧ true false ⊥

false true ⊥ true true true true true true false ⊥
false true false ⊥ false false false false
⊥ true ⊥ ⊥ ⊥ ⊥ false ⊥

Figure 5.5: Truth tables for three-valued logic

x dxeN U LL bxcN U LL
true true true
⊥ true false
false false false

Figure 5.6: Interpretation of ⊥ values

Chapter 6

Functional Dependencies

In many query results attribute values are not independent of each other but
have certain dependencies. Keeping track of these dependencies is very useful
for many optimizations, for example in the following query

select c.id, n.name

from customers c, nations n
where c.nid=n.id
order byc.id, n.name

the order by clause can be simplified to c.id without affecting the result:
c.id is the key of customers, and thus determines c.nid. c.nid is joined with
n.id, which is the key of nations and determines n.name, thus transitively c.id
determines n.name.
These functional dependencies between attributes have been studied primar-
ily in the context of database design, but many optimization steps like order
optimization (Chapter 23) and query unnesting (Chapter 14) profit greatly from
known functional dependencies. In the following we first study functional de-
pendencies when all attributes are not NULL, then extend this to attributes
with NULL values, and finally discuss how functional dependencies are effected
by relational operators.

6.1 Functional Dependencies

As illustrated by the previous example, a functional dependency describes how
attribute values depend on other attribute values. More formally, a relation R
(with A1 , A2 ⊆ A(R)) satisfies a functional dependency

f : A1 → A2

if and only if the following condition holds:

∀t1 , t2 ([t1 ∈ R ∧ t2 ∈ R ∧ t1 .A1 = t2 .A1 ] ⇒ [t1 .A2 = t2 .A2 ]).

For base relations functional dependencies can be derived from the schema,
in particular key constraints and check conditions [?]. For intermediate results

203
204 CHAPTER 6. FUNCTIONAL DEPENDENCIES

additional function dependencies can be induced by algebraic operators, as we

will see below.
Once some functional dependencies are known to hold, further function-
al dependencies can be derived by using Armstrong’s axioms [?] (assuming
A1 , A2 , A3 ⊆ A(R)):

1. A2 ⊆ A1 ⇒ A1 → A2
2. A1 → A2 ⇒ (A1 ∪ A3 ) → (A2 ∪ A3 )
3. A1 → A2 ∧ A2 → A3 ⇒ A1 → A3
The Armstrong axioms are sound and complete, i.e., it is possible to derive
all valid functional dependencies by applying these three axioms. For practical
purposes it is often convenient to include three additional rules which can be
derived from the original axioms:

4. A1 → A2 ∧ A1 → A3 ⇒ A1 → (A2 ∪ A3 )
5. A1 → (A2 ∪ A3 ) ⇒ A1 → A2 ∧ A1 → A3
6. A1 → A2 ∧ (A2 ∪ A4 ) → A3 ⇒ (A1 ∪ A4 ) → A3
Given a set of functional dependencies F, we denote with F + the closure
of F, i.e., the set of all functional dependencies that can be derived from F by
using the inference rules shown above.
Closely related to the concept of functional dependencies is the concept of
keys: Given a relation R and an attribute set A ⊆ A(R), A is a super key of
R if A → A(R) holds in R. Further A is a key of R if the following condition
holds:
∀A(A0 ⊂ A ⇒ ¬(A0 → A(R))).

6.2 Functional Dependencies in the presence of NULL

values
In the presence of NULL values, a relation R (with A1 , A2 ⊆ A(R)) satisfies a
functional dependency
f : A1 → A2
if and only if the following condition holds:
N U LL N U LL
∀t1 , t2 ([t1 ∈ R ∧ t2 ∈ R ∧ t1 .A1 = t2 .A1 ] ⇒ [t1 .A2 = t2 .A2 ]).

XXX explain why, discuss lax dependencies

6.3 Deriving Functional Dependencies over algebra-

ic operators
XXX dependency graphs

6.4 Bibliography
Chapter 7

An Algebra for Sets, Bags,

and Sequences

7.1 Sets, Bags, and Sequences

7.1.1 Sets
Sets and their laws (see Figure 7.1) should be well-known. A set contains
elements drawn from some domain D. In our case, the domain will often be
tuples and we only consider finite sets.
The set operations we are interested in are union (∪), intersection (∩), and
set difference (\). If the domain consists of tuples, we assume that both argu-
ments have the same schema. That is, the attributes and their domains are the
same in both arguments. Otherwise, the expression is not well-typed. In any
case, set union and intersection are commutative and associative. Set differ-

X ∪∅ = X
X ∪X = X
X ∪Y = Y ∪X (commutativity)
(X ∪ Y ) ∪ Z = X ∪ (Y ∪ Z) (associativity)
X ∩∅ = ∅
X ∩x = X
X ∩Y = y∩X (commutativity)
(X ∩ Y ) ∩ Z = X ∩ (Y ∩ z) (associativity)
X \∅ = X
∅\X = ∅
X \Y 6= Y \X (∗ ∗ ∗wrong ∗ ∗∗)
(X \ Y ) \ Z 6= X \ (Y \ Z) (∗ ∗ ∗wrong ∗ ∗∗)
X ∪ (Y ∩ Z) = (X ∩ Y ) ∪ (X ∩ Z) (distributivity)
X ∩ (Y ∪ Z) = (X ∪ Y ) ∩ (X ∪ Z) (distributivity)
(X ∪ Y ) \ Z = (X \ Z) ∪ (Y \ Z) (distributivity)

Figure 7.1: Laws for Set Operations

205
206 CHAPTER 7. AN ALGEBRA FOR SETS, BAGS, AND SEQUENCES

ence is neither of them. Expressions containing the empty set can simplified.
Further, some distributivity laws hold.
As we have seen in Chapter 2, algebraic equivalences that reorder algebraic
operators form the fundamental core for query optimization. One could discuss
the reorderability of each pair of operators resulting in n2 investigations if the
number of operators in the algebra is n. In order to simplify this, we introduce
a general argument covering most of the cases. The observation will be that
set-linearity of set operators implies their reorderability easily.
A unary function f from sets to sets is called set-linear (or homomorph), if
and only if the following two conditions hold for all sets X and Y :

f (∅) = ∅
f (X ∪ Y ) = f (X) ∪ f (Y )

An n-ary mapping from sets to a set is called set-linear in its i-th argument, if
and only if for all sets X1 , . . . , Xn and Xi0 the following conditions hold:

f (X1 , . . . , Xi−1 , ∅, Xi+1 , . . . , Xn ) = ∅

f (X1 , . . . , Xi−1 , Xi ∪ Xi0 , Xi+1 , . . . , Xn ) = f (X1 , . . . , Xi−1 , Xi , Xi+1 , . . . , Xn )
∪f (X1 , . . . , Xi−1 , Xi0 , Xi+1 , . . . , Xn )

It is called set-linear , if it is linear in all its arguments. For a binary function or

operator where we can distinguish between the left and the right argument, we
call it left (right) set-linear if it is set-linear in its first (second) argument. Note
that if an equivalence with linear mappings on both sides has to be proven, it
suffices to proof it for disjoint singleton sets, i.e. sets with one element only.
Set intersecion is set-linear, set difference is left set-linear but not right
set-linear and set union is neither left nor right set-linear.
A set of elements from a domain D can be seen a function from D to {0, 1}.
For a given set S, this function  is called the characteristic function of S. It
0 if s 6∈ S
can be defined as χS (s) = Of course their is a bijection between
1 if s ∈ S
characteristic functions and sets.

7.1.2 Duplicate Data: Bags

A bag or multiset is can contain every element more than once. It cannot
contain an element less than zero times. A typical bag is {{a, b, b}}. Another
example is {{a, b}}. The latter bag does not contain any duplicates. Hence, it
could also be considered a set.
Hence, for a given bag B, the characteristic function for bags maps every
element of a domain D to the set of non-negative integers IN0 . The characteristic
function gives the number of occurrences of each element in the bag. Again,
there is a bijection between bags and their characteristic functions. We will
only consider finite bags.
The bag union X ∪ ¯ Y of two bags is defined such that the number of occur-
rences of some element in the union is the sum of its occurrences in X and Y :
The number of occurrences of some element in the bag intersection X ∩ ¯ Y is the
7.1. SETS, BAGS, AND SEQUENCES 207

X∪ ¯¯∅ = X
X∪ ¯X = X
X∪ ¯Y = Y∪ ¯X (commutativity)
(X ∪¯ Y )∪¯Z = X∪ ¯ (Y ∪
¯ Z) (associativity)
X∩ ¯¯∅ = ¯
∅
X∩ ¯x = X
X∩ ¯Y = Y∩ ¯X (commutativity)
(X ∩¯ Y )∩
¯Z = X∩ ¯ (Y ∩
¯ Z) (associativity)
¯
X \∅ ¯ = X
¯
∅¯\X = ¯
∅
X¯ \Y 6= Y ¯\X (∗ ∗ ∗wrong ∗ ∗∗)
(X ¯\Y )¯\Z 6= X ¯\(Y ¯\Z) (∗ ∗ ∗wrong ∗ ∗∗)
¯ ¯
X ∪(Y ∩Z) = (X ∩¯ Y )∪
¯ (x∩
¯ Z) (distributivity)
X∩ ¯ (Y ∪
¯ Z) 6= (X ∪¯ Y )∩
¯ (X ∪
¯ Z) (∗ ∗ ∗wrong ∗ ∗∗)
(X ∪Y )¯
¯ \Z 6= ¯ ¯
(X \Z)∪(Y \Z)¯ (∗ ∗ ∗wrong ∗ ∗∗)

Figure 7.2: Laws for Bag Operations

minimum of the number its occurrences in X and Y . In the bag difference X ¯\Y
the number of occurrences of some element is the difference (−̇) of its occur-
rences in X and Y where a−̇b is defined as max(0, a − b). Using characteristic
functions, we can define

χX ∪¯ Y (z) = χX (z) + χY (z)

χX ∩¯ Y (z) = min(χX (z), χY (z))
χX ¯\Y (z) = χX (z)−̇χY (z)

The laws for sets do not necessarily hold for bags (see Figure 7.2). We will
have that bag union and bag intersection are both commutative and associative.
Bag difference is neither of them. The only distributivity law that holds for bags
is the one that distributes a union over an intersection.
Having every operation twice, once for bags and once for sets is quite in-
convenient. Fortunately, for some operations we only need the one for bags.
We can get rid of some set operations as follows. Every set can be seen as a
¯
bag whose the characteristic function never exceeds one. Let I(S) turn a set S
into a bag with identical characteristic function. The partial function I¯−1 (B)
return a bag into a set if the bag’s characteristic function does not exceed one.
Otherwise let I¯−1 be undefined. Let X and Y be two sets. For the intersection
function we then have

I¯−1 (I(X)
¯ ∪ ¯ )) = X ∪ Y
¯ I(Y

That is, for any two sets X and Y bag union and set union are the same. This
gives rise to the notion of set-faithfulness. We call a unary function on sets f
set-faithtul if and only if

I¯−1 (f (I(X)))
¯ = f (X)
208 CHAPTER 7. AN ALGEBRA FOR SETS, BAGS, AND SEQUENCES

holds for all sets X. Analogously, binary functions g are set-faithful if and only
if
I¯−1 (g(I(X),
¯ ¯ ))) = f (X, Y )
I(Y
holds for all sets X and Y .
¯
\ and ∩¯ are set-faithful. Hence, we can (and often will) simply use \ and ∩
to denote set or bag difference and intersection. However, ∪ ¯ is not. Hence, we
have to carefully distinguish between ∪ ¯ and ∪.
To go from a bag to a set, we have to eliminate duplicates. Let us denote
by ΠD the duplicate elimination operation. For a given bag B we then have
χΠD (B) (z) = min(1, χB (z)).
Instead of working with sets and bags, we can work with bags only by
¯
identifying every set S with the bag I(S). We can annotate all bags with a
property indicating whether it contains duplicates or not. If at some place a
set is required and we cannot infer that the bag in that place is duplicate free,
we can use ΠD as an enforcer of the set property. Note that for every set S we
have ΠD (S) = S. Hence, ΠD does not do any harm except for the resources
it takes. The reasoning whether a given expression produces duplicates or not
will be very important, especially in the context of XPath/XQuery.
A unary function f from bags to bags is called bag-linear (or homomorph),
if and only if the following two conditions hold for all bags X and Y :

f (¯∅) = ¯∅
¯ Y ) = f (X)∪
f (X ∪ ¯ f (Y )

An n-ary mapping from bags to a bag is called bag-linear in its i-th argument,
if and only if for all bags X1 , . . . , Xn and Xi0 the following conditions hold:

f (X1 , . . . , Xi−1 , ¯
∅, Xi+1 , . . . , Xn ) = ¯∅
f (X1 , . . . , Xi−1 , Xi ∪ Xi0 , Xi+1 , . . . , Xn ) = f (X1 , . . . , Xi−1 , Xi , Xi+1 , . . . , Xn )
¯ f (X1 , . . . , Xi−1 , Xi0 , Xi+1 , . . . , Xn )
∪

It is called bag-linear , if it is linear in all its arguments. For a binary function

or operator where we can distinguish between the left and the right argument,
we call it left (right) bag-linear if it is bag-linear in its first (second) argument.
Note that if an equivalence with linear mappings on both sides has to be proven,
it suffices to proof it for disjoint singleton bags, i.e. bags with one element only.
None of bag union, intersection, and difference are left or right bag-linear.
TODO
¯ Y )¯
• (X ∪ \Z 6= (X ¯ ¯ (Y ¯\Z)
\Z)∪

• A(()R) = A(()S)
(R1̄S) 6= (R∩
¯ S)

7.1.3 Ordered Data: Sequences

A sequence is ordered and may contain duplicates. An example sequence is
ha, b, b, c, bi. The length of the sequence is the number of elements it contains.
7.2. ALGEBRA 209

For any sequence S, the length of the sequence is denoted by |S|. The above
sequence has length five. The empty sequence () contains zero elements and
has length zero.
As we consider only finite sequences, a sequence of length n ≥ 0 has a
characteristic function χ from an interval [0, n[ to a domain D. Outside [0, n[,
χ is undefined (⊥). Let S be a sequence. Then α(S) gives us the first element of
the sequence, i.e. α(S) = χS (0). For our example sequence, α(ha, b, b, c, bi) = a.
The rest or tail of a sequence S of length n is denoted by τ (S) and contains
all but the first element in the sequence. That is χτ (S) (i) = χS (i + 1). For our
example sequence, τ (ha, b, b, c, bi) = hb, b, c, bi.
Concatenation of two sequences is denoted by ⊕. The characteristic  function
χS (i) if i < |S|
of the concatenation of two sequences S and T is χS⊕T (i) =
χT (i − |S|) if i ≥ |S|
As an example, ha, b, b, c, bi ⊕ ha, b, ci = ha, b, b, c, b, a, b, ci.
We can easily go from a sequence to a bag by just forgetting the order. To
convert a bag into a sequence, we typically have to apply a Sort operator. In
reality however, bags are often represented as (ordered) streams, i.e. they are
sequences. This is due to fact that most physical algebras are implemented
using the iterator concept introduced in Section 4.6.
Analogously to set and bag linearity, we can introduce sequence linearity
of unary and n-ary functions on sequences. In the definition, we only have to
exchange the set (bag) union operator by concatentation:
A unary function f from sequences to sequences is called sequence-linear , if
and only if the following two conditions hold for all sequences X and Y :

f () = 
f (X ⊕ Y ) = f (X) ⊕ f (Y )

An n-ary mapping from sequences to a sequence is called sequence-linear in its

i-th argument, if and only if for all sequences X1 , . . . , Xn and Xi0 the following
conditions hold:

f (X1 , . . . , Xi−1 , , Xi+1 , . . . , Xn ) = 

f (X1 , . . . , Xi−1 , Xi ∪ Xi0 , Xi+1 , . . . , Xn ) = f (X1 , . . . , Xi−1 , Xi , Xi+1 , . . . , Xn )
⊕f (X1 , . . . , Xi−1 , Xi0 , Xi+1 , . . . , Xn )

It is called sequence-linear , if it is sequence-linear in all its arguments. For a

binary function or operator where we can distinguish between the left and the
right argument, we call it left (right) sequence-linear if it is sequence-linear in
its first (second) argument. Note that if an equivalence with linear mappings
on both sides has to be proven, it suffices to proof it for disjoint singleton
sequences, i.e. sequences with one element only.

7.2 Algebra
Grouping Mapping and Commutativity Comment on ΠA (R1 ∩ R2 ) 6≡ ΠA (R1 ) ∩ ToDo
ΠA (R2 ) ΠA (R1 \ R2 ) 6≡ ΠA (R1 ) \ ΠA (R2 ) ToDo
 210 CHAPTER 7. AN ALGEBRA FOR SETS, BAGS, AND SEQUENCES

This section summarizes a logical algebra that is sufficent to express plans

for SQL, OQL and XPath/XQuery queries. The algebra is an extension of a
union of algebras developed by many people [61, 63, 161, 162, 416, 417, 466, 711].
The most prominent features of the algebra are:

• All operators are polymorphic and can deal with (almost) any kind of
complex arguments.

• The operators take arbitrary complex expressions as subscripts. This

includes algebraic expressions.

• The algebra is redundant since some special cases of the operators can be
implemented much more efficiently. These cases are often introduced as
abbreviations.

The remainder of this subsection is organized by operator. The core of the

algebra consists of the following operators that are all defined on sets, bags,
and sequences. We have already seen the union, intersubsection, and difference
operators. The others are selection (σ), projection (Π), map (χ), join(1), semi-
join (<), anti-join (.), left-outer join ( 1 ), d-join (< · >), map (χ), unnest
(µ), and unary (Γ) and binary grouping (Γ). For every algebraic operator we
have a subsection discussing it.
While some of the operators are simple extensions of standard operators,
others are not widely spread. This forces us to reconsider existing algebra-
ic equivalences as well as to discover new ones. The main question here is
reorderability of operators since reorderability is fundamental to any optimiza-
tion process. Hence, we will discuss reorderability results. Thereby, we will
make use of the notion of linearity.
ToDo Since the join remains the most expensive operator in our algebra, subsubsection 7.2.11
discusses simplifications of expressions containing joins.

7.2.1 The Operators

The set operators as well as the selection operator and the different join oper-
ators (except for the d-join) are known from the relational context. As we will
see, the only difference in their definition is that they are extended to express
nested queries. For this, we allow the subscripts of these operators to contain
full algebraic expressions. Further, to adjust them to the object-oriented con-
text, they do not only deal with relations, but with sets, bags, and sequences
of items, where items can be simple tuples, tuples where attributes are allowed
to have complex values, and even non-tuple items (e.g. objects or document
nodes). This means, that the attribute values are in no way restricted to atom-
ic types but can carry also objects, sets, bags, sequences and so on.
The left-outer join additionally needs some tuning in order to exploit the
possibility to have sets as attribute values. For this, it carries a superscript
giving a default value for some attribute for those tuples in the left argument
for which there is no matching tuple in the right argument. The d-join oper-
ation is used for performing a join between two bulk valued items, where the
7.2. ALGEBRA 211

second one is dependent on the first one. This operator can be used for unnest-
ing nested queries and is in many cases equivalent to a join between two sets
with a membership predicate [694]. In some cases (as we will see later on), it
corresponds to an unnest operation. We introduced the d-join in order to cope
with the values of types that do not have extensions (i.e. there exist no explicit
set on which a join could be applied). The d-join is also useful for introducing
index structures.
The map operator χ ([416]) is well-known from the functional programming
language context. A special case of it, where it adds derived information in
form of an added attribute with an according value (e.g. by object-base lookup
or by method calls) to each tuple of a set has been proposed in [415, 416]. Later,
this special case was given the name materialization operator [80].
The unnest operator is known from NF2 [654, 636]. It will come in two
different flavors allowing us to perform unnesting not only on nested relations
but also on attributes whose value is a bulk of elements which are not tuples.
The last operator—the grouping operator—generalizes the nest operator quite a
bit. That is why we renamed it. In fact, there exist two grouping operators, one
unary grouping operator and one binary grouping operator. The unary grouping
operator groups one set of tuples according to a grouping condition. Further,
it can apply an arbitrary expression to the newly formed group. This allows an
efficient implementation by saving on intermediate results. The binary grouping
operator adds a group to each element in the first argument set. This group is
formed from the second argument. The grouping operator will exploit the fact
that in the object-oriented context attributes can have set-valued attributes.
As we will see, this is useful for both, unnesting nested queries and producing
nested results. A variant of the binary grouping operator is also called nest-join
[720]. Implementations of it are discussed in [120]. There, the binary grouping
operator is called MD-Join.

7.2.2 Preliminaries
As already mentioned, our algebraic operators can deal not only with standard
relations but are polymorphic in the general sense. In order to fix the domain
of the operators we need some technical abbreviations and notations. Let us
introduce these first.
Since our operators are polymorphic, we need variables for types. We use τ
possibly with a subscript to denote types. To express that a certain expression
is of type e, we write e :: τ . Starting from concrete names for types and type
variables, we can build type expressions the standard way by using type con-
structors to build tuple tupes ([·]), set types {·}, bag types {{·}} and sequence
types < · >. Having two type expressions t1 and t2 , we denote by t1 ≤ t2 , that
t1 is a subtype of t2 . It is important to note that this subtype relationship is not
based on the sub-/superclass hierarchy found in most object-oriented models.
Instead, it simply denotes substitutability. That is the type t1 provides at least
all the attributes and member functions that t2 provides [101].
Most of our algebraic operators are tuned to work on bulks of tuples. The
most important information here is the attributes provided. For this we intro-
212 CHAPTER 7. AN ALGEBRA FOR SETS, BAGS, AND SEQUENCES

duce A(A). The function A is defined as follows. A(e) = {a1 , . . . , an } if e ::

{[a1 : τ1 , . . . , an : τn ]}, e :: {{[a1 : τ1 , . . . , an : τn ]}}, e :: h[a1 : τ1 , . . . , an : τn ]i,
or e :: [a1 : τ1 , . . . , an : τn ]. Giving a set of attributes A, we are sometimes
interested in the attributes provided by an expression e which are not in A. For
this complement we use the notation A(e) defined as A(e) \ A. When e is clear
from the context, we use A as a shorthand.
Often, we are not only interested in the set of attributes an expression
provides, but also in the set of free variables occurring in an expression e. For
this, we introduce F(e) denoting the set of all free variables of e.
Since the subscripts of our algebraic operators can contain arbitrary ex-
pressions, they may contain variables or even free variables. Then, there is a
need to get bindings for these variables before the subscript expression can be
evaluated. These bindings are taken from the argument(s) of the operator. In
order to do so, we need a specified binding mechanism. The λ-notation is such
a mechanism and can be used e.g., in case of ambiguities. For our purpose, it
suffices if we stick to the following convention.
• For an expression e with free variables F(e) = {a1 , . . . , an } and a tuple
t with F(e) ⊆ A(t) we define e(t) := e[a1 ← t.a1 , . . . , an ← t.an ].1 Simi-
larily, we define e(t1 , . . . , tn ) for more than a single tuple. Note that the
attribute names of the ti have to be distinct to avoid name conflicts.

• For an expression e with only one free variable x, we define e(t) = e[x ← t].
The mechanism is very much like the standard binding for the relational algebra.
Consider for example a select operation σa=3 (R), then we assume that a, the
free variable of the subscript expression a = 3 is bound to the value of the
attribute a of the tuples of the relation R. To express this binding explicitly,
we would write for a tuple t ∈ R (a = 3)(t). Since a is an attribute of R and
hence of t, by our convention a is replaced by t.a, the value of attribute a of
tuple t. Since we want to avoid name conflicts right away, we assume that all
variable/attribute names used in a query are distinct. This can be achieved in
a renaming step.
Application of a function f to arguments ei is denoted by either regular
(e.g., f (e1 , . . . , en )) or dot (e.g., e1 .f (e2 , . . . , en )) notation. The dot notation is
used for type associated methods occurring in the object-oriented context.
Last, we introduce the heavily overloaded symbol ◦. It denotes function
concatenation and (as a special case) tuple concatenation as well as the con-
catenation of tuple types to yield a tuple type containing the union of the
attributes of the two argument tuple types.
Sometimes it is useful to be able to produce a set/bag/sequence containing
only a single tuple with no attributes. This is done by the singleton scan
operator denoted by 2.
Very often, we are given some database item which is a bulk of other items.
Binding these to variables or equivalently, embedding the items into a tuple, we
use the notation e[x] for an expression e and a variable/attribute name x. For
1
e[v1 ← e1 , . . . , vn ← en ] denotes a substitution of the variables vi by the expressions ei
within an expression e.
7.2. ALGEBRA 213

set valued expressions e, e[x] is defined as e[x] = {[x : y]|y ∈ e}. For bags the
definition is analogous. For sequence valued expressions e, we define e[a] =  if
e is empty and e[a] = h[a : α(e)]i ⊕ τ (e)[a] otherwise.

By id we denote the identity function.

7.2.3 Operator Signatures

We are now ready to define the signatures of the operators of our algebra.
Their semantics is defined in a subsequent step. Remember that we consider
all operators as being polymorphic. Hence, their signatures are polymorphic
and contain type variables, denoted by τ often with an index. We only give the
signatures for set operators. For bag operators, just replace the set sign by the
214 CHAPTER 7. AN ALGEBRA FOR SETS, BAGS, AND SEQUENCES

bag sign.

∪ : {τ }, {τ } → {τ }
∩ : {τ }, {τ } → {τ }
\ : {τ }, {τ } → {τ }
σp : {τ } → {τ }
if p : τ → B
1p : {τ1 }, {τ2 } → {τ1 ◦ τ2 }
if τi ≤ [], p : τ1 , τ2 → B, and
A(τ1 ) ∩ A(τ2 ) = ∅
<p : {τ1 }, {τ2 } → {τ1 }
if τi ≤ [], p : τ1 , τ2 → B
p : {τ1 }, {τ2 } → {τ1 }
if τi ≤ [], p : τ1 , τ2 → B
1 g=c
p : {τ1 }, {τ2 } → {τ1 ◦ τ2+ }
if τ1 < [], c :: τ , τ2 < [g : τ ],
+ just adds a null value to the domain of τ2 ,
if it does not already contain one,
p : τ1 , τ2 → B
< · > : {τ1 }||{τ2 } → {τ1 ◦ τ2 }
if τi ≤ [],
A(τ1 ) ∩ A(τ2 ) = ∅
χf : {τ1 } → {τ2 }
if f : τ1 → τ2
Γg;θA;f : {τ } → {τ ◦ [g : τ 0 ]}
if τ ≤ [], f : {τ } → τ 0 , A ⊆ A(τ )
Γg;A1 θA2 ;f : {τ1 }, {τ2 } → {τ1 ◦ [g : τ 0 ]}
if τ1 ≤ [], f : {τ2 } → τ 0 , Ai ⊆ A(τi ) for i = 1, 2
µg : {τ } → {τ 0 }
if τ = [a1 : τ1 , . . . , an : τn , g : {τ0 }],
τ0 ≤ [],
τ 0 = [a1 : τ1 , . . . , an : τn ] ◦ τ0 ,
µg;c : {τ } → {τ 0 }
if τ = [a1 : τ1 , . . . , an : τn , g : {τ0 }],
τ0 6≤ [],
τ 0 = [a1 : τ1 , . . . , an : τn ] ◦ [c : τ0 ],
f latten : {{τ }} → {τ }
maxg;m;aθ;f : {τ } → [m : τa , g : τf ]
if τ ≤ [a : τa ], f : {τ } → τf
7.2. ALGEBRA 215

7.2.4 Selection
Note that in the following definition there is no restriction on the selection
predicate. It may contain path expressions, method calls, nested algebraic
operators, etc.

σp (e) = {x|x ∈ e, p(x)}

σ̄p (e) = {{x|x ∈ e, p(x)}}

7.2.5 Projection
7.2.6 Map
These operators are fundamental to the algebra. As the operators mainly work
on sets of tuples, sets of non-tuples (mostly sets of objects) must be transformed
into sets of tuples. This is one purpose of the map operator. Other purposes
are dereferenciation, method and function application. Our translation process
also pushes all nesting into map operators.
The first definition corresponds to the standard map as defined in, e.g.,
[416]. The second definition concerns the special case of a materialize operator
[415, 80]. The third definition handles the frequent case of constructing a set
of tuples with a single attribute out of a given set of (non-tuple) values.

χe2 (e1 ) = {e2 (x)|x ∈ e1 }

χa:e2 (e1 ) = {y ◦ [a : e2 (y)]|y ∈ e1 }
e[a] = {[a : x]|x ∈ e}

Note that the oo map operator obviates the need of a relational projection.
Sometimes the map operator is equivalent to a simple projection (or renaming).
In these cases, we will use π (or ρ) instead of χ.

7.2.7 Join Operators

The algebra features many different join operators. Besides the complex join
predicate, the first four of them are rather standard: join, semi-join, anti-join
and left-outer join are defined similarly to their relational counterparts. One
difference is that the left-outer join accepts a default value to be given, instead
of null, to one attribute of its right argument.

e1 1p e2 = {y ◦ x|y ∈ e1 , x ∈ e2 , p(y, x)}

e1 <p e2 = {y|y ∈ e1 , ∃x ∈ e2 , p(y, x)}
e1 p e2 = {y|y ∈ e1 , ¬∃x ∈ e2 p(y, x)}
e1 1 g=c
p e2 = {y ◦ x|y ∈ e1 , x ∈ e2 , p(y, x)} ∪
{y ◦ z|y ∈ e1 , ¬∃x ∈ e2 p(y, x), A(z) = A(e2 ), g ∈ A(e2 ),
z.g = c, ∀a ∈ A(e2 ) (z.a 6= N U LL =⇒ a = g)}

Remember that the function A used in the last definition returns the set of
attributes of a relation.
216 CHAPTER 7. AN ALGEBRA FOR SETS, BAGS, AND SEQUENCES

The last join operator is called d-join (< · >). It is a join between two sets,
where the evaluation of the second set may dependent on the first set. It is
used to translate from clauses into the algebra. Here, the range definition of
a variable may depend on the value of a formerly defined variable. Whenever
possible, d-joins are rewritten into standard joins.
e1 < e2 > = {y ◦ x|y ∈ e1 , x ∈ e2 (y)}

Grouping Operators Two grouping operators will be used for unnesting

purposes. The first one — called unary grouping — is defined on a set and
its subscript indicates (i) the attribute receiving the grouped elements (ii) the
grouping criterion, and (iii) a function that will be applied to each group.
Γg;θA;f (e) = {y.A ◦ [g : G]|y ∈ e,
G = f ({x|x ∈ e, x.Aθy.A})}
Note that the traditional nest operator [654] is a special case of unary grouping.
It is equivalent to Γg;A=;id . Note also that the grouping criterion may be defined
on several attributes. Then, A and θ represent sequences of attributes and
comparators.
The second grouping operator — called binary grouping — is defined on
two sets. The elements of the second set are grouped according to a criterion
that depends on the elements of the first argument.
e1 Γg;A1 θA2 ;f e2 = {y ◦ [g : G]|y ∈ e1 , G = f ({x|x ∈ e2 , y.A1 θx.A2 })}
In the sequel, the following abbreviations will be used: Γg;A;f for Γg;A=;f , Γg;A
for Γg;A;id .
New implementation techniques have to be developed for these grouping
operators. Obviously, those used for the nest operator can be used for simple
grouping when θ stands for equality. For the other cases, implementations based
on sorting seem promising. We also consider adapting algorithms for non-equi
joins, e.g. those developed for the band-width join [205]. A very promissing
approach is the use of θ-tables developed for efficient aggregate processing [163].

Unnest Operators The unnest operators come in two different flavor. The
first one is responsible for unnesting a set of tuples on an attribute being a set
of tuples itself. The second one unnests sets of tuples on an attribute not being
a set of tuples but a set of something else, e.g., integers.

µg (e) = {y.[A(y) \ {g}] ◦ x|y ∈ e, x ∈ y.g}

µg;c (e) = {y.[A(y) \ {g}] ◦ [c : x]|y ∈ e, x ∈ y.g}

Flatten Operator The flatten operator flattens a set of sets by unioning the
elements of the sets contained in the outer set.
f latten(e) = {y|x ∈ e, y ∈ x}
7.2. ALGEBRA 217

Max Operator The M ax operator has a very specific use that will be ex-
plained in the sequel. Note that an analogous M in operator can be defined.

M axg;m;aθ;f (e) = [m : max({x.a|x ∈ e}), g : f ({x|x ∈ e, x.aθm})]

This definition is a generalization of the Max operator as defined in [161]. Since
the equivalences don’t care whether we use Max or Min, we write Agg to denote
either of them.

Remarks Note that, apart from the χ and f latten operations, all these op-
erations are defined on sets of tuples. This guarantees some nice properties
among which is the associativity of the join operations. Note also that the
operators may take complex expressions in their subscript, therefore allowing
nested algebraic expressions. This is the most fundamental feature of the alge-
bra when it comes to express nested queries at the algebraic level. Unnesting
is then expressed by algebraic equivalences moving algebraic expression out of
the superscript.
The Γ, f latten and M ax operations are mainly needed for optimization
purposes, as we will see in the sequel, but do not add power to the algebra.
Note that a M in operation similar to the M ax operation can easily be defined.
The algebra is defined on sets whereas most OBMS also manipulate lists
and bags. We believe that our approach can easily be extended by considering
lists as set of tuples with an added positional attribute and bags as sets of tuples
with an added key attribute.

7.2.8 Linearity and Reorderability

Linearity of Algebraic Operators
As already mentioned, the core argument for optimizability of algebraic expres-
sions is the reorderability of their operators. One could discuss the reorderabili-
ty of each two operators resulting in n2 investigations if the number of operators
in the algebra is n. In order to avoid this, we introduce a general argument
covering most of the cases. This argument is that linearity of operators implies
their reorderability easily. Hence, let us first look at the linearity property.
A unary mapping f : {τ } → {τ 0 } is called linear (or homomorph), if and
only if
f (∅) = ∅
f (A ∪ B) = f (A) ∪ f (B)
If τ , τ 0 and τi are collection types, an n-ary mapping
f : τ1 , . . . , τi−1 , {τ }, τi+1 , . . . , τn → {τ 0 }
is called linear in its i-th argument, iff for all e1 , . . . , en , e0i
f (e1 , . . . , ei−1 , ∅, ei+1 , . . . , en ) = ∅
f (e1 , . . . , ei−1 , ei ∪ e0i , ei+1 , . . . , en ) = f (e1 , . . . , ei−1 , ei , ei+1 , . . . , en )
∪f (e1 , . . . , ei−1 , e0i , ei+1 , . . . , en )
218 CHAPTER 7. AN ALGEBRA FOR SETS, BAGS, AND SEQUENCES

It is called linear , if it is linear in all its arguments. Note that if an equivalence

with linear mappings on both sides has to be proven, it suffices to proof it for
disjunct singletons, i.e. sets with one element only.
The following summarizes the findings on the linearity of the algebraic op-
erators:
∪ . . ..

∩ . . ..

\ . . ..

π . . ..

π d . . ..

χf is linear.

χf (∅) = ∅
χf (e1 ∪ e2 ) = {f (x)|x ∈ e1 ∪ e2 }
= {f (x)|x ∈ e1 } ∪ {f (x)|x ∈ e2 }
= χf (e1 ) ∪ χf (e2 )

σ is linear (for a proof see [783])

1p is linear (for a proof see [783]). Similarly, < is linear.  is linear in its
first argument but obviously not in its second.

1 is linear in its first argument.

∅ 1 g=c
p e = ∅
(e1 ∪ e2 ) 1 g=c
p e = {y ◦ x|y ∈ e1 ∪ e2 , x ∈ e, p(y, x)} ∪
{y ◦ z|y ∈ e1 ∪ e2 , ¬∃x ∈ e p(y, x), A(z) = A(e),
∀a a 6= g  z.a = N U LL, a.g = c}
= (e1 1 g=c
p e) ∪ (e2 1 g=c
p e)

To see that 1 is not linear in its second argument consider

e1 1 g=c
p ∅ = ∅ iff e1 = ∅

< > is linear in its first argument:

∅<e> = ∅
(e1 ∪ e2 ) < e > = {y ◦ x|y ∈ e1 ∪ e2 , x ∈ e(y)}
= {y ◦ x|y ∈ e1 , x ∈ e(y)} ∪ {y ◦ x|y ∈ e2 , x ∈ e(y)}
= (e1 < e >) ∪ (e2 < e >)
7.2. ALGEBRA 219

Note that the notion of linearity cannot be applied to the second (in-
ner) argument of the d-join, since, in general, it cannot be evaluated
independently of the first argument. Below, we summarize some basic
observations on the d-join.
Γg;A;f is not linear.
Consider the following counterexample:

Γg;a ({[a : 1, b : 1], [a : 1, b : 2]})

= {[a : 1, g : {[a : 1, b : 1], [a : 1, b : 2]}]}
6= {[a : 1, g : {[a : 1, b : 1]}]} ∪ {[a : 1, g : {[a : 1, b : 2]}]}
= Γg;a ({[a : 1, b : 1]}) ∪ Γg;a ({[a : 1, b : 2]})

µg is linear.

µg (∅) = ∅
µg (e1 ∪ e2 ) = {x.[g] ◦ y|x ∈ e1 ∪ e2 , y ∈ x.g}
= {x.[g] ◦ y|x ∈ e1 , y ∈ x.g} ∪ {x.[g] ◦ y|x ∈ e2 , y ∈ x.g}
= µg (e1 ) ∪ µg (e2 )

µg;c is also linear. This is shown analogously to the linearity of µg .

f latten is linear.

f latten(e1 ∪ e2 )
= {x|y ∈ e1 ∪ e2 , x ∈ y}
= {x|y ∈ e1 , x ∈ y} ∪ {x|y ∈ e2 , x ∈ y}
= f latten(e1 ) ∪ f latten(e2 )

Note that the notion of linearity does not apply to the max operator, since it
does not return a set.
The concatenation of linear mappings is again a linear mapping. Assume f
and g to be linear mappings. Then

f (g(∅)) = ∅
f (g(x ∪ y)) = f (g(x) ∪ g(y))
= f (g(x)) ∪ f (g(y))

Reorderability Laws
From the linearity considerations of the previous subsection, it is easy to derive
reorderability laws.
Let f : {τ1f } → {τ2f } and g : {τ1g } → {τ2g } be two linear mappings. If
f (g({x})) = g(f ({x})) for all singletons {x} then

f (g(e)) = g(f (e)) (7.1)

220 CHAPTER 7. AN ALGEBRA FOR SETS, BAGS, AND SEQUENCES

For the linear algebraic operators working on sets of tuples, we can replace
the semantic condition f (g({x})) = g(f ({x})) by a set of syntactic criterions.
The main issue here is to formalize that two operations do not interfere in
their consumer/producer/modifier relationship on attributes. In the relational
algebra we have the same problem. Nevertheless, it is often neglected there.
Consider for example the algebraic equivalence

σp (R 1 S) = (σp (R)) 1 S

Then, this algebraic equivalence is true only if the predicate p accesses only those
attributes already present in R. Now, for our operators we can be sure that
f (g(e)) = g(f (e)) for singleton sets e, if g does not consume/produce/modify an
attribute that f is going to access and if f is not going to consume/produce/modify
an attribute that is accessed by g. In fact, most of the conditions attached to
the algebraic equivalences given later on concern this point.
We now consider binary mappings. Let f1 be a binary mapping being linear
in its first argument, f2 a binary mapping being linear in its second argument,
and g a unary linear mapping. If f1 (g({x}), e0 ) = g(f1 ({x}, e0 )) for all x and e0
then

f1 (g(e), e0 ) = g(f1 (e, e0 )) (7.2)

for all e. Again, we can recast the condition f1 (g({x}), e0 ) = g(f1 ({x}), e0 ) into
a syntactical criterion concerning the consumer/producer/modifier relationship
of attributes.
Analogously, if f2 (e, g({x})) = g(f2 (e, {x})) for all x and e then

f1 (e, g(e0 )) = g(f1 (e, e0 )) (7.3)

for all e0 .
Since the outerjoin is not linear in its second argument, we state at least
some reorderability results concerning the reordering of joins with outerjoins
since much performance can be gained by chosing a (near-) optimal evaluation
order. The results are not original but instead taken from [626] and repeated
here for convenience:

(e1 1p1,2 e2 ) 1 p2,3 e3 = e1 1p1,2 (e2 1 p2,3 e3 ) (7.4)

(e1 1 p1,2 e2 ) 1 p2,3 e3 = e1 1 p1,2 (e2 1 p2,3 e3 ) (7.5)
if p2,3 is strong w.r.t. e2
(e1 1 p1,2 e2 ) 1 p2,3 e3 = e1 1 p1,2 (e2 1 p2,3 e3 ) (7.6)

where an outer join predicate p is strong w.r.t. some expression e2 , if it yields

false if all attributes of the relation to be preserved are NULL.

7.2.9 Reordering of joins and outer-joins

Whereas the join operator is commutative and associative, this is no longer
true for outer joins. Especially, joins and outer joins together do not behave
7.2. ALGEBRA 221

L R
A B C C D E
a1 b1 c1 c1 d1 e1
a2 b2 c2 c3 d2 e2

L 1 R L 1 R
A B C D E A B C D E
a1 b1 c1 d1 e1 a1 b1 c1 d1 e1
a2 b2 c2 – – – – c3 d2 e2

L 1 R
A B C D E
a1 b1 c1 d1 e1
a2 b2 c2 – –
– – c3 d2 e2

Figure 7.3: Outer join examples

associatively. Further, not always are outerjoins and joins reorderable. In this
subsection we discuss the reorderability of outerjoins. For a full account on the
topic see [626, 254, 263]
The occurance of an outer join can have several reasons. First, outer joins
are part of the SQL 2 specification. Second, outer joins can be introduced during
query rewrite. For example, unnesting nested queries or hierarchical views
may result in outer joins. Sometimes, it is also possible to rewrite universal
quantifiers to outerjoins [766, 187].
The different outer joins can be defined using the outer union operator
introduced by Codd [170]. Let R1 and R2 be two relations and S1 and S2 their
corresponding attributes. The outerjoin is then defined by padding the union
of the relations with null values to the schema S1 ∪ S2 :
+
R1 ∪ R2 = (R1 × {nullS2 \S1 }) ∪ (R2 × {nullS1 \S2 }) (7.7)
Given this definition of the outer union operator, we can define the outer join
operations as follows:
+
R1 1 p R2 = R1 1p R2 ∪ (R1 \ πS1 (R1 1p R2 )) (7.8)
+ +
R1 1 p R2 = R1 1p R2 ∪ (R1 \ πS1 (R1 1p R2 )) ∪ (R2 \ πS2 (R1 1p R2(7.9)
))
R1 1 p R2 = R2 1 R1 (7.10)
Each outer join preserves the tuples on the according side. For example, the left-
outer join preserves the tuples of the relation on the left-hand side. Figure 7.3
gives example applications of the different outer join operations. A null value
is indicated by a “-”.
Obviously, the left-outer join and the right-outer join are not commutative.
To illustrate associativity problems consider the following three relations
222 CHAPTER 7. AN ALGEBRA FOR SETS, BAGS, AND SEQUENCES

R S T
A B C D
a b - d

The results of different left-outer join applications are

R 1 A=B S S 1 C=D∨C=null T
A B C B C D
a – – b – c

(R 1 A=B S) 1 C=D∨C=null T R 1 A=B (S 1 C=D∨C=null T)

A B C D A B C D
a – – c a – – –

Hence, in general (R 1 pRS S) 1 pST T 6= r 1 pRS (S 1 pST T ). The problem

is that the predicate pST does not reject null values, where a predicate rejects
null values (or rejects nulls for short) in attribute set A, if it evaluates to false
or undefined on every tuple in which all attributes in A are null . Using this
definition, we have the following identities

(R1 1p12 R2 ) 1 p23 R3 = R1 1p1 2 (R2 1 p23 R3 ) (7.11)

(R1 1 p12 R2 ) 1 p23 R3 = R1 1 p1 2 (R2 1 p23 R3 )
if p23 rejects nulls on A(R2 ) (7.12)
(R1 1 p12 R2 ) 1 p23 R3 = R1 1 p1 2 (R2 1 p23 R3 ) (7.13)
(R1 1 p12 R2 ) 1 p23 R3 = R1 1 p1 2 (R2 1 p23 R3 )
if p12 and p23 reject nulls on A(R2 )(7.14)
(R1 1 p12 R2 ) 1 p23 R3 = R1 1 p1 2 (R2 1 p23 R3 )
if p23 rejects nulls on A(R2 ) (7.15)

Further, we can rewrite an outer join to a regular join whenever null-padded

tuples are eliminated by some predicate. Equivalences that allow do so and
some further ones are given next.

R1 1 p1 ∧p2 R2 = R1 1 p1 (σp2 (R2 )) if F(p2 ) ⊆ A(R2 ) (7.16)

σp1 (R1 1 p2 R2 ) = σp1 (R1 ) 1 p2 R2 if F(p1 ) ⊆ A(R1 ) (7.17)
σp1 (R1 1 p2 R2 ) = σp1 (R1 1p2 R2 ) if p1 rejects nulls on A(R2 )(7.18)
σp1 (R1 1 p2 R2 ) = σp1 (R1 1 p2 R2 ) if p1 rejects nulls on A(R2 )(7.19)

The expression R1 1 p12 (R2 1p23 R3 ) cannot be reordered given the equiva-
lences so far. It is equal to neither (R1 1 p12 R2 ) 1p23 R3 not (R1 1 p12 R2 ) 1p23
R3 . In order to allow reorderability on this expression, the generalized outer join
was introduced by Rosenthal and Galindo-Legaria [626]. It preserves attributes
for a set A ⊆ A(R1 ) and is defined as
+
R1 1 A
p R2 = (R1 1p R2 ) ∪ (πA (R1 ) \ πA (R1 1p R2 )) (7.20)
7.2. ALGEBRA 223

With this definition, we have the following equivalences:

A(R1 )
R1 1 p12 (R2 1p23 R3 ) = (R1 1 p12 R2 ) 1 p23 R3 if p23 rejects nulls on A(R
(7.21)
2)
A(R1 )
R1 1 p12 (R2 1p23 R3 ) = (R1 1 p12 R2 ) 1 p23 R3 if p23 rejects nulls on A(R
(7.22)
2)
(7.23)

The generalized outer join can be generalized to preserve disjoint sets of at-
tributes in order to derive more equivalences [263].
We only gave the basic equivalences for reordering algebraic expressions
containing outer joins. General frameworks for dealing with these expressions
in toto are presented in [75, 263].

7.2.10 Basic Equivalences for d-Join and Grouping

The d-join and the grouping operators are not linear. Thus, so far, we do not
have any reorderability results of these operators. Since they are further quite
new, we give some algebraic equivalences which hold despite the fact that they
are not linear. This shows that there exist still some kind of optimization which
can be performed in the presence of these operators.
Already at the beginning of this subsection, we mentioned that d-join and
unnest are closely related. To be more precise, we state the following:

e1 < e2 > = µg (χg:e2 (e1 )) (7.24)

πA(e2 ) e1 < e2 > = µg (χ[g:e2 ] (e1 )) (7.25)

Between flatten and the d-join there also exists a correspondence:

f latten(χe2 (e1 )) = πA(e2 ) (e1 < e2 >) (7.26)

The following summarizes basic equivalences on the d-join:

e<e> = e (7.27)
e1 < e2 > = e1 × e2 (7.28)
if F(e2 ) ∩ A(e1 ) = ∅
e1 < e2 > = e1 1 (e1 < e2 >) (7.29)
e1 < e2 >< e3 > = e1 < e3 >< e2 > (7.30)
if (A(e2 ) \ F(e2 )) ∩ F(e3 ) = ∅
and (A(e3 ) \ F(e3 )) ∩ F(e2 ) 6= ∅
πA(e1 ) (e1 < e2 >) = σe2 !=∅ (e1 ) (7.31)
(7.32)

We call a function
f extending :≺ ∀x, y : f (x) ◦ y ↓=⇒ f (x ◦ y) = f (x) ◦ y
We call a function
f restricting :≺ ∀x, y : f (x) ↓, x ◦ y ↓=⇒ f (x ◦ y) = f (x)
224 CHAPTER 7. AN ALGEBRA FOR SETS, BAGS, AND SEQUENCES

πA0 :A denotes projection on the attributes A and renaming to A0 . Unnesting

of operations burried in the d-join can be performed by applying the following
equivalence:

e1 < σp (e2 ) > = σp (e1 < e2 >) (7.33)

e1 < σA1 θA2 (e2 ) > = e1 1A1 θA2 e2 (7.34)
if F(e2 ) ∩ A(e1 ) = ∅, Ai ⊆ A(ei )
πA0 :A (e) < f (σA=A0 (e)) > = µg (πA:A0 (Γg;A;f (e))) (7.35)
if A ⊆ A(e)
e1 < e2 1 e3 > = (e1 < e2 >) 1 e3 (7.36)
if F(e3 ) ∩ A(e1 ) = ∅
e1 < χf (e2 ) > = χf (e1 < e2 >) (7.37)
if f extending
πA (e1 < χf (e2 ) >) = πA (χf (e1 < e2 >)) (7.38)
if A ⊆ A(χf (e2 )), and f restricting
e1 < µg (e2 ) > = µg (e1 < e2 >) (7.39)
e1 < µg;c (e2 ) > = µg;c (e1 < e2 >) (7.40)

For f1 being σ or χ and the non-linear unary Γ we still have

f1 (Γg;=A;f2 (e)) = Γg;=A;f2 (f1 (e)) (7.41)

if F(f1 ) ∩ (A ∪ A(f2 ) ∪ {g}) = ∅, (A ∪ F(f2 )) ⊆ A(f1 (e))

This equivalence should, e.g., be used form left to right for selections, in order
to reduce the cardinality for the Γ operator. For the binary Γ we have

f1 (e1 Γg;A1 θA2 ;f2 e2 ) = f1 (e1 )Γg;A1 θA2 ;f2 e2 (7.42)

since the binary Γ is linear in its first argument.

Lately, work has been reported on the reordering of grouping and join op-
erations despite the fact that grouping is not linear [128, 823, 824, 825, 826].
Since pushing grouping inside join operations can result in a tremendious speed
up, let us sketch at least the most basic equivalence:

Γg;A;agg(e) (e1 1 e2 ) ≡ e1 1 (Γg;A;agg(e) (e2 ))

This sketched equivalence only holds under certain conditions. For details on
the conditions and the correctness proof see [825] and Section ??.

7.2.11 Simplifying Expressions Containing Joins

Since the join operation is very expensive, it makes sense to investigate expres-
sions containing joins very intensely in order to discover optimization potential.
In this subsubsection, we do so.
7.2. ALGEBRA 225

Sometimes, redundant joins can be eliminated:

πA(e2 ) (e1 1A1 =A2 e2 ) = e2 (7.43)

if A1 = A(e1 ), πA2 (e2 ) ⊆ πA2 :A1 (e1 )
g:c g:c
e1 1 A1 =A2,3 (e2 1A2 =A3 e3 ) = e1 1 A1 =A3 e3 (7.44)
if A1 ⊆ A(e1 ), A2 ⊆ A(e2 ), A3 ⊆ A(e3 ),
A2,3 ⊆ A(e2 ) ∪ A(e3 ), A02 = A(e1 ) ∪ A(e3 ),
πA2 :A02 (e1 1A1 =A3 e3 ) ⊆ e2
e1 Γg;A1 =A2,3 ;f (e2 1A2 =A3 e3 ) = e1 Γg;A1 =A2 ;f e3 (7.45)
if A1 ⊆ A(e1 ), A2 ⊆ A(e2 ), A3 ⊆ A(e3 ),
A2,3 ⊆ A(e2 ) ∪ A(e3 ), A02 = A(e1 ) ∪ A(e3 ),
πA2 :A02 (e1 1A1 =A3 e3 ) ⊆ e2

Equivalences 7.44 and 7.45 bear similarity to equivalence EJA of [783] (p. 107),
where the outer-aggregation is used instead of semi-join and binary grouping,
respectively. Note that for checking conditions of the form πA2 (e2 ) ⊆ πA2 :A1 (e1 )
subtyping implying subsetrelationships on type extensions plays a major role
in object bases.
The following shows how to turn an outerjoin into a join:

e1 1 g:c
p e2 = e1 1p e2 (7.46)
if ¬p(c)
σps (e1 1 g:c
pj e2 ) = σps (e1 1pj e2 ) (7.47)
if ¬ps (c)
σf1 θf2 (e1 1 g:c
pj e2 ) = σf1 θf2 (e1 1pj e2 ) (7.48)
if ¬(f1 θf2 )(c)

We can easily check these conditions if some predicate (f1 θf2 )(c) is—after in-
serting c for the free variable—, iθ0 with i constant, or f1 ∈ ∅, or a similar
simple form. An application of these equivalences can sometimes be followed
by a removal of the join.
Note, that the latter equivalence depends on the knowledge we have on the
selection predicate. Note also, that the special outerjoin is only introduced
by unnesting nested χ operations. Hence, we could combine the equivalences
introducing the outerjoin and replacing it by a join into one. In case we have
even more information on the selection predicate than above, more specifically,
if it depends on a max or min aggregate, we can do so in a very efficient way:

σa=m (e1 )[m : agg(χb (e2 ))] = Aggg;m;a (e1 ).g (7.49)
if πa (e1 ) = πb (e2 )
χg:σa=m (e2 ) (χm:agg(e1 ) (e)) = χAggg;m;a (e1 ) (e) (7.50)
if πa (e1 ) = πb (e2 )
226 CHAPTER 7. AN ALGEBRA FOR SETS, BAGS, AND SEQUENCES

7.2.12 Reordering Joins and Grouping

Introduction
In general, join and grouping operations are not reorderable. Consider the fol-
lowing relations R and S

R A B S A C
a 5 a 7
a 6 a 8
Joining these relations R and S results in

R1S A B C
a 5 7
a 5 8
a 6 7
a 6 8
Applying ΓA;count(∗) to R and R 1 S yields

ΓA;count(∗) (R) A count (∗) ΓA;count(∗) (R 1 S) A count (∗)

a 2 a 4
Compare this to the result of ΓA;count(∗) (R) 1 S:

ΓA;count(∗) (R) 1 S A count (∗) C

a 2 7
a 2 8
Hence ΓA;count(∗) (R) 1 S 6= ΓA;count(∗) (R 1 S).
Since grouping and join operations are in general not reorderable, it is impor-
tant that a query language determines the order of grouping and join operators
properly. In SQL, the grouping operator is applied after the join operators of
a query block.
For example, given the relations schemata

Emp (eid, name, age, salary) and

Sold (sid, eid, date, product id, price)

and the query

select e.eid, sum (s.price) as amount

from Emp e, Sold s
where e.eid = s.eid and
s.date between “2000-01-01” and “2000-12-31”
group by s.eid, s.name

results in the algebraic expression

Πe.eid,amount Γs.eid;amount:sum(s.price) (Emp[e] 1e.eid=s.eid σp (Sold[s]))

7.2. ALGEBRA 227

where p denotes

s.date ≥ ‘2000 − 01 − 010 ∧ s.date ≤ ‘2000 − 12 − 310

Figure 20.1 (a) shows this plan graphically. Note that the grouping operator
is executed last in the plan.
Now consider the plan where we push the grouping operator down:

Πe.eid,amount Emp[e] 1e.eid=s.eid Γs.eid;amount:sum(s.price) (σp (Sold[s]))

This plan (see also Figure 20.1 (b)) is equivalent to the former plan. More-
over, if the grouping operator strongly reduces the cardinality of

σs.date≥... (Sold[s])

because every employee sells many items, then the latter plan might become
cheaper since the join inputs are smaller than in the former plan. This moti-
vates the search for conditions under which join and grouping operators can be
reordered. Several papers discuss this reorderability [129, 823, 824, 825, 826].
We will summarize their results in subsequent subsections.

Lazy and eager group by

Lazy group by pulls a group operator up over a join operator [823, 824, 825, 826].
Eager group by does the opposite.
Consider the query:

*
select[all | distinct] A, F (B)
from R, S
where pR ∧ pS ∧ pR,S
group by G

with
G = GR ∪ GS , GR ⊆ A(R), GS ⊆ A(S),

F(pR ) ⊆ A(R), F(pS ) ⊆ A(S)

F(pR,S ) ⊆ A(R) ∪ A(S)

B ⊆ A(R) A = AR ∪ AS , AR ⊆ GR , AS ⊆ GS

αR = GR ∪ F(pR,S ) \ A(S) κR key of R

228 CHAPTER 7. AN ALGEBRA FOR SETS, BAGS, AND SEQUENCES

project[e.eid, amount]

group by[e.eid; amount:sum(price)]

join[e.eid=s.eid]

Emp[e] select[s.date between ...]

Sold[s]
(a)

project[e.eid, amount]

join[e.eid = s.eid]

Emp[e] group by[e.eid, amount:sum(price)]

select[s.date ...]

Sold[s]
(b)

Figure 7.4: Two equivalent plans

αS = GS ∪ F(pR,S ) \ A(R) κS key of S

We are interested in the conditions under which the query can be rewritten
into

select[all | distinct] A, F B
from R0 , S 0
where pR,S

with R0 (αR , F B) ≡
*
select all αR , F (B) as F B
7.2. ALGEBRA 229

from R
where pR
group by αR

and S 0 (αS ) ≡

select all αR
from S
where pS

The following equivalence expresses this rewrite in algebraic terms.

 
[d]
σpR (R) 1pR,S σpS (S) ≡


ΠA,F Γ *
G;F : F (B)

 
[d]
ΠA,F Γ * (σpR (R)) 1pR,S σpS (S)
αR ;F : F (B)

holds iff in σpR ∧pS ∧pR,S (R × S) the following functional dependencies hold:
F D1 : G → αR
F D2 : αR , GS → κS
Note that since GS ⊆ G, this implies G → κS .
F D2 implies that for any group there is at most one join partner in S.
Hence, each tuple in Γ * (σpR (R)) contributes at most one row to the
αR ;F : F (B)
overall result.
F D1 ensures that each group of the expression on the left-hand side corre-
sponds to at most one group of the group expression on the right-hand side.
We now consider queries with a having clause.
In addition to the assumptions above, we have that the tables in the from
clause can be partitioned into R and S such that R contains all aggregated
columns of both the select and the having clause. We further assume that
conjunctive terms in the having clause that do not contain aggregate functions
have been moved to the where clause.
Let the predicate of the having clause have the form HR ∧ H0 where HR ⊆
A(R) and H0 ⊆ R ∪ S where H0 only contains non-aggregated columns from S.
We now consider all queries of the form
*
select[all | distinct] A, F (B)
from R, S
where pR ∧ pS ∧ pR,S
group by G    
* *
having H0 F0 (B) ∧ HR FR (B)
* *
where F0 and FR are vectors of aggregate functions on the aggregated columns
B.
An alternative way to express such a query is
230 CHAPTER 7. AN ALGEBRA FOR SETS, BAGS, AND SEQUENCES

select[all | distinct] G, F B
from R0 , S
where cS ∧ cR,S ∧ H0 (F0 B)

where R0 (αR , F B, F0 B) ≡
* *
select all αR , F (B) as F B, F0 (B) as F0 B
from R
where cR
group by αR  
*
having HR FR (B)

The according
 equivalence
 is [825]: 


ΠG,F σHR ∧H0 Γ * * * σpR ∧pS ∧pR,S (R × S)
G;F : F (B),FR :FR (B),F0 :F0 (B)
≡      
ΠG,F σpR,S ∧pS ∧H0 (F0 ) ΠG,F,F0 σHR Γ * * * (R) ×S
G;F : F (B),FR :FR (B)F0 :F0 (B)

Coalescing Grouping
In this subsection we introduce coalescing grouping which slightly generalizes
simple coalescing grouping as introduced in [129].
We first illustrate the main idea by means of an example.
Given two relation schemes

Sales (pid, deptid, total price)

Department (did, name, region)

the query
select region, sum (total price) as s
from Sales, Department
where did = deptid
group by region
is straightforwardly translated into the following algebraic expression:
Γregion;s:sum(total price) (Sales 1deptid=did Department)
Note that Equivalence ?? cannot be applied here. However, if there are many
sales performed by a department, it might be worth reducing the cardinality of
the left join input by introducing an additional group operator. The result is
Γregion;s=sum(s0 ) Γdeptid;s0 :sum(total price) (Sales) 1deptid=did Department

Note that we must keep the outer grouping.

That is, we introduced an additional group operator to reduce the cardi-
nality of sales. This way, all subsequent joins (only one in this case) become
cheaper and the additional group operator may result in a better plan.
We have the following restrictions for this subsection:
7.2. ALGEBRA 231

1. There are no NULL-values allowed for attributes occurring in the query.

2. All queries are of the form select all.

That is select distinct is not allowed.

3. All aggregate functions agg must fulfill aggs1 ∪ s2 = agg{agg(s1 ), agg(s2 )}

for bags s1 and s2 .
This has two consequences:

• Allowed are only sum, min, max. Not allowed are avg and count.
• For any allowed aggregate function we only allow for agg(all . . .).
Forbidden is agg(distinct . . .).

4. The query is a single-block conjunctive query with no having and no

order by clause.

The above transformation is an application of the following equivalence,

where R1 and R2 can be arbitrary algebraic expressions:

ΓG;A (R1 1p R2 ) ≡ ΓG;A2 (ΓG1 ;A1 (R1 ) 1p R2 ) (7.51)

with

A = A1 : agg1 (e1 ) , . . . , An : aggn (en )

A1 = A11 : agg11 (e1 ) , . . . , A1n : aggn1 (en )
A2 = A1 : agg12 A11 , . . . , An : aggn2 A2n

G1 = (F (p) ∪ G) ∩ A (R1 )

Further, the following condition must hold for all i(1 ≤ i ≤ n):
! !
[ [
aggi Sk = aggi2 {aggi1 (Si )}
k k

In the above example, we had agg1 = agg11 = agg12 = sum.

We now prove the correctness of Equivalence 20.1.

Proof :
First, note that
[
R1 1p R2 = R1 1p {t2 } (7.52)
t2 ∈R2

Second, note that for a given t2

ΓG;A (R1 [t1 ]) 1p {t2 } = σp(t1 ◦t2 ) (ΓG;A (R1 [t1 ])) (7.53)


= ΓG;A σp(t1 ◦t2 ) (R1 [t1 ])
= ΓG;A (R1 [t1 ] 1p {t2 })
232 CHAPTER 7. AN ALGEBRA FOR SETS, BAGS, AND SEQUENCES

holds where we have been a little sloppy with t1 . Applying (20.2) and (20.3)
to ΓG1 ;A1 (R1 ) 1p R2 , the inner part of the right-hand side of the equivalence
yields:

[
ΓG1 ;A1 (R1 ) 1p R2 = ΓG1 ;A1 (R1 ) 1p {t2 } (7.54)
t2 ∈R2
[
= ΓG1 ;A1 (R1 1p {t2 })
t2 ∈R2

Call the last expression X.

Then the right-hand side of our equivalence becomes

ΓG;A2 (X) = {t ◦ a2 |t ∈ ΠG (X), a2 = A1 : a21 , . . . , An : a2n ,

(7.55)
a2i = aggi2 {s.A1i |s ∈ X, S|G = t} }

Applying (20.2) to the left-hand side of the equivalence yields:

 
[
ΓG;A (R1 1p R2 ) = ΓG;A  {t1 ◦ t2 |t1 ∈ R1 , p (t1 ◦ t2 )} (7.56)
t2 ∈R2

S
Abbreviate {t1 ◦ t2 |t1 ∈ R1 , p (t1 ◦ t2 )} by Y.
t2 ∈R2
Applying the definition of ΓG;A yields:

{t ◦ a | t ∈ ΠG (Y ), a = (A1 : e1 , . . . , An : en ) , (7.57)
ai = aggi ({ei (s)|s ∈ Y, S|G = t})}

Compare (20.5) and (20.7). Since ΠG (X) = ΠG (Y ), they can only differ in
their values of Ai .
7.3. LOGICAL ALGEBRA FOR SEQUENCES 233

Hence, it suffices to prove that a2i = ai for 1 ≤ i ≤ n for any given t.

a2i = aggi2 ({s.A1i |s ∈ X, S|G = t})

[
= aggi2 ({s.A1i |s ∈ ΓG1 ;A1 (R1 1p {t2 }), S|G = t})
t2 ∈R2
[
= aggi2 ({s.A1i |s ∈ {t1 ◦ t2 ◦ a1 |t1 ∈ ΠG1 (R1 ), p(t1 ◦ t2 ),
t2 ∈R2
a1 = (A11 : a11 , . . . , A1n : a1n )
a1i = aggi1 ({ei (s1 ◦ t2 )|s1 ∈ R1 , S1 |G1 =t1 , p(s1 , t2 )})
S|G = t}})
[
= aggi2 ( {aggi1 ({ei (s1 ◦ t2 )|t1 ∈ ΠG1 (R1 ), p(t1 ◦ t2 ), s1 ∈ R1 , S1 |G1 = t1 ,
t2 ∈R2
p(s1 , t1 ), t1 ◦ t2 |G = t})})
[
= aggi2 ( {aggi1 ({ei (s1 ◦ t2 )|s1 ∈ R1 , s1 ◦ t2 |G = t, p(s1 ◦ t2 )})})
t2 ∈R2
[
= aggi2 ( {aggi1 ({ei (t1 ◦ t2 )|t1 ∈ R1 , t1 ◦ t2 |G = t, p(t1 ◦ t2 )})})
t2 ∈R2
[
= aggi ( {ei (t1 ◦ t2 )|t1 ∈ R1 , p(t1 ◦ t2 ), t1 ◦ t2 |G = t})
t2 ∈R2
[
= aggi ({ei (s)|s ∈ {t1 ◦ t2 |t1 ∈ R1 , p(t1 ◦ t2 )}, S|G = t})
t2 ∈R2
= ai

Equivalence 20.1 can be used to add an additional coalescing grouping in

front of any of a sequence of joins. Consider the schematic operator tree in
Figure 20.2(a). It is equivalent to the one in (b), which in turn is equivalent
to the one in (c) if the preconditions of Equivalence 20.1 hold. Performing a
similar operation multiple times, any of the join operations can be made to be
preceded by a coalescing grouping.

7.2.13 ToDo
[611]

7.3 Logical Algebra for Sequences

7.3.1 Introduction
The algebra (NAL) we use here extends the SAL-Algebra [63] developed by
Beeri and Tzaban. SAL is the order-preserving counterpart of the algebra used
in [161, 162] and in this book.
SAL and NAL work on sequences of sets of variable bindings, i.e., sequences
of unordered tuples where every attribute corresponds to a variable. We allow
nested tuples, i.e. the value of an attribute may be a sequence of tuples. Single
tuples are constructed by using the standard [·] brackets. The concatenation
234 CHAPTER 7. AN ALGEBRA FOR SETS, BAGS, AND SEQUENCES

Γ Γ Γ

1 1 1

1 a e 1 Γc 1

1 b 1 a e 1 a

ec c b c b

(a) (b) (c)

Figure 7.5: Applications of coalescing grouping

of tuples and functions is denoted by ◦. The set of attributes defined for an

expression e is defined as A(e). The set of free variables of an expression e is
defined as F(e).
The projection of a tuple on a set of attributes A is denoted by |A . For
an expression e1 possibly containing free variables, and a tuple e2 , we denote
by e1 (e2 ) the result of evaluating e1 where bindings of free variables are taken
from variable bindings provided by e2 . Of course this requires F(e1 ) ⊆ A(e2 ).
For a set of attributes we define the tuple constructor ⊥A such that it returns
a tuple with attributes in A initialized to NULL.
For sequences e we use α(e) to denote the first element of a sequence. We
identify single element sequences and elements. The function τ retrieves the
tail of a sequence and ⊕ concatenates two sequences. We denote the empty
sequence by . As a first application, we construct from a sequence of non-
tuple values e a sequence of tuples denoted by e[a]. It is empty if e is empty.
Otherwise e[a] = [a : α(e)] ⊕ τ (e)[a].
By id we denote the identity function. In order to avoid special cases during
the translation of XQuery into the algebra, we use the special algebraic operator
(2̂) that returns a singleton sequence consisting of the empty tuple, i.e., a tuple
with no attributes.
We will only define order-preserving algebraic operators. For the unordered
counterparts see [162]. Typically, when translating a more complex XQuery into
our algebra, a mixture of order-preserving and not order-preserving operators
7.3. LOGICAL ALGEBRA FOR SEQUENCES 235

will occur. In order to keep the paper readable, we only employ the order-
preserving operators and use the same notation for them that has been used in
[161, 162] and SAL [63].
Again, our algebra will allow nesting of algebraic expressions. For example,
within a selection predicate of a select operator we allow the occurrence of
further nested algebraic expressions. Hence, a join within a selection predicate is
possible. This simplifies the translation procedure of nested XQuery expressions
into the algebra. However, nested algebraic expressions force a nested loop
evaluation strategy. Thus, the goal of the paper will be to remove nested
algebraic expressions. As a result, we perform unnesting of nested queries not
at the source level but at the algebraic level. This approach is more versatile
and less error-prone.

7.3.2 Algebraic Operators

We define the algebraic operators recursively on their input sequences. For
unary operators, if the input sequence is empty, the output sequence is also
empty. For binary operators, the output sequence is empty whenever the left
operand represents an empty sequence.
The order-preserving selection operator is defined as

  if e = 
σ̂p (e) := α(e) ⊕ σ̂p (τ (e)) if p(α(e))
σ̂p (τ (e)) else


For a list of attribute names A we define the projection operator as


 if e = 
Π̂A (e) :=
α(e)|A ⊕ Π̂A (τ (e)) else

We also define a duplicate-eliminating projection Π̂D A . Besides the projection,

it has similar semantics as the distinct-values function of XQuery: it does
not preserve order. However, we require it to be deterministic and idempotent.
Sometimes we just want to eliminate some attributes. When we want to elimi-
nate the set of attributes A, we denote this by Π̂A . We use Π̂ also for renaming
attributes. Then we write Π̂A0 :A . The attributes in A are renamed to those in
A0 . Attributes other than those in A remain untouched.
The map operator is defined as follows:

 if e1 = 
χ̂a:e2 (e1 ) :=
α(e1 ) ◦ [a : e2 (α(e1 ))] ⊕ χ̂a:e2 (τ (e1 )) else

It extends a given input tuple t1 ∈ e1 by a new attribute a whose value is

computed by evaluating e2 (t1 ). For an example see Figure ??.
We define the cross product of two tuple sequences as

 if e1 = 
ˆ 2 :=
e1 ×e ˆ ˆ 2 ) else
(α(e1 )×e2 ) ⊕ (τ (e1 )×e
236 CHAPTER 7. AN ALGEBRA FOR SETS, BAGS, AND SEQUENCES

R2
R1 χ̂a:σ̂A1 =A2 (R2 ) (R1 ) =
A2 B
A1 A1 a
1 2
1 1 h[1, 2], [1, 3]i
1 3
2 2 h[2, 4], [2, 5]i
2 4
3 3 hi
2 5

Figure 7.6: Example for Map Operator

where 
ˆ :=  if e2 = 
e1 ×e2 ˆ
(e1 ◦ α(e2 )) ⊕ (e1 ×τ (e2 )) else
We are now prepared to define the join operation on ordered sequences:

e1 1̂p e2 := σp (e1 ×e
ˆ 2)

We define the semijoin as


ˆ p e2 ) if ∃x ∈ e2 p(α(e1 ) ◦ x)
α(e1 ) ⊕ (τ (e1 )>

ˆ p e2 :=
e1 >
ˆ
τ (e1 )>
p e2 else

and the anti-join as


α(e1 ) ⊕ (τ (e1 ).̂p e2 ) if 6 ∃x ∈ e2 p(α(e1 ) ◦ x)
e1 .̂p e2 :=
(τ (e1 ).̂p e2 ) else

The left outer join, which will play an essential role in unnesting, is defined
g:e
as e1 1̂ p e2 :=
 g:e
 (α(e1 )1̂p e2 ) ⊕ (τ (e1 ) 1̂ p e2 )
 if (α(e1 )1̂p e2 ) 6= 
(α(e1 ) ◦ ⊥A(e2 )\{g} ◦ [g : e]) else
g:e
⊕(τ (e1 ) 1̂ p e2 )



where g ∈ A(e2 ). Our definition deviates slightly from the standard left outer
join operator, as we want to use it in conjunction with grouping and (aggregate)
functions. Consider the relations R1 and R2 in Figure ??. If we want to join
R1 (via left outer join) to R2count that is grouped by A2 with counted values for
B, we need to be able to handle empty groups (for A1 = 3). e defines the value
given to attribute g for values in e1 that do not find a join partner in e2 (in this
case 0).
We define the dependency join (d-join for short) as

 if e1 = 
ˆ ˆ
e1 <e2 > := ˆ ˆ ˆ
α(e1 )×e2 (e1 ) ⊕ τ (e1 )<e2 > else

Let θ ∈ {=, ≤, ≥, <, >, 6=} be a comparison operator on atomic values. The
grouping operator which produces a sequence-valued new attribute containing
“the group” is defined by using a binary grouping operator.

Γ̂g;θA;f (e) := Π̂A:A0 (Π̂D

A0 :A (Π̂A (e))Γ̂g;A0 θA;f e)
7.3. LOGICAL ALGEBRA FOR SEQUENCES 237

where the binary grouping operator (sometimes called nest-join [720]) is defined
as

 if e1 = 
e1 Γ̂g;A1 θA2 ;f e2 :=
α(e1 ) ◦ [g : G(α(e1 )] ⊕ (τ (e1 )Γ̂g;A1 θA2 ;f e2

Here, G(x) := f (σx|A1 θA2 (e2 )) and function f assigns a meaningful value to
empty groups. See also Figure ?? for an example. The unary grouping operator
processes a single relation and obviously groups only on those values that are
present. The binary grouping operator works on two relations and uses the
left hand one to determine the groups. This will become important for the
correctness of the unnesting procedure.

R2
R1 Γ̂g;=A2 ;count (R2 ) = Γ̂g;=A2 ;id (R2 ) =
A2 B R2count R2g
A1
1 2
1 A2 g A2 g
1 3
2 1 2 1 h[1, 2], [1, 3]i
2 4
3 2 2 2 h[2, 4], [2, 5]i
2 5
R1 Γ̂g;A1 =A2 ;id (R2 ) =
g
R1,2
A1 g
1 h[1, 2], [1, 3]i
2 h[2, 4], [2, 5]i
3 hi

Figure 7.7: Examples for Unary and Binary Γ̂

Given a tuple with a sequence-valued attribute, we can unnest it using the

unnest operator defined as

 if e = 
µ̂g (e) := ˆ
(α(e)|{g} ×α(e).g) ⊕ µ̂g (τ (e)) else

where e.g retrieves the sequence of tuples of attribute g. In case that g is empty,
it returns the tuple ⊥A(e.g) . (In our example in Figure ??, µ̂g (R2g ) = R2 .)
We define the unnest map operator as follows:

Υ̂a:e2 (e1 ) := µ̂g (χg:e2 [a] (e1 ))

This operator is mainly used for evaluating XPath expressions. Since this is
a very complex issue [285, 287, 357], we do not delve into optimizing XPath
evaluation but instead take an XPath expression occurring in a query as it is
and use it in the place of e2 . Optimized translation of XPath is orthogonal to
our unnesting approach and not covered in this paper. The interested reader is
referred to [357].
238 CHAPTER 7. AN ALGEBRA FOR SETS, BAGS, AND SEQUENCES

7.3.3 Equivalences
To acquaint the reader with ordered sequences, we state some familiar equiva-
lences that still hold.

σ̂p1 (σ̂p2 (e)) = σ̂p2 (σ̂p1 (e)) (7.58)

ˆ 2 ) = σ̂p (e1 )×e
σ̂p (e1 ×e ˆ 2 (7.59)
ˆ 2 ) = e1 ×σ̂
σ̂p (e1 ×e ˆ p (e2 ) (7.60)
σ̂p1 (e1 1̂p2 e2 ) = σ̂p1 (e1 )1̂p2 e2 (7.61)
σ̂p1 (e1 1̂p2 e2 ) = e1 1̂p2 σ̂p1 (e2 ) (7.62)
ˆ p2 e2 ) = σ̂p1 (e1 )>

σ̂p1 (e1 >
ˆ p2 e2 (7.63)
g:e g:e
σ̂p1 (e1 1̂p2 e2 ) = σ̂p1 (e1 ) 1̂ p2 e2 (7.64)
ˆ 2 ×e
e1 ×(e ˆ 3 ) = (e1 ×e
ˆ 2 )×e
ˆ 3 (7.65)
e1 1̂p1 (e2 1̂p2 e3 ) = (e1 1̂p1 e2 )1̂p2 e3 (7.66)
ˆ 2 ) = e1 1̂p e2
σ̂p (e1 ×e (7.67)
ˆ 2>
e1 <e ˆ 2
ˆ = e1 ×e (7.68)
Υ̂a:f (χb (e)) (2̂) = Π̂a:b (f (e)) (7.69)
ˆ Υ̂a:e2 (2̂)
Υ̂a:e2 (e1 ) = e1 × (7.70)
(7.71)

Of course, in the above equivalences the usual restrictions hold. For ex-
ample, if we want to push a selection predicate into the left part of a join,
it may not reference attributes of the join’s right argument. In other words,
F(p1 ) ∩ A(e2 ) = ∅ is required. As another example, equivalence 7.70 only holds
if F(e1 ) ∩ A(e1 ) = ∅ In Eqv. 7.69 the function f may not alter the schema and
b must be an attribute name. Please note that cross product and join are still
associative in the ordered context. However, neither of them is commutative.
Further, pushing selections into the second argument of a left-outer join is (in
general) not possible. For strict predicates we can do better but this is beyond
the scope of the paper.

7.3.4 Bibliography
Zaniolo [458]

7.4 Literature
• NF2 : [4, 174, 371, 636, 637, 469, 638, 470, 666]

• HAS: [107]

• Aggregates: [422, 431]

• SQL to Algebra: [783, 110]

• Calculus to Algebra: [783, 542]

7.4. LITERATURE 239

• BAGs: [22]

• Algebra with control over duplicate elimination: [189]

• OO Algebra of Steenhagen et al. [720, 721, 719, 722]

• OO Algebra of Cluet and Moerkotte [161, 162].

• OO Algebra [147]

• OO Algebra [160]

• OO Algebra [325]

• OO Algebra [484]

• OO Algebra [650]

• OO Algebra [693, 692, 691, 694]

• OO Algebra [779, 780]

• OO Algebra [841]

• SAL [63]: works on lists. Intended for semistructured data. SAL can be
thought of as the order-preserving counterpart of the algebra presented
in [161, 162] extended to handle semistructured data. These extensions
are similar to those proposed in [5, 153]

• TAX [393]: The underlying algebra’s data model is based on sets of or-
dered labeled trees. Intended for XML.

• XML: Construction: [242, 243]

• no-name [711]: order preserving algebra for OLAP-style queries

• [316]

• Document Processing Algebras: [154, 329]

• Geo: [330]
240 CHAPTER 7. AN ALGEBRA FOR SETS, BAGS, AND SEQUENCES
Chapter 8

Declarative Query
Representation

8.1 Calculus Representations

relational calculus originally introduced by Codd: [168, 167].
Variant for embedding in Pascal/R: [665]
calculus for complex objects: [44]

8.2 Datalog

8.3 Tableaux Representation

Tableaus have been introduced by [18, 19, 20] Tableaus are able to represent a
particuar kind of queries, the so called conjunctive queries ([118], [623]).
Expressions containing disjunction (set union) and negation (set difference)
can be represented by sets of tableaus ([649],[403]).
query processing with tables: [559]

8.4 Monoid Comprehension

[96, 238, 239]

8.5 Expressiveness
transitivity: [588]. aggregates: [431]. complex object and nested relations: [3].

8.6 Bibliography

241
242 CHAPTER 8. DECLARATIVE QUERY REPRESENTATION
Chapter 9

Translation and Lifting

9.1 Query Language to Calculus

9.2 Query Language to Algebra

9.3 Calculus to Algebra

9.4 Algebra to Calculus

9.5 Bibliography

243
244 CHAPTER 9. TRANSLATION AND LIFTING
Chapter 10

Query Equivalence,
Containment, Minimization,
and Factorization

This chapter is devoted to three related problems. Let q be a query and d be a

database. We denote by q(d) the result of evaluating the query on the database.
Two queries q1 and q2 are by definition equivalent (q1 ≡ q2 ), if q1 (d) = q2 (d) for
all databases d. The problem of deciding whether two queries are equivalent
is the query equivalence problem. We define q1 ⊆ q2 if q1 (d) ⊆ q2 (d) for all
databases d. The problem of deciding whether for two q1 ⊆ q2 holds is the
query containment problem. Obviously, q1 ≡ q2 ≺ q1 ⊆ q2 ∧ q2 ⊆ q1 .
The third problem is query minimization. Consider the following conjunc-
tive query written as a rule in datalog:

q(X, Y ) : −p(X, Y ), p(X, Y ).

Obviously, this query is equivalent to

q(X, Y ) : −p(X, Y ).

under set semantics. The latter query now contains fewer body literals. Query
minimization now asks for an equivalent query with the least possible number
of body literals. One possible approach is to successively delete a body literal
until no more body literal can be deleted without violating equivalence to the
original query.
The above example is also illustrative since it shows that query equiva-
lence (and thus query containment) differs under different semantics: whereas
the above two queries are equivalent under set semantics, they are not under
bag semantics. To see this, consider the extensional database {p(a, b), p(a, b)}.
The result of the first query contains p(a, b) four times whereas the last query
contains is only 2 times.

245
 246CHAPTER 10. QUERY EQUIVALENCE, CONTAINMENT, MINIMIZATION, AND FACTORIZAT

10.1 Set Semantics

10.1.1 Conjunctive Queries
A conjunctive query may contain literals where the predicate is built-in. For
example, it applies comparison operators =, <, >, ≤, ≥, 6=. Any explicit use
of equality can be eliminated as follows. For any literal of the form X = c,
any occurrence of X is replaced by c and the equality literal is dropped from
the query clause. For any literal of the form X = Y , any occurrence of Y
is replaced by X and the equality literal is dropped from the query clause.
This procedure is not possible for the other comparison operators <, >, ≤, ≥, 6=
which we call inequality opertors. An inequality is any literal literal using an
inequality operator.
Containment and minimization for conjunctive queries without inequalities
are NP-complete Problems. First note that a tableaux directly corresponds
to a conjunctive queries with all body literals having a common predicate.
From that and the NP-completeness results for tableaux containment which
in turn follows immediately from first order subsumption [58, 272], it follows
immediately that containment of conjunctive queries is NP-complete. Chandra
and Merlin proved that minimization is NP-complete [118]. The complexity of
checking for equivalence of conjunctive queries is related to graph isomorphism.
EX
The procedure for checking query containment builds upon mappings from
queries to queries1 . These mappings have two different names: homomorphism
and containment mapping.
Let q1 and q2 be the two queries for which we want to check containment.
Assume the qi are of the form

q1 : r1 : − l1 , . . . , lk
q2 : r2 : − l10 , . . . , lm
0

Let V(qi ) be the set of variables occurring in qi , and C(qi ) be the set of constants
occurring in qi . Further, let h be a substitution h : V(q2 ) → (V(q1 ) ∪ C(q1 )).
We call h a containment mapping from q2 to q1 , if and only if the following
conditions are fulfilled:

1. h(r2 ) = r1 for the head literals, and

2. for all i (1 ≤ i ≤ m) there exists a j (1 ≤ j ≤ k) such that h(li0 ) = lj .

The latter condition states that for each body literal li0 in q2 there is a body
literal lj in q1 such that h(li ) = li0 . Note that this does not imply that h is
injective or surjective.
The following theorem connects containment mappings with the contain-
ment problem:

Theorem 10.1.1 Let q1 and q2 be two conjunctive queries. Then q1 ⊆ q2 if

and only if there is a containment mapping h mapping q2 to q1 .
1
In fact, Chandra and Merlin mapped natural models which is essentially the same.
10.1. SET SEMANTICS 247

Consider the following example:

q1 : p(X1 , X2 ) : − q(X2 , X1 ), q(X1 , X3 )
q2 : p(Y1 , Y2 ) : − q(Y2 , Y1 ), q(Y3 , Y1 ), q(Y1 , Y4 )

Consider h with h(Y1 ) = X1 , h(Y2 ) = X2 , h(Y3 ) = X2 , and h(Y4 ) = X3 . Then

l: p(Y1 , Y2 ) q(Y2 , Y1 ) q(Y3 , Y1 ) q(Y1 , Y4 )

h(l) : p(X1 , X2 ) q(X2 , X1 ) q(X2 , X1 ) q(X1 , X3 )
and, hence, q1 ⊆ q2 .
A query q is minimal, if it contains the minimal possible number of body
literals. More formally, q is minimal , if for any query q 0 with q ≡ q 0 the number
of body literals in q 0 greater than or equal to the number of body literals in
q. The following theorem shows that our initial thoughts on minimization are
correct for conjunctive queries.
Theorem 10.1.2 Let q be a conjunctive query. Then there is a minimal query
q 0 equivalent to q such that q 0 results from q by deleting zero or more body
literals.
This suggests a simple procedure for minimizing a given query q. For every
body literal check whether some containment mapping h exists such that it is
subsumed by some other body literal. Note that this containment mapping
must not rename head variables.
Let q and q 0 be two conjunctive queries. If q can be derived from q 0 solely
by reordering body literals and renaming variables, then q and q 0 are called
isomorphic. Minimal queries are unique up to some isomorphism. Obviously,
minimizing conjunctive queries is also NP-complete.
Let us now come to unions of conjunctive queries. Let Q = Q1 ∪ . . . ∪ Qk
and Q0 = Q01 ∪ . . . ∪ Q0l be two unions of conjunctive queries Qi and Q0j with a
common head predicate. A containment mapping h from Q to Q0 maps each Qi
to some Q0j such that h(Qi ) ⊆ Q0j . Sagiv and Yannakakis showed the following
theorem [649].
Theorem 10.1.3 Let Q = Q1 ∪ . . . ∪ Qk and Q0 = Q01 ∪ . . . ∪ Q0l be two unions
of conjunctive queries Qi and Q0j with a common head predicate. Then Q ⊆ Q0
if and only if there is a containment mapping from Q to Q0 .
This theorem gives us a corollary which allows us minimizing unions of
conjunctive queries by a pairwise checking of containment [649] (see also [767]).

Corollary 10.1.4 Let Q = Q1 ∪ . . . ∪ Qk be a union of conjunctive queries Qi

with common head predicate. Then there exists a subset R of Q such that
1. R ≡ Q

2. ¬∃ R0 ⊂ R R0 ≡ Q

3. If Qm is any equivalent to Q, then there is a containment mapping from

Qm to R but none from Qm to any proper subset R0 of R.
248CHAPTER 10. QUERY EQUIVALENCE, CONTAINMENT, MINIMIZATION, AND FACTORIZAT

This corollary implies that we can minimize a query that is a union of con-
junctive queries by eliminating those conjunctive queries Qi from it that are
contained in some Qj .
For conjunctive queries the problems of containment, equivalence, and min-
imization are
The problems of containment, equivalence, and minimization of conjunctive
queries are most difficitult if all body literals have a common predicate p. This
is quite an unrealistic assumption as typical conjunctive queries will not only
self-join the same relation. A first question is thus whether there exist special
cases where there are polynomial algorithms for containment checking. Another
strain of work is devoted to more complex queries. As it turns out, the results
become less nice and more restricted.

10.1.2 . . . with Inequalities

We now turn to conjunctive queries with inequalities in their body. For this
section, we assume that the domain is totally ordered and dense. That is, for
all x and y with x < y, there exists a z with x < z < y. In this context, we
have the following theorem:

Theorem 10.1.5 Assume the two conjunctive queries q1 and q2 are of the form

q1 : p1 : − l1 , . . . , lk , e1 , . . . , el
q2 : p2 : − l10 , . . . , lm
0 , e0 , . . . , e0
1 n

where pi are the head literals, li and li0 are ordinary subgoals and ei and e0i
are inequalities. Let h be a containment mapping from q2 to q1 where both are
restricted to their ordinary literals. If additionally for all i = 1, . . . , n we have

e1 , . . . , el =⇒ h(e0i )

then q1 ⊆ q2 .

This result is due to Klug [432] who used the following procedure to reason
about inequalities using comparison operators in {=, <, ≤}. Given a set of
inequalities L, an directed graph G is defined whose nodes are the variables
and constants in L. Whenever for all x < y or x ≤ y in L, the edge (x, y) is
added to G. For all constants c and c0 in L, if c < c0 then we add an edge
(c, c0 ). Edges are labeled with the according comparison operator. For equality
predicates, an edge in both direction is added. Given the graph G, we conclude
that x ≤ y if there is a path from x to y and x < y only if additionally at least
one edge is labelled by <. An alternative is to use the procedure presented in
Section 11.2.3 to solve the inequality inference problem. It also allows for the
comparison operator 6=.
To see why a dense domain is important consider the domain of integers.
From 1 < x < 3 we can easily conclude that x = 2, a fact we can derive
neither from the procedure above nor from the axioms and inference procedure
presented in Section 11.2.3.
10.2. BAG SEMANTICS 249

Unfortunately, the other direction of Theorem ?? is wrong as the following

example shows:

q1 : p(X1 , X2 ) : − q(X1 , X2 ), r(X3 , X4 ), r(X4 , X3 )

q2 : p(Y1 , Y2 ) : − q(Y1 , Y2 ), r(Y3 , Y4 ), Y3 ≤ Y4

Obviously, Y3 ≤ Y4 cannot be implied by any non-existing inequalities from q1 .

However, for q1 to be non-empty, we must have r(a, b) and r(b, a) for some a
and b. We also have a ≤ b or b ≤ a. In the former case, we can chose Y3 = a
and Y4 = b and in the latter Y3 = b and Y4 = a to satisfy r(Y3 , Y4 ) and Y3 ≤ Y4 .
Klug provides an alternative method to solve the containment problem. It
builds upon canonical models. He then shows that if the containment test
succeeds for all canonical models then and only then query containment holds
[432]. Klug does not give an explicit algorithm for constructing these canonical
models but these can be found in the literature []. He also gives two simple
subclasses of inequality queries, where constants are allowed only on the left-
or only on the right-hand side. For these subclasses if and only if holds in the
above Theorem ??.
Although the theorem is stated in terms of conjunctive queries with in-
equalities, it holds for any predicate p. Assume two queries of the following
form:
q1 : p1 : − l1 , . . . , lk , P
q2 : p2 : − l10 , . . . , lm
0 ,P0

where P and P 0 are arbitrary formulas. If there is a containment mapping from

q2 to q1 where both are restricted to their ordinary literals and P =⇒ h(P 0 ),
then q1 ⊆ q2 .

10.1.3 . . . with Negation

The first incarnation of negation we consider is set difference. Here, Sagiv and
Yannakakis where the first to derive some results [649].
[171]

10.1.4 . . . under Constraints

constraints: [401, 402, 378]
negation+constraints: [232, 233, 234, 235]

10.1.5 . . . with Aggregation

[172, 173]

10.2 Bag Semantics

10.2.1 Conjunctive Queries
• definition bag-containment, bag-equivalence [189, 427]

– characterizations [135, 383] (no proofs in [136])

250CHAPTER 10. QUERY EQUIVALENCE, CONTAINMENT, MINIMIZATION, AND FACTORIZAT

– complexity results [135]

• definition bag-set containment, bag-set equivalence [135]

10.3 Sequences
10.3.1 Path Expressions
XPath constructs and their short-hands to denote XPath sublanguages.

• branching (’[]’)

• wild cards (’*’)

• descendant axis (’//’)

• disjunction : only binary or branching, (’—’) (or-branching)

Otherwise XPath only contains the child axis and node name tests. These
sublanguages are represented as tree patterns.
Query containment for certain subclasses:

• XP[],∗,// is coNP-complete [518]

Consider we have to answer p ⊆ p0 . Then

– if p ∈ P [],// and p ∈ P [],∗,// then query containment is coNP-

complete.
– in PTIME if number of ’//’ is restricted by d which then gives the
degree of the polynomial describing the time complexity
– remains coNP-complete if p contains no ’*’ p0 contains at most two
’*’s
– remains coNP-complete if p contains at most 5 branches and p0 con-
tains at most 3 branches.

• P[],∗ is in PTIME (follows from work on conjunctive acyclic queries [830],

also noted by Wood [811])

• P[],// is in PTIME [27]

• P∗,// is in PTIME (these are related to a fragment of regular expressions

[519])

• Por is in PTIME

• P[],or is coNP-complete

• P| is coNP-complete [518]
[545] showed that P[],∗,//,| is coNP-complete for infinite alphabets and in
PSPACE for finite alphabets.
10.4. MINIMIZATION 251

• P//,| is PSPACE-complete

• P[],∗,// with variable binding and equivality tests is Πp2 - hard [201]

A PTIME algorithm for the fragment P// can be found in [95]

Florescu, Levy, and Suciu showed that for a language quite similar to P[],//
containment is NP-complete if evaluated on a graph-based data model instead
of a tree-based one [246].
Calvanese et al. also consider a graph-based data model and more expressive
queries [99].
[545] also contains work on languages with variable bindings with different
semantics.
More result: [201]
query containment with DTDs: [812]
Schwentick gives a very good overview over complexity results for contain-
ment checking [667]. We should repeat his table here.

10.4 Minimization
minimization: [445]

10.5 Detecting common subexpressions

[244, 337, 335]

10.5.1 Simple Expressions

Simple Non-Expensive Expressions
Simple Expensive Expressions
10.5.2 Algebraic Expressions

10.6 Bibliography
In a pair of papers Aho, Sagiv, and Ullmann [16, 17] study equivalence, con-
tainment, and minimization problems for tableaux. More specifically, they
introduce a restricted variant of relational expressions containing projection,
natural join, and selection with predicates that only compare attributes with
constants. They further assume the existence of a universal relation. That
is, every relation R is the projection of the universal relation on A(R). Now,
these restricted conjunctive queries can be expressed with tableaux. The au-
thors tableaux equivalence, containment, and minimization problems also in
the presence of functional dependences. The investigated problems are all NP-
complete. Since the practical usefulness is limited we do not give the concrete
results of this pair of papers.
[134, 137] contains (complexity) results for deciding query equivalence in
the case of recursive and nonrecursive datalog.
252CHAPTER 10. QUERY EQUIVALENCE, CONTAINMENT, MINIMIZATION, AND FACTORIZAT

View selection problem (just pointers): . . .

[398, 395, 396]
[141]

• conjunctive queries: equivalence and minimization are NP-complete [118,

17]
In [17] tableaux are used.

• polynomial algorithms for equivalence and minimization for simple tableaux:

[17, 16]

• union of elementary differences: Πp2 complete: remark in [649] and a

pointer to the thesis of Sagiv [646].

• acyclic conjunctive queries: PTIME [830]

• equivalence (σ, 1, π, ∪), equivalence (σ, 1, π, ∪, \): ΠP2 -complete [649]

• Recursive Datalog: [85]

 Part III

Rewrite Techniques

253
Chapter 11

Simple Rewrites

11.1 Simple Adjustments

11.1.1 Rewriting Simple Expressions
Constant Folding

Constant subexpressions are evaluated and the result replaces the subexpres-
sion. For example an expression 1/100 is replaced by 0.01. Other expressions
like a − 10 = 50 can be rewritten to a = 40. However, the latter kind of rewrite
is rarely performed by commercial systems.

Eliminate Between

A predicate of the form Y BETWEEN X AND Z is replaced by X <= Y AND Y <=

Z. This step not only eliminates syntactic sugar but also enables transitivity
reasoning to derive new predicates (see ).

Eliminate IN

A predicate of the form x IN (c1 ,...,cn ) is rewritten to x = c1 OR ...OR x

= cn . This eliminates on form of the IN predicate and enables multikey index
access.
Another possibility is to use a table function that produces a table with one
column whose values are exactly those in the IN-list. From thereon, regular
optimization takes place. This possibility is also investigated when several
comparisons of a column with a constants are disjunctively connected.

Eliminating LIKE

A predicate of the form a LIKE ’Guy’ can only be rewritten to a = ’Guy’ if

a is of type varchar. This is due to the different white space padding rules for
LIKE and =.

255
 256 CHAPTER 11. SIMPLE REWRITES

Start and Stop conditions derived from LIKE predicates

A predicate of the form a LIKE ‘bla%‘ gives rise to a start condition a >=
‘bla‘. Which can enable subsequent index usage. A stop predicate of the form
a < ’blb’ can also be derived. completing a range predicate for an index scan.
Start and stop conditions can only be derived if there is no leading ‘%‘ in the
pattern.

Pushing NOT operations down and eliminating them

NOT operations need to be pushed downwards for correctness reasons. At-
tention has to be paid to the IS NOT NULL and IS NULL predicates. XXX
complete set of rules go into some table.

Merge AND, OR, and other associative operations

While parsing, AND and OR operations are binary. For simpler processing they
are often n-ary in the internal representation. Therefor (p AND (q AND r)) is
rewritten to (AND p q r).
In general, associative nested operations should be merged. Examples of
other associative operations are + and ∗.

Normalized Argument Order for Commutative Operations

ToDo enabling factorization, constant folding: move constants to the left Speed up
evaluation of equal.

Eliminate - and /
(x − y) ; x + (−y) x/y ; x ∗ (1/y)

Adjust join predicates

A = B + C becomes A − C = B if AandB are from one relation and C is from
another.

Simplifying boolean expressions

The usual simplification rules for boolean expressions can be applied. For ex-
ample, if a contradiction can be derived.

Eliminating ANY, SOME, and ALL

ANY and SOME operators in conjunction with a comparison operator are
rewritten into disjunction of comparison predicates. For example a > ANY
(c1 , c2 ) is rewritten to a > c1 OR a > c2 . Correspondingly, an ALL oper-
ator with a constant list is rewritten into a conjunction of comparisons. For
example, a > ALL(c1 , c2 ) is rewritten to a > c1 AND a > c2 .
If a subquery occurs, then the ANY or SOME expression is rewritten to
a correlated subquery in an EXIST predicate. Consider the query a > ANY
11.2. DERIVING NEW PREDICATES 257

(SELECT b FROM ...WHERE p). It is rewritten to EXISTS(SELECT ...FROM

...WHERE p AND a > b).
Correspondingly, a subquery within an ALL operator is rewritten into a
NOT EXISTS subquery. For example, a > (SELECT b FROM ...WHERE p) is
rewritten into NOT EXISTS (SELECT b FROM ...WHERE p and a <= b)

• CASE ¡==¿ UNION

11.1.2 Normal forms for queries with disjunction

Another step of the NFST component or the first step of the rewriting compo-
nent can be the transformation of boolean expressions found in where clauses
in order to account for NULL values. Pushing not operators inside the boolean
expression allows to use two-valued logic instead of three-valued logic. If we
miss this step, we can get wrong results.
Another possible step is the subsequent transformation of the boolean ex-
pressions in where clauses into disjunctive normal form (DNF) or conjunctive
normal form (CNF). This step is not always necessary and really depends on
which plan generation approach is taken. Hence, this step could take place as
late as in a preparatory step for plan generation. It is (obviously) only neces-
sary if the query contains disjunctions. We discuss plan generation for queries
with disjunctions in Section ??.

11.2 Deriving new predicates

Given a set of conjunctive predicates, it is often possible to derive new predicates
which might be helpful during query plan generation.
This section discusses ways to infer new predicates.

11.2.1 Collecting conjunctive predicates

A query predicate may not only contain the and connector, but also or or not.
For the inference rules in this section we need base predicates that occur
conjunctively.
We say that a (base) predicate q occurs conjunctively in a (complex) pred-
icate p if p [q ← f alse] can be simplified to false. That is, if we replace every
occurrence of q by true, the simplification rules in Figure 11.1 (Fig. ??) simplify
p [q ← true] to false.
These simplification rules can be used to implement a simple member func-
tion occursConjunctively to determine whether a predicate occurs conjunctively
in a predicate or not. Together with a member function or visitor Collect-
BasePredicates, we can compute the set of conjunctively occurring predicates.
This set will form the basis for the next subsections.

11.2.2 Equality
Equality is a reflexive, symmetric and transitive binary relationship (see Fig. 11.2).
Such a relation is called an equivalence relation Hence, a set of conjunctively
258 CHAPTER 11. SIMPLE REWRITES

N OT true → f alse
N OT f alse → true
p AN D true → p
p AN D f alse → f alse
p OR true → true
p OR f alse → p

Figure 11.1: Simplification rules for boolean expressions

x=x
x=y =⇒ y = x
x = y ∧ y = z =⇒ x = z

Figure 11.2: Axioms for equality

occurring equality predicates implicitly partitions the set of composed terms

(IUs) into disjunctive equivalence classes.
Constants: Let X be an equivalence class of equal expressions. Let Y be
the set of all equality expressions that contributed to X. Then, in the query
predicate we replace all expressions x = y by x = c and y = c and subsequently
eliminate redundant expressions.

σx=c (e1 1x=y e2 ) ≡ σx=c (e1 ) × σy=c (e2 )

replace all predicates by IU=C.IU’s equivalent to a constant In [178] an ab-
stract data structure is presented that helps computing the equivalence classes
fast and also allows for a fast check whether two terms (IUs) are in the same
equivalence class. Since we are often interested in whether a given IU is equal
to a constant - or, more specifically, equal to another IU bound to a constant
-, we have to modify these algorithms such that the IU bound to a constant, if
it exists, becomes the representative of its equivalence class.
For the member functions addEqualityPredicate, getEqualityRepresentative
and isInSameEqualityClass we need an attribute equalityRepresentative in
class IU that is initialized such that it points to itself. Another member
equalityClassRank is initialized to 0. The code for the two member functions
is given in Figure 11.3.
By calling addEqualityPredicate for all conjunctively occurring equality pred-
icates we can build the equivalence classes.

11.2.3 Inequality
Table 11.1 gives a set of axioms used to derive new predicates from a set of
conjunctively occurring inequalities S (see [767], see Fig. 11.4).
11.2. DERIVING NEW PREDICATES 259

These axioms have to be applied until no more predicates can be derived.

The following algorithm [767] performs this task efficiently:

1. Convert each X < Y into X 6= Y and X ≤ Y .

2. Compute the transitive closure of ≤.

3. Apply axiom A8 until no more new predicates can be derived.

4. Reconstruct < by using axiom A4.

Step 3 can be performed as follows. For any true IUs X and Y we find these
IUs Z with X ≤ Z ≤ Y .
Then we check whether any two such Z’s are related by 6=. Here, it is
sufficient to check the original 6= pairs in S and these derived in 1.

A1 : X ≤ X
A2 : X < Y ⇒ X ≤ Y
A3 : X < Y ⇒ X 6= Y
A4 : X ≤ Y ∧ X 6= Y ⇒ X < Y
A5 : X 6= Y ⇒ Y 6= X
A6 : X < Y ∧ Y < Z ⇒ X < Z
A7 : X ≤ Y ∧ Y ≤ Z ⇒ X ≤ Z
A8 : X ≤ Z ∧ Z ≤ Y ∧ X ≤ W ∧ W ≤ Y ∧ W 6= Z ⇒ X 6= Y

Table 11.1: Axioms for inequality

11.2.4 Aggregation

Let R1 , . . . , Rn be relations or views, A1 , . . . , Am attributes thereof, pw and ph

predicates, and a1 , . . . , al expressions of the form fj (Bj ) for aggregate functions
fj and attributes Bj . For a query block of the form

select A1 , . . . , Ak , a1 , . . . , al
from R1 , . . . , Rn
where pw
group by
A1 , . . . , A m
having ph
260 CHAPTER 11. SIMPLE REWRITES

we consider the derivation of new predicates [474]. Obviously, the following

predicates are true:
min(B) ≤ B
max(B) ≥ B
max(B) ≥ min(B)
min(B) ≤ avg(B)
avg(B) ≤ max(B)

If pw contains conjunctively a predicate Bθc for some constant c, we can fur-

min(B) θ c if θ ∈ {>, ≥}
ther infer max(B) θ c if θ ∈ {<, ≤} These predicates can then
avg(B) θ c if θ ∈ {<, ≤, >, ≥}
be used to derive further predicates. The original and the derive predicates
are usefule when the query block is embedded in another query block since
we are allowed to add them to the embedding query block conjunctively (see
Section 12.3).
If we know restrictions on the aggregates from some embedding query block,
we might be able to add predicates to pw . The following table contains the re-
strictions on an aggregate we know in the left column and the predicates we can
max(B) ≥ c ; B ≥ c if no other aggregation occurs
max(B) > c ; B > c if no other aggregation occurs
infer in the right column:
min(B) ≤ c ; B ≤ c if no other aggregation occurs
min(B) < c ; B < c if no other aggregation occurs
Note that the aggregation occurring in the left column must be the only aggre-
gation found in the query block. That is, l = 1 and ph contains no aggregation
other than a1 . To see why this is necessary, consider the following query
select deptNo, max(salary), min(salary)
from Employee
group by
deptNo

Even if we know that max(salary) > 100.000, the above query block is not
equivalent to
select deptNo, max(salary), min(salary)
from Employee
where salary ¿ 100.000
group by
deptNo

Neither is
select deptNo, max(salary)
from Employee
group by
deptNo
having avg(salary) ¿ 50.000
11.3. PREDICATE PUSH-DOWN AND PULL-UP 261

equivalent to

select deptNo, max(salary)

from Employee
where salary ¿ 100.000
group by
deptNo
having avg(salary) ¿ 50.000

even if we know that max(salary) > 100.000.

11.2.5 ToDo
[497]

11.3 Predicate Push-Down and Pull-Up

11.4 Eliminating Redundant Joins

11.5 Distinct Pull-Up and Push-Down

11.6 Set-Valued Attributes

In this section, we investigate the effect of query rewriting on joins involving
set-valued attributes in object-relational database management systems. We
show that by unnesting set-valued attributes (that are stored in an internal
nested representation) prior to the actual set containment or intersection join
we can improve the performance of query evaluation by an order of magnitude.
By giving example query evaluation plans we show the increased possibilities
for the query optimizer. This section is based on [363].

11.6.1 Introduction
The growing importance of object-relational database systems (ORDBMS) [730]
has kindled a renewed interest in the efficient processing of set-valued attributes.
One particular problem in this area is the joining of two relations on set-valued
attributes [269, 360, 608]. Recent studies have shown that finding optimal join
algorithms with set-containment predicates is very hard [98]. Nevertheless, a
certain level of efficiency for joins on set-valued attributes is indispensable in
practice.
Obviously, brute force evaluation via a nested-loop join is not going to be
very efficient. An alternative is the introduction of special operators on the
physical level of a DBMS [360, 608]. Integration of new algorithms and data
structures on the physical level is problematic, however. On one hand this
approach will surely result in tremendous speed-ups, but on the other hand
this efficiency is purchased dearly. It is very costly to implement and integrate
new algorithms robustly and reliably.
262 CHAPTER 11. SIMPLE REWRITES

We consider an alternative approach to support set-containment and non-

empty intersection join queries by compiling these join predicates away. The
main idea is to unnest the set-valued attributes prior to the join. Thereby, we
assume a nested internal representation [607]. This is also the underlying rep-
resentation for the specific join algorithms proposed so far [360, 608]. Whereas
[608] concentrates on set-containment joins, we also consider joins based on
non-empty intersections. Ramasamy et al. also present a query rewrite for con-
tainment queries in [608], but on an unnested external representation, which
(as shown there) exhibits very poor performance. Further, the special case of
empty sets was not dealt with.
The goal of our paper is to show that by rewriting queries we can compile
away the original set-containment or intersection join. As our experiments with
DB2 show, our rewrite results in speed-up factors that grow linearly in the size
of the input relations as compared to quadratic growth for brute-force nested-
loop evaluation. The advantage of this approach—as compared to [360, 608]—is
that no new join algorithms have to be added to the database system.

11.6.2 Preliminaries
In this section we give an overview of the definition of the set type. Due to the
deferral of set types to SQL-4 [247], we use a syntax similar to that of Informix
1 . A possible example declaration of a table with a set-valued attribute is:

create table ngrams (

setID integer not null primary key,
content set<char(3)>
);

setID is the key of the relation, whereas content stores the actual set. The
components of a set can be any built-in or user-defined type. In our case we
used set<char(3)>, because we wanted to store 3-grams (see also Section ??).
We further assume that on set-valued attributes the standard set operations
and comparison operators are available.
Our rewriting method is based on unnesting the internal nested representa-
tion. The following view defining the unnested version of the above table keeps
our representation more concise:

create view view_ngrams(setID, d, card) as (

(select ngrams.setID, d.value, count(ngrams.content)
from ngrams, table(unnest<char(3)>(ngrams.content)) d)
union all
(select ngrams.setID, NULL, 0)
from ngrams
where count(ngrams.content) = 0)
);
1
http://www.informix.com/documentation/
11.6. SET-VALUED ATTRIBUTES 263

where setID identifies the corresponding set, d takes on the different values in
content and card is the cardinality of the set. We also need unnest<char(3)>,
a table function that returns a set in the form of a relation. As unnest<char(3)>
returns an empty relation for an empty set, we have to consider this special case
in the second subquery of the union statement, inserting a tuple containing a
dummy value.

11.6.3 Query Rewrite

We are now ready to describe the queries we used to compare the nested and
unnested approach. We concentrate on joins based on subset-equal and non-
empty intersection predicates, because these are the difficult cases as shown in
[98]. We have skipped joins involving predicates based on equality, because the
efficient evaluation of these predicates is much simpler and can be done in a
straightforward fashion (see [360]).

Checking Subset Equal Relation

Here is a query template for a join based on a subset-equal predicate:

select n_1.setID, n_2.setID

from ngrams n_1, ngrams n_2
where is_subseteq(n_1.content, n_2.content) <> 0;

(The comparison with 0 is only needed for DB2, which does not understand the
type bool.)
This query can be rewritten as follows. The basic idea is to join the unnest-
ed version of the table based on the set elements, group the tuples by their
set identifiers, count the number of elements for every set identifier and com-
pare this number with the original counts. The filter predicate vn1.card <=
vn2.card discards some sets that cannot be in the result of the set-containment
join. We also consider the case of empty sets in the second part of the query.
Summarizing the rewritten query we get

(select vn1.setID, vn2.setID

from view_ngrams vn1, view_ngrams vn2
where vn1.d = vn2.d
and vn1.card <= vn2.card
group by vn1.setID, vn1.card, vn2.setID, vn2.card
having count(*) = vn1.card)
union all
(select vn1.setID, vn2.setID
from view_ngrams vn1, view_ngrams vn2
where vn1.card = 0);

Checking Non-empty Intersection

Our query template for joins based on non-empty intersections looks as follows.
264 CHAPTER 11. SIMPLE REWRITES

select n_1.setID, n_2.setID

from ngrams n_1, ngrams n_2
where intersects(n_1.content, n_2.content) <> 0;

The formulation of the unnested query is much simpler than the unnested
query in Section 11.6.3. Due to our view definition, not much rewriting is
necessary. We just have to take care of empty sets again, although this time in
a different, simpler way.

select distinct vn1.setID, vn2.setID

from view_ngrams vn1, view_ngrams vn2
where vn1.d = vn2.d
and vn1.card > 0;

11.7 Bibliography
This section is based on the investigations by Helmer and Moerkotte [363].
There, we also find a performance evaluation indicating that that the rewrites
depending on the relation sizes result in speed-up factors between 5 and 50 even
for moderately sized relations. Nevertheless, it is argued their, that support for
set-valued attributes must be build into the DBMS. A viable alternative to the
rewrites presented here is the usage of special join algorithms for join predicates
involving set-valued attributes [269, 359, 360, 499, 514, 515, 608]. Nevertheless,
as has been shown by Cai, Chakaravarthy, Kaushik, and Naughton, dealing
with set-valued attributes in joins theoretically (and of course practical) difficult
issue [98]. Last, to efficiently support simple selection predicates on set-valued
attributes, special index structures should be incorporated into the DBMS [361,
362, 364].
11.7. BIBLIOGRAPHY 265

IU::addEqualityClassUnderThis(IU* lIU){
IU*lRepresentativeThis = this -> getEqualityRepresentativeIU;
IU*lRepresentativeArg = aIU -> getEqualityRepresentativeIU;

lRepresentativeArg -> _equalityRepresentative =

lRepresentativeThis;
if(lRepresentativeArg -> _equalityClassRank >=
lRepresentativeThis -> _equalityClassRank){
lRepresentativeThis -> _equalityClassRank =
lRepresentativeArg -> _equalityClass Rank + 1;
}
}

IU::addEqualityPredicate(Compositing* p){
IU*lLeft = p -> leftIU;
IU*lRight = p -> rightIU;
if (p -> isEqualityPredicateIU &&
lLeft -> getEqualityRepresentativeIU ==
lRight -> getEqualityRepresentativeIU){
if(lLeft - > isBoundToConstantIU) {
lLeft -> addEqualityClassUnderThis(lRight);
}else
if(lRight -> isBoundToConstantIU){
lRight -> addEqualityClassUnderThis(lLeft),
}else
if (lLeft -> _equalityClassRank > lRight ->
_equalityClassRank){
lLeft -> addEqualityClassUnderThis(lRight)
}else{
lright -> addEqualityClassUnderThis(lLeft)
}
}
}

IU* IU:: getEqualityRepresentativeIU(){

if (this == _equalityRepresentative){
_equalityRepresentative = _equalityRepresentative ->
getEqualityRepresentativeIU;
}
return_equalityRepresentative;
}

Figure 11.3:
266 CHAPTER 11. SIMPLE REWRITES

A1 X≤X
A2 X <Y ⇒ X≤Y
A3 X <Y ⇒ X 6= Y
A4 X ≤Y ∧X 6= Y ⇒ X<Y
A5 X 6= Y ⇒ Y 6= X
A6 X <Y ∧Y <Z ⇒ X<Z
A7 X ≤Y ∧Y ≤Z ⇒ X≤Z
A8 X ≤ Z ∧ Z ≤ Y ∧ X ≤ W ∧ W ≤ Y ∧ W 6= Z ⇒ X 6= Y

Figure 11.4: Axioms for inequality

Chapter 12

View Merging

12.1 View Resolution

View merging can be as simple as replacing the view name in the from clause
of a query by the view definition. We would like to call this step view reso-
lution. This then results in a query with nesting in the from clause that can
subsequently be unnested (see ??). Consider the following example: XXX Ex-
ample Other examples are given below. One must be careful not to produce
variable clashes. Especially if a view is referenced several times, variables must
be renamed.

12.2 Simple View Merging

Of course, these two steps can be merged into one step. The overall effect is
then that the view name is replaced by all the entries in the from clause of the
view definition and the predicate contained in the where clause of the view
definition is conjunctively added to where clause of the query block whose
from clause contained the view name. Consider the following view definition

create view

which is refenced in the following query:

View merging resuls in

However, there are a few pitfalls. This simple version of view merging can
only be applied to simple select-project-join queries not containing duplicate
elimination, set operations, grouping or aggregation. In these cases, complex
view merging must be applied.

267
268 CHAPTER 12. VIEW MERGING

12.3 Predicate Move Around (Predicate pull-up and

push-down)
If unnesting is not implemented or not possible, several techniques like predicate
move around, semi-join techniques and magic rewriting allow the copying of
predicates from one block into another block in order to reduce the number of
qualifying tuples [474, 536, 537, 538, 680].
Let us briefly illustrate the main idea by means of a simple example query
selecte.name
from Employee e,
(select d.name, d.dno
from Department d
where d.dno = e.dno and
d.boss.name = e.name and
d.boss.name like ’%S’) as D(dname,ddno)
where e.dno between 1 and 10
which can be rewritten by predicate move around to
selecte.name
from Employee e,
(select d.name, d.dno
from Department d
where d.dno = e.dno and
d.boss.name = e.name and
d.dno between 1 and 10 and
d.boss.name like ’%S’) as D(dname,dd no)
where e.dno between 1 and 10 and
e.name like ’%S’
Predicate push-down and pull-up often occurs in conjunction with views.
Let us therefore consider some examples. The following view that cannot be
simply merged because it contains a union operator. Consider the case where
there are two different employee tables that are unioned in a view.
create view Emp(eno, name, salary, dno) as
select e1.eno, e1.name, e1.salary, e1.dno
from Emp1[e1]
union all
select e2.eno, e2.name, e2.salary, e2.dno
from Emp2[e2]

Simple view merging cannot be applied to the query

select e.eno, e.name
from Emp[e]
where e.salary > 150000
12.4. COMPLEX VIEW MERGING 269

but view resolution with a subsequent push-down of the predicate e.salary >
150.000 will result in
select e.eno, e.name
from ( select e1.eno, e1.name, e1.salary, e1.dno
from Emp1[e1]
where e1.salary > 150000)
union
( all select e2.eno, e2.name, e2.salary, e2.dno
from Emp2[e2]
where e2.salary > 150000)

Note that we did not eliminate unneeded columns/attributes. Further note

that we can now exploit possible indexes on Emp1.salary and Emp2.salary.
In case union would have been used in the view definition, the rewritten query
would also contain union requiring a duplicate elimination.
Here is another example where pushing a predicate down results in much
more efficient plans. Given the view
define view EmpStat as
select e.dno, min(e.salary) minSal, max(e.salary) maxSal, avg(e.salary) avgSal
from Emp[e]
group by e.dno

the query
select *
from EmpStat[e]
where e.dno = 10

can be rewritten to
select e.dno, min(e.salary) minSal, max(e.salary) maxSal, avg(e.salary) avgSal
from Emp[e]
where e.dno = 10
group by e.dno

which can be further simplified to

select e.dno, min(e.salary) minSal, max(e.salary) maxSal, avg(e.salary) avgSal
from Emp[e]
where e.dno = 10

12.4 Complex View Merging

12.4.1 Views with Distinct
XXX TODO views with distinct
270 CHAPTER 12. VIEW MERGING

12.4.2 Views with Group-By and Aggregation

Consider the following view with a group-by clause and aggregation:

create view AvgSalary as

select e.dno, avg(e.salary) as avgSalary
from Emp[e]
group by e.dno

The following query uses this view:

select d.name, s.avgSalary)

from Dept[d], AvgSalary[s]
where d.location = ‘Paris‘ and
d.dno = s.dno

Using the view definition, this query can be rewritten to

select d.name, avg(e.salary) as avgSalary

from Dept[d], Emp[e]
where d.location = ‘Paris‘ and
d.dno = e.dno
group by d.ROWID, d.name

where d.ROWID is a either a key-attribute like d.dno or a unique row identifier of

the tuples in Dept. Or course, this transformation is not valid in general. The
primary condition here is that we have a key-foreign key join. More specifically,
d.dno must be the key of the Dept table or it must be a unique attribute.
Applying simple view resolution results in:

selectd.name, s.avgSalary)
from Dept[d], (select e.dno, avg(salary) as avgSalary
from Emp[e]
group by e.dno) [s]
where d.location = ‘Paris‘ and
d.dno = s.dno

This query can then be unnested using the techniques of Section ??.
Sometimes strange results occur. Consider for example the view

define view EmpStat as

select e.dno, min(e.salary) minSal, max(e.salary) maxSal, avg(e.salary) avgSal
from Emp[e]
group by e.dno

If the user issues the query

12.4. COMPLEX VIEW MERGING 271

select avg(minSal), avg(maxSal), avg(avgSal)

from EmpStat

view merging results in

select avg(min(e.salary)), avg(max(e.salary)), avg(avg(e.salary))

from Emp[e]
group by e.dno

This is perfectly o.k. You just need to think twice about it. The resulting plan
will contain two group operations: XXX Plan

12.4.3 Views in IN predicates

Consider a view that contains the minimum salary for each department

create view MinSalary as

select e.dno, min(e.salary) as minSalary
from Emp[e]
group by e.dno

and a query asking for all those employees together with their salaries in Parisian
departments earning the minimum salary:

select e.name, e.salary

from Emp[e], Dept[d]
where e.dno = d.dno and
d.location = ‘Paris‘ and
(e.dno, e.sal) in MinSalary

This query can be rewritten to:

select e.name, e.salary

from Emp[e], Dept[d], Emp[e2]
where e.dno = d.dno and
d.location = ‘Paris‘ and
e.dno = e2.dno
group by e.ROWID, d.ROWID, e.name, e.salary
having e.salary = min(e2.sal)

Note that the employee relation occurs twice. Avoiding to scan the employee
relation twice can be done as follows:

12.4.4 Final Remarks

Not all views can be merged. If for example a rownum function that numbers
rows in a table is used in a view definition for a result column, then the view
cannot be merged. Unmerged views will remain as nested subqueries with
272 CHAPTER 12. VIEW MERGING

two alternative evaluation strategies: Either they will be evaluated as nested

queries, that is for every row produced by some outer producer the view is
evaluated, or the view will be materialized into a temporary table. Whatever
is more efficient must be chosen by the plan generator. However, techniques
for deriving additional predicates and subsequent techniques such as predicate
move around (predicate pull-down, push-down) are still applicable.

12.5 Bibliography
Chapter 13

Quantifier treatment

13.1 Pseudo-Quantifiers
Again, the clue to rewrite subqueries with a ANY or ALL predicate is to apply
aggregate functions [268]. A predicate of the form

< ANY (select . . .

from . . .
where . . . )

can be transformed into the equivalent predicate

< (select max(. . . )

from . . .
where . . . )

Analogously, a predicate of the form

< ALL (select . . .

from . . .
where . . . )

can be transformed into the equivalent predicate

< (select min(. . . )

from . . .
where . . . )

In the above rewrite rules, the predicate < can be replaced by =, ≤, etc. If the
predicate is > or ≥ then the above rules are flipped. For example, a predicate
of the form >ANY becomes >select min and >ALL becomes >select max.
After the rewrites have been applied, the Type A or Type JA unnesting
techniques can be applied, depending on the details of the inner query block.

273
274 CHAPTER 13. QUANTIFIER TREATMENT

13.2 Existential quantifier

Existential quantifiers can be seen as special aggregate functions and query
blocks exhibiting an existential quantifier can be unnested accordingly [188].
For example, an independent existential subquery can be treated the same way
as a Type A query. Nested existential quantifiers with a correlation predi-
cate can be unnested using a semi-join. Other approaches rewrite (existential)
quantifiers using the aggregate function count [268]. Consider the partial query
pattern

...
where exists (select ...
from ...
where ...)

It is equivalent to

...
where 0 > (select count(. . . )
from ...
where ...)

A not exists like in

...
where not exists (select ...
from ...
where ...)

is equivalent to

...
where 0 = (select count(. . . )
from ...
where ...)

After these rewrites have been applied, the Type A or Type JA unnesting
techniques can be applied, depending on the details of the inner query block.

13.3 Universal quantifier

Universal quantification is a little more complex. An overview is provided in
[156]. Here is the prototypical OQL query pattern upon which our discussion
13.3. UNIVERSAL QUANTIFIER 275

Case-No. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
p() p() p() p() p(e1 ) p(e1 ) p(e1 ) p(e1 )
q() q(e1 ) q(e2 ) q(e1 , e2 ) q() q(e1 ) q(e2 ) q(e1 , e2 )
Case-No. 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16
p(e2 ) p(e2 ) p(e2 ) p(e2 ) p(e1 , e2 ) p(e1 , e2 ) p(e1 , e2 ) p(e1 , e2 )
q() q(e1 ) q(e2 ) q(e1 , e2 ) q() q(e1 ) q(e2 ) q(e1 , e2 )

Table 13.1: Classification Scheme According to the Variable Bindings

of universal quantifiers nested within a query block is based:

Q ≡ select e1
from e1 in E1
where for all e2 in select e2
from e2 in E2
where p:
q

where p (called the range predicate) and q (called the quantifier predicate) are
predicates in a subset of the variables {e1 , e2 }. This query pattern is denoted
by Q.
In order to emphasize the (non-)occurrence of variables in a predicate p, we
write p(e1 , . . . , en ) if p depends on the variables e1 , . . . , en . Using this conven-
tion, we can list all the possible cases of variable occurrence. Since both e1 and
e2 may or may not occur in p or q, we have to consider 16 cases (see Table 13.1).
All cases but 12, 15, and 16 are rather trivial. Class 12 queries can be unnested
by replacing the universal quantifier by a division, set difference, anti-semijoin,
or counting. Class 15 queries are treated by set difference, anti-semijoin or
grouping with count aggregation. For Class 16 queries, the alternatives are set
difference, anti-semijoin, and grouping with count aggregation. In all cases,
special care has to be taken regarding NULL values. For details see [156].

Class 12 Let us first consider an example of a Class 12 query.

select al.name
from al in Airline
where for all ap in (select ap
from ap in Airport
where apctry = ’USA’):
ap in al.lounges

Define U ≡ πap (σapctry=0 U SA0 (Airport[ap, apctry])). Then the three alternative
algebraic expressions equivalent to this query are

• plan with division:

if U = ∅
276 CHAPTER 13. QUANTIFIER TREATMENT

then Airline[name]
else µap:lounges (Airline[name, lounges]) ÷ U

• plan with set difference:

Airline[name] \ (πname (U <ap6∈lounges Airline[name, lounges]))

• plan with anti-semijoin:

πname (U <ap6∈lounges Airline[name, lounges])

This plan is only valid, if the projected attributes of Airline form a su-
perkey.

The plan with the anti-semijoin is typically the most efficient.

In general, the plan with division is [542, 301]:

ifσp(e (E2 [e2 ])6=∅ (((E1 [e1 ] 1q(e1 ,e2 ) E2 [e2 ]) ÷ σp(e2 ) (E2 [e2 ])), E1 [e1 ])
2)

In case the selection σp(e2 ) (E2 [e2 ]) yields at least a one tuple or object, we can
apply the prediate p to the divident, as in

ifσp(e (E2 [e2 ])6=∅ (((E1 [e1 ] 1q(e1 ,e2 ) σp(e2 ) (E2 [e2 ])) ÷ σp(e2 ) (E2 [e2 ])), E1 [e1 ]).
2)

If the quantifier predicate q(e1 , e2 ) is of the form e2 ∈ e1 .SetAttribute, then the

join can be replaced by an unnest operator:

ifσp(e (E2 [e2 ])6=∅ ((µe2 :SetAttribute (E1 [e1 , SetAttribute]) ÷ σp(e2 ) (E2 [e2 ])), E1 [e1 ])
2)

Using set difference, the translation is

E1 [e1 ] \ πe1 ((E1 [e1 ] × σp(e2 ) (E2 [e2 ])) \ (E1 [e1 ] 1q(e1 ,e2 ) σp(e2 ) (E2 [e2 ])))

which can be optimized to

E1 [e1 ] \ E1 [e1 ] >
¬q(e1 ,e2 ) σp(e2 ) (E2 [e2 ])

This plan is mentioned in [719], however using a regular join instead of a semi-
join.
The anti-semijoin can be employed to eliminate the set difference yielding
the following plan:
E1 [e1 ]>
¬q(e1 ,e2 ) σp(e2 ) (E2 [e2 ])

This plan is in many cases the most efficient plan. However, the correctness of
this plan depends on the uniqueness of e1 , i.e., the attribute(s) e1 must be a
(super) key of E1 . This is especially fulfilled in the object-oriented context if
e1 consists of or contains the object identifier.
We do not present the plans based group and count operations (see [156]).
13.3. UNIVERSAL QUANTIFIER 277

Class 15 Here is an example query of Class 15:

select al.name
from al in Airline
where for all f in (
select f
from f in Flight
where al = f.carrier):
f.to.apctry != “Libya”
The quantifier’s range formulat σp(e1 ,e2 ) (E2 [e2 ]) is obviously not closed. It
contains the free variable e1 . According to the reduction algorithm of Codd
[169], the division plan is

(E1 [e1 ] 1¬p(e1 ,e2 )∨q(e2 ) E2 [e2 ]) ÷ E2 [e2 ].

The plan with set difference is

E1 [e1 ] \ πe1 ((E1 [e1 ] 1p(e1 ,e2 ) E2 [e2 ]) \ (E1 [e1 ] 1p(e1 ,e2 ) σq(e2 ) (E2 [e2 ])))

and the most efficient plan using the anti-semijoin is

E1 [e1 ]>
p(e1 ,e2 ) σ¬q(e2 ) (E2 [e2 ]).

Class 16 Here is an example Class 16 query:

select al.name
from al in Airline
where for all ap in (
select ap
from ap in Airport
where apctry = alctry):
ap in al.lounges
The range predicate again depends on the outer level variable e1 . A valid
division plan looks similar to the one for Class 15. A plan with set difference is

E1 [e1 ] \ πe1 ((E1 [e1 ] 1p(e1 ,e2 ) E2 [e2 ]) \ (E1 [e1 ] 1p(e1 ,e2 )∧q(e1 ,e2 ) E2 [e2 ])).

This plan can first be refined by replacing the seet difference of the two join
expression by a semijoin resultint in

E1 [e1 ] \ (E1 [e1 ] >
p(e1 ,e2 )∧¬q(e1 ,e2 ) E2 [e2 ])

Finally, the remaining set difference is transformed into an anti-semijoin which

also covers the semijoin:

E1 [e1 ]>
p(e1 ,e2 )∧¬q(e1 ,e2 ) E2 [e2 ].

Again, the uniqueness constraing on E2 [e2 ] is required for this most efficient
plan to be valid.
For all discussed classes, problems with NULL values might occur. In that
case, the plans have to refined [156].
278 CHAPTER 13. QUANTIFIER TREATMENT

13.4 Bibliography
[397] [188] [156] [610, 603]
 Chapter 14

Unnesting Nested Queries

The first step in unnesting a query is view merging. This is simply the re-
placement of a view name by the view definitionThe result will always be a
nested query. Unnesting a nested query that resulted from view merging is not
different from unnesting any other nested query. However, due to a lack of
orthogonality, the kinds of nesting arising from view merging can be different
from that of “regular” nested queries. Several problems add to the complexity
of query unnesting.
• Special cases like empty results lead easily to bugs like the famous count
bug [424, 431, 268, 539, 540].

• If the nested query contains a grouping, special rules are needed to pull
up grouping operators [133].

• Special care has to be taken for a correct duplicate treatment [468, 586,
681, 682].
The main reason for the problems was that SQL lacked expressiveness and
unnesting took place at the query language level. The most important construct
needed for correctly unnesting queries are outer-joins [188, 268, 421, 227, 539].
After their introduction into SQL and their usage for unnesting, reordering
of outer-joins became an important topic [75, 188, 263, 539, 626]. Lately, a
unifying framework for different unnesting strategies was proposed in [540].

14.1 Classification of nested queries

We start by extending the classification of nested queries given by Kim [424].
We restrict ourselves to a single nested block. Kim’s classification introduces
five types of nested queries one of which is not used here (Type D). The four
remaining types are
Type A nested queries have a constant inner block returning single elements.
Type N nested queries have a constant inner block returning sets.
Type J nested queries have an inner block that is dependent on the outer block
and return a set.

279
 280 CHAPTER 14. UNNESTING NESTED QUERIES

Type JA nested queries have an inner block that is dependent on the outer block
and return a single element.
Obviously, the need for extending the relational classification arises from the
richness of the oo model compared to the relational one and its impact on
the query language. The classification we propose has three dimensions: the
original one plus two that are required by the following oo characteristics. In
the oo context, as opposed to the relational, (i) nested blocks may be located in
any clause of a select-from-where query and (ii) a dependency (i.e., reference
to a variable of the outer block) may be expressed in any clause of a query’s
inner block. We restrict the presentation to queries of type A/N/J/JA with
nesting and dependency (J/JA only) in the where clauses.
As in the relational context, the optimization of nested queries is done by
unnesting, using different kinds of joins and group operators. There are two
good reasons for unnesting nested queries. The first is that the underlying
evaluation plan of a nested query relies on nested loops that, as shown in [424],
can be very inefficient. On the other hand, we know of good algorithms for joins
and group operations (using indexes, sorting, hashing). The second reason
is that algebraic operators have nice properties that can be used for further
rewriting whereas nested algebraic expressions don’t have them a priori.

14.2 Queries of Type A

In this case, the nested query does not have any reference to any variable
defined outside its block. This is equivalent to say that the nested query does
not contain any free variables. This allows its independent evaluation. It can
be moved outside the query block and the result produced by the nested query
can be plugged in later. This way we avoid multiple evaluation of the nested
query. The treatment is independent of the place where the nesting occurred.
Consider the following simple example:

select x1 define m = max(select x2s

from x1 in Employee from x2 in Employee)
where x1.TotSales = define x2s = x2.TotSales
max (select x2.TotSales select x1
from x2 in Employee)from x1 in Employee
where x1s = m
define x1s = x1.TotSales

The original query is on the left-hand side. The rewritten query after NFST is
shown on the right-hand side—a convention holding throughout the rest of this
section. Note that the first define entry is independent of the second block.
Hence, it is written before it. Within the implementation of the query compiler
it is convenient to have an artificial outer SFWD-block to which the outer define
clause then belongs.
Type A nested queries can be unnested by moving them one block up (like
in the example). Sometimes, more efficient ways to to unnest these queries are
14.3. QUERIES OF TYPE N 281

possible. In the example the extent of Student has to be scanned twice. This
can be avoided by introducing the new algebraic operator MAX defined as
M AXf (e) := {x|x ∈ e, f (x) = maxy∈e (f (y))}
The MAX operator can be computed in a single pass over e.
Using MAX the above query can be expressed in the algebra as
q ≡ M AXs.age (Student[s])

14.3 Queries of Type N

We discuss three different kinds of predicates occurring within the outer where
clause:
1. f (~x) in select . . .
2. not (f (~x) in select . . . )
3. f (~x) = (⊆, ⊇, . . . ) select . . .
where ~x represents variables of the outer block, f a function (or subquery) on
these variables and =, ⊆, ⊇, . . . are set comparisons. Other cases are possible
but not necessarily unnestable.

1. Type N queries with an in operator can be transformed into a semi-join

by using the following equivalence1 :
σA1 ∈χA2 (e2 ) e1 ≡ e1 <A1 =A2 e2 (14.1)
if Ai ⊆ A(ei ), F(e2 ) ∩ A(e1 ) = ∅
The first condition is obvious, the second merely stipulates that expres-
sion e2 must be independent of expression e1 . The interest for having
this equivalence and the following is obvious. As stated previously, semi-
joins and anti-joins can be implemented efficiently and they allow further
rewriting. Note that special care has to be taken in order to treat dupli-
cates correctly. We use the annotations introduced earlier, to indicate the
correct treatment of duplicates.
2. Also inspired by the relational type N unnesting is the following equiv-
alence which turns a type N query with a negated in operator into an
antijoin:
σA1 6∈χA2 (e2 ) e1 ≡ e1 A1 =A2 e2 (14.2)
if Ai ⊆ A(ei ), F(e2 ) ∩ A(e1 ) = ∅

We refer to [162, 719] for the third case.

These algebraic equivalences are not helpful in themselves. What is need-
ed is a rewrite of the internal representation. We illustrate this for the first
equivalence. Consider the example query
1
A is the set of defined IUs, F is the set of free IUs
282 CHAPTER 14. UNNESTING NESTED QUERIES

select e.name
from Employee e
where e.dno in (select d.dno
from Department d
where d.name like ’S%’)
and its internal representation in textual form:
select en
from Employee[e] (J)
where ed in dnos
define en = e.name
ed = d.dno
dnos = (select dd
from Department[d](J)
where dn like ’S%’
define dd = d.dno
dn = d.dname)

The equivalence allows us to replace the in predicate by a join. On the internal

representation, this is reflected by adding the from clause of the subquery
to the outer from clause, adding the subquery’s define clause entries to the
outer query’s define and adding the subquery’s predicate to the outer query’s
predicate. The result is
select en
from Employee[e] (J)
Department[d] (SJ)
where ed = dd and
dn like ’S%’
define en = e.name
ed = e.dno
dd = d.dno
dn = d.dname

The equivalence allows us to replace the in predicate by a join. Note that we

had to be careful about possible duplicates that would have been introduced
if we added a simple join between departments and employees, since multiple
department names might have started with a ’S’. Adding a distinct would not
have helped since multiple employees might have the same name. Hence, the
correct solution is to add a (SJ) annotation to the departments.
In the presence of key or unique constraints on the inner join column, no
phantom duplicates can be produced. Consider the following example:
select *
from Account[a]
where a.custno IN (select c.custno FROM Customer)
14.3. QUERIES OF TYPE N 283

If c.custno is a key or there is a unique constraint on it, then no phantom

duplicates can be introduced. Hence, it is safe to rewrite the query as
select a.*
from Account[a], Customer[c]
where a.custno = c.custno

If there further exists a reference constraint, we can eliminate the join altogeth-
er. For example, if the create table statement for Account contains a references
Customer on custno constraint on custno, then the query is equivalent to
select *
from Account[a]

Another possibility would be to eliminate duplicates on the subqueries re-

sult. As an example consider the following query:
select *
from Customer[c]
where c.location in (select d.location
from Dept[d]

This query can be rewritten to

select *
from Customer[c],
(select distinct d.location
from Dept[d])
where c.location = d.location

Let us briefly consider queries nested in a set comparison predicate. This

case does not have a counterpart in SQL. However, if we formulate the corre-
sponding queries on a relational schema using the non-standard SQL found in
[424], they would be of Type D—resolved by a division. Using standard SQL,
they would require a double nesting using EXISTS operations. Treating Type
D queries by a relational division can only treat very specific queries where the
comparison predicate corresponds, in our context, to a non-strict inclusion as
in the example below. The query returns the employees who have sold all the
expensive products.
select x define ExpItems = select i
from x in Employee from i in Item
where x.SoldItems ⊇ where p > 20000
select i define p = i.price
from i in Item select x
where i.price > 20000 from x in Employee
where xsi ⊇ ExpItems
define xsi = x.SoldItems
284 CHAPTER 14. UNNESTING NESTED QUERIES

One solution to evaluate this query is to use a technique similar to that of

[424] and add to our algebra an object division. If the set of expensive items
is important, a well implemented division operation could do much compared
to a nested loop evaluation. However, we voted against this operation for three
reasons. The first reason is, as we stated before, that the division is based on
a non-strict inclusion of the divider set. There are no more reasons to have
this inclusion than any other set comparison (⊆, ⊃, . . .). Accordingly, to be
coherent, we would have to introduce one operation per set comparator (as a
matter of fact, this also holds for the relational context). The second reason
is that division does not have particularly nice algebraic properties that we
would like to exploit. The third reason is that, since object models feature set
attributes, it seems more natural to add good algorithms for dealing with selec-
tions involving set comparisons than to add new algebraic operators. Further,
there already exist proposals to treat restriction predicates involving set com-
parison operators [721]. Thus, we prefer not to rewrite the following algebraic
expression which corresponds to the translation of the above query.
q ≡ χx (σxsi⊇ExpItems (χxsi:x.SoldItems (Employee[x])))
ExpItems ≡ χi (σp>20000 (χp:i.price (Item[i])))

The set ExpItems will be evaluated first, independently of query q. The result
of its evaluation will be used by the selection σxsi⊇ExpItems in the outer block.
The selection itself can be evaluated using an algorithm similar to that of a
relational division.
Note that there is no need to consider the negation of set comparisons,
since it is possible to define for each set comparison an equivalent negated
counterpart. Consider for example ¬(e1 ⊆ e2 ) and the set comparison operator
6⊆ defined as (e1 6⊆ e2 ) := (e1 \ e2 6= ∅).

14.4 Queries of Type J

For Type J queries, we distinguish the same three cases as for Type N queries.
Again, queries with in (not in) as the connection predicate are transformed.
At the algebraic level the unnesting reads:
1.
σA1 ∈χA2 (σp (e2 )) e1 ≡ e1 <A1 =A2 ∧p e2 (14.3)
if Ai ⊆ A(ei ), F(p) ⊆ A(e1 ∪ e2 ), F(e2 ) ∩ A(e1 ) = ∅
This equivalence is similar to the one used for type N queries. It just takes
into account a predicate p relying on both e1 and e2 (second condition).
2.
σA1 6∈χA2 (σp (e2 )) e1 ≡ e1 A1 =A2 (e2 <p e1 ) (14.4)
if Ai ⊆ A(ei ), F(p) ⊆ A(e1 ∪ e2 ), F(e2 ) ∩ A(e1 ) = ∅
Type J not in queries cannot be translated directly using an anti-join
operation: a semi-join has to be performed first.
14.4. QUERIES OF TYPE J 285

For other cases and different unnesting possibilities see [162, 719]. The alter-
native unnesting strategies apply outer-joins and unary and binary grouping
operations.
Now, let us consider again the case featuring a set comparison. The query
below returns the employees who have sold all the items with a high-tech degree
larger than the sales speciality of the employee.
select x select x
from x in Employee from x in Employee
where x.SoldItems ⊇ where xsi ⊇ SpecialItems
select i define xsi = x.SoldItems
from i in Item xs = x.speciality
where i.hTD > x.speciality SpecialItems = select i
from i in Item
where ihTD > xs
define ihTD = i.hTD

The algebraic translation of the query is splitted for reasons of clarity:

q ≡ χx (σxsi⊇SpecialItems (q1 ))
q1 ≡ χSpecialItems:χi (σihT D>xs (q3 )) (q2 )
q2 ≡ χxsi:x.SoldItems,xs:x.speciality (Employee[x])
q3 ≡ χihT D:i.hT D (Item[i])

The problem here is that the nested query is not constant. In order to unnest the
query and avoid several costly scans over the set of items, we have to associate
with each employee its corresponding set of special items. For this, we rely on
the following equivalence:

χg:f (σA1 θA2 (e2 )) (e1 ) ≡ e1 Γg;A1 θA2 ;f e2 (14.5)

if Ai ⊆ A(ei ), g 6∈ A1 ∪ A2 , F(e2 ) ∩ A(e1 ) = ∅

Applying this equivalence on q1 results in

q ≡ χx (σxsi⊇SpecialItems (q2 ΓSpecialItems;ihT D>xs;χi q3 ))

The binary grouping operation can be implemented by adapting standard group-

ing algorithms. There is another alternative to this operation that will be given
in the sequel.
Two remarks. First, note that the selection with set comparator ⊇ is now
evaluated between two attributes. As for type N queries, we rely on good algo-
rithms for such selections. Second, note that the application of the equivalence
did not depend on the set comparison of the predicate in the outer where block
but on the comparison of the correlation predicate within the inner block. We
will come back to this point, soon.
Eqv. 14.5 is the most general equivalence for the considered type of queries.
There exist two other equivalences which deal more efficiently, using simple
286 CHAPTER 14. UNNESTING NESTED QUERIES

grouping, with two special cases. The equivalence

g=f (∅)
χg:f (σA1 =A2 (e2 )) (e1 ) ≡ πA2 (e1 1 A1 =A2 (Γg;A2 ;f (e2 ))) (14.6)
if Ai ⊆ A(ei ), F(e2 ) ∩ A(e1 ) = ∅,
A1 ∩ A2 = ∅, g 6∈ A(e1 ) ∪ A(e2 )
relies on the fact that the comparison of the correlation predicate is equality.
The superscript g = f (∅) is the default value given when there is no element in
the result of the group operation which satisfies A1 = A2 for a given element of
e1 . The equivalence
χg:f (σA1 θA2 (e2 )) (e1 ) ≡ πA1 :A2 (Γg;A2 θ;f (e2 )) (14.7)
if Ai ⊆ A(ei ), F(e2 ) ∩ A(e1 ) = ∅,
g 6∈ A(e1 ) ∪ A(e2 ),
e1 = πA1 :A2 (e2 ) (this implies that A1 = A(e1 ))
relies on the fact that there exists a common range over the variables of the
correlation predicate (third condition). We believe that these two cases are
more common than the general case. We will show one application of Eqv. 14.6
in this section. In the next one, we will give an example using an equivalence
derived from Eqv. 14.7.
Eqv. 14.5, 14.6, and 14.7 are not only useful for unnesting type J nested
queries occurring within the where clause in a predicate utilizing set compar-
ison. As already remarked above, applying these equivalence solely depends
on the presence of a correlation predicate. Hence, they enable the derivation
of alternative unnested expressions for the in and not in cases. To see this,
consider σA∈e2 (e1 ) ≡ σA∈B (χB:e2 (e1 )). Further, as demonstrated in the next
section, they play a major role in unnesting type JA nested queries. That is
why they should be considered the core of unnesting nested queries in the oo
context.
Further, alternative unnested evaluation plans avoiding the binary group-
ing operator can also be achieved by applying the following equivalence which
produces an intermediate flat result and then groups it
χg:f (σA0 θA0 (e2 )) (e1 ) ≡ Γg;A1 ;f ◦πA ◦σA2 6=⊥A (e1 1 A01 θA02 e2 ) (14.8)
1 2 1 2

if Ai = A(ei ), A0i ⊆ Ai , g 6∈ A1 ∪ A2 , F(e2 ) ∩ A1 = ∅

where ⊥A is a tuple with attributes A and null values only. Which of the
Eqns. 14.5–14.8 to apply is a matter of costs.
Last, there is a variant of Eqn. 14.5 in case no selection is present:
χg:f (e2 ) (e1 ) ≡ e1 Γg;true;f e2 (14.9)
if g 6∈ A(e1 ) ∪ A(e2 ), F(e2 ) ∩ A(e1 ) = ∅

14.5 Queries of Type JA

In the relational context, the treatment of type JA queries is radically different
from that of type J, N or A. It requires joins, grouping and sometimes outer-joins
14.6. ALTERNATIVE LOCATIONS 287

[188, 268] (remember, from the previous sections, that type N/J SQL queries
required anti-joins and semi-joins). In the oo context, there is no difference
between type J and type JA queries. The reason is that, in order to deal
with set comparison, outer-joins and grouping operations have already been
introduced to treat Type J queries and the resulting equivalences apply to type
J and type JA queries [162, 719]. The grouping operators have been defined
to allow the application of functions to the sets of grouped elements. This
function might as well be an aggregate function. Thus, by applying Eqv. 14.5–
14.8 aggregated type JA queries are treated in exactly the same manner as type
J queries.
Note that, if the applied function of the unary Γ in Equivalence 14.6 is an
aggregate function (as implied by type JA queries), then its right-hand side is
equivalent to the generalized aggregation of [188].

14.6 Alternative locations

Nesting in the from clause Thus far we have only considered unnesting
in the where clause. We briefly consider an example for unnesting in the from
clause in order to illuminate the problems involved in correct duplicate handling.
Consider the follwing query template:

select R.a, S.b

from R, (select s.b
from Ss
where Q) as S(b)
where P

This query can easily be rewritten to

select R.a, S.b

from R, S
where P and Q

No problems occur with duplicates. If both queries specify select distinct,

there is no problem either. However, in

select R.a, S.b

from R, (select distinct s.b
from Ss
where Q) as S(b)
where P

duplicate removal is enforced on the inner query but not on the outer. If we
just unnest is the way we did before, then both possibilities, specifying distinct
for the outer block and not specifying it, possibly results in wrong duplicate
 288 CHAPTER 14. UNNESTING NESTED QUERIES

treatment. We need the annotations introduced earlier to avoid such complica-

tions. Another alternative is to add the keys of R to the select clause, specify
distinct (i.e. remove duplicates) and then project on R.a and S.b without
duplicate removal.

Nesting in the select clause Although nothing forbids it, type A or N

nesting rarely occurs in select clauses. Indeed, there is not much sense in
associating a constant (set or element) to each element of a set. Should that
happen, we rely on the first phase of the optimization process to factor out the
constant block. Thus, it will only be evaluated once.
For type J/JA queries, nesting in the select clause is equivalent to nesting
in the where clause. Remember that the application of Eqns. 14.5–14.8 did
not depend on the predicate in the outer where block but on the correlation
predicate within the inner block. The same kind of correlation predicates is
used when type J/JA nesting occurs in the select clause. We illustrate this
with the following type JA query that associates to each department its number
of employees.

select tuple( select tuple(dept: d, emps: ce)

dept: d, from d in Department
emps: count( select e define ce = count( select e
from e in Employee from e in Employee
where e.dept=d)) where ed=d
from d in Department define ed=e.dept)

Translating this expression into the algebra yields

q ≡ χ[dept:d,emps:ce] (χce:q1 (Department[d]))

q1 ≡ count(χe (σed=d (χed:e.dept (Employee[e]))))

Eqv. 14.6 can be applied yielding:

q ≡ χ[dept:d,emps:ce] (πed (Department[d] 1 ce=0

d=ed (Γce;ed;count◦χe (χed:e.dept Employee[e]))))
≡ πed (Department[d] 1 ce=0
d=ed (Γce;ed;count◦χe (χed:e.dept Employee[e])))

The zero value in the superscript ce = 0 corresponds to the result of the count
function on an empty set. The transformed query can be evaluated efficiently
using, for instance, a sort or an index on Employee.dept.
There exists one type J case where another more powerful technique can
be applied: a flatten operation is performed on the outer block, and there is
no tuple constructor within the outer block’s select clause. As shown in [161],
these queries can be optimized by pushing the flatten operation inside until it
is applied on stored attributes; thus eliminating the nesting. For completeness,
we repeat the example. The example query is
 14.7. DIFFERENT KINDS OF DEPENDENCY 289

flatten(select flatten(select g
select tuple(name:c.name,age:c.age) from e in employee
from c in e.children define ec = e.children
where c.age < 18) g = select tuple(name:n,age:a)
from e in employee) from c in ec
where a < 18
define n = c.name
a = c.age )

The standard translation gives

q ≡ f latten(χg (χg:e2 (χec:e.children (Emp[e]))))
e2 ≡ χ[name:n,age:a] (σa<18 (χa:c.age,n:c.name (ec[c])))
In order to push the flatten operation inside, we have to eliminate the redundant
tuple extension for the attribute g:
q ≡ f latten(χe2 (χec:e.children (Emp[e]))))
e2 ≡ χ[name:n,age:a] (σa<18 (χa:c.age,n:c.name (ec[c])))
Now, we know that for linear f : {τ } → {τ 0 } that
f latten(χf (e)) = f (f latten(e)) (14.10)
Hence,
q ≡ χ[name:n,age:a] (f latten(χe02 )(χec:e.children Emp[e]))
e02 ≡ σa<18 (χa:c.age,n:c.name (ec[c]))
q ≡ χ[name:n,age:a] (σa<18 (f latten(χe002 (χec:e.children Emp[e])))))
e002 ≡ χage:c.age,n:c.name (ec[c])
q ≡ χ[name:n,age:a] (σa<18 (χa:c.age,n:c.name (f latten(χec[c] (χec:e.children Emp[e])))))
≡ χ[name:n,age:a] (σa<18 (χa:c.age,n:c.name (f latten(χe.children[c] (Emp[e])))))
≡ χ[name:n,age:a] (σa<18 (χa:c.age,n:c.name (f latten(χchildren[c] (Emp)))))
≡ σage<18 (χ[name:n,age:a] (χ[a:age,n:name] (f latten(χchildren (Emp)))))
≡ σage<18 (χ[name:name,age:age] (f latten(χchildren (Emp)))))

where redundant tuple constructions were eliminated in the last steps. Note
that the flatten operation is now applied on stored data.

14.7 Different Kinds of Dependency

We distinguish three kinds of dependency: projection dependency (a reference
to an outer variables occurs in the select clause), range dependency (. . . in the
from clause) and predicate dependency (. . . in the where clause). Above, we
studied queries with predicate dependency. In the sequel, we concentrate on
optimization techniques required for range and projection dependencies.
 290 CHAPTER 14. UNNESTING NESTED QUERIES

Range dependency Consider the following query exhibiting a range depen-

dency. It returns the set of employees having the same name than one of their
children.
select x select x
from x in Employee from x in Employee
where x.name in select c.name where xn in CN
from c in x.children define xn = x.name
xc = x.children
CN = select cn
from c in xc
define cn = c.name

The algebraic translation is:

q ≡ χx (σxn∈CN (χCN :nq (χxn:x.name,xc:x.children (Employee[x]))))
nq ≡ χc.name (xc[c])
In terms of unnesting, there is nothing one can do. Nevertheless, the where
clause of the above query is equivalent to the application of the path expression
x.children.name which passes through a set. Hence, in this case, already known
optimization techniques for optimizing path expressions can be applied (see also
Section 33.1).
However, there exist cases where we are able to advantagely reduce range
dependencies to predicate dependencies and, hence, can unnest these queries
by the above introduced techniques. The reduction relies on the existence of
type extents and uses type based rewriting (see Section 33.1). [159, 399, 522,
524, 526]. Since it has already been described, we merely present its usage as
a reduction technique useful for enabling further unnesting of range dependent
subqueries. The example query is
select tuple (e: x.name, c: select s.customer.nameselect tuple (e: xn, c: SCN)
from s in = x.salesfrom x in Employee,
where s.customer.citydefine xn = x.name
= “Karlsruhe”) xs = x.sales
from x in Employee SCN =select scn
from s in xs
where scc = “Karlsruhe”
define sc = s.customer
scn = sc.name
scc = sc.city

Translation to the algebra yields

q ≡ χ[e:xn,c:SCN ] (χSCN :nq (χxn:x.name,xs:x.sales (Employee[x])))
nq ≡ χscn (σscc=“Karlsruhe00 (χscn:sc.name,scc:sc.city (χsc:s.city (xs[s]))))
Relying on the fact that the elements of the attribute sales of an employee
belong to the extent of the class Sale, the inner block of the query can be
14.8. UNNESTING IN 291

rewritten as
nq ≡ χsc.name (σscc=“Karlsruhe00 (χsc:s.customer,scc:sc.city (σs∈xs (Sale[s]))))
Type based rewriting can be performed again using the extent of class Cus-
tomer. This allows us, for instance, to use indexes on Customer.city and
Sale.customer to evaluate the query. However, since our goal is unnesting and
not general optimization, we do not detail on this. Concerning unnesting, it is
important to note that the dependency no longer specifies the range (xs[s]) but
now represents a predicate (σs∈xs ). Herewith, the algebraic expression is of the
same form as one resulting from a predicate dependency. Hence, our unnesting
techniques apply.

Projection dependency Queries of this kind should be rare. If they occur,

they do so in two different flavors. One nice one and one nasty one. The first
occurs if, within the expression forming the select clause, an expression occurs
whose variables all depend on the outer block. Then, this expression has to be
computed only once for each variable combination resulting from the evaluation
of the outer block. Besides this expression, the evaluation of the inner block
is independent of outer variables. Hence, it can be factored out resulting in a
halfway efficient evaluation plan. The nasty case, where the expression contains
variables from the outer and the inner block, requires in general the nested loop
evaluation or cross product.

Remark Nothing restricts variables of the outer block to occur only at one
place within the inner block. If there exist several dependencies, all the cor-
responding unnesting techniques can be applied alternatively. Hence, if for
example a range and a predicate dependency occur, the latter should be used
for unnesting if the range dependency cannot be resolved by type based rewrit-
ing.

14.8 Unnesting IN
requires that the nested query produces no duplicates. this can be enforced by
introducing a duplicat elimination operation.

14.9 Further reading

For those who want to read more about unnesting in the relational context we
recommend the classical papers [188, 268, 280, 421, 424, 431, 468, 539, 540, 626,
681, 682] as well as the newer ones [352, 682]. For unnesting in object-oriented
database systems we recommend [161, 162, 719].

14.10 History
With his seminal paper Kim opened the area of unnesting nested queries in the
relational context [424]. Very quickly it became clear that enormous perfor-
292 CHAPTER 14. UNNESTING NESTED QUERIES

mance gains are possible by avoiding nested-loops evaluation of nested query

blocks (as proposed in [36]) by unnesting them. Almost as quickly, the sub-
leties of unnesting became apparent. The first bugs in the original approach
were detected — among them the famous count bug [431]. Retrospectively, we
can detect the following problem areas:

• Special cases like empty results lead easily to bugs like the count bug [431].
These have been corrected by taking different approaches [188, 431, 421,
268, 539, 540].

• If the nested query contains a grouping, special rules are needed to pull
up grouping operators [133].

• Special care has to be taken for a correct duplicate treatment [352, 468,
586, 681, 682].

The main reason for the problems was that SQL lacked expressiveness and
unnesting took place at the query language level. The most important construct
needed for correctly unnesting queries are outer-joins [188, 268, 421, 227, 539].
After their introduction into SQL and their usage for unnesting, reordering
of outer-joins became an important topic [75, 188, 263, 539, 626]. Lately, a
unifying framework for different unnesting strategies was proposed in [540].
With the advent of object-oriented databases and their query languages,
unnesting once again drew some attention from the query optimization research
community [161, 162, 720, 721, 719, 722]. Different from the relational unnest-
ing strategies which mainly performed at the (extended) SQL source level, re-
searchers prefered to use algebras that allowed nesting. For example, a predicate
of a selection operator could again contain algebraic operators. Unnesting than
took place at the algebraic level. The advantage of this approach are (1) it
is mainly query language independent and (2) by using algebraic equivalences,
correctness proofs could be delivered.
With the arrival of XQuery [240], the field was reopened by Paparizos et al.
[572]. Within their approach, unnesting takes place at the algebraic level. The
underlying algebra’s data model is based on sets of ordered labeled trees [393].
However, instead of using a simple equivalence, a verbal description of more
than one page is used to describe detection of applicability and the according
unnested plan. Since this description is verbal, it is not rigorous and indeed
buggy.

14.11 Bibliography
[256] [574] [612] [41] [100]

14.12 ToDo
betrachte unnesting query:
14.12. TODO 293

select [a:a,b:b]
from a in A
b in A.b

ExtremumSpecialCases ToDo
Nested Relational Approach: [100]
294 CHAPTER 14. UNNESTING NESTED QUERIES
Chapter 15

Optimizing Queries with

Materialized Views

15.1 Conjunctive Views

15.2 Views with Grouping and Aggregation

15.3 Views with Disjunction

15.4 Bibliography
materialized view with aggregates: [717],
materialized view with disjunction: [11],
SQL Server: [282]
other: [12, 125, 126, 139, 472, 732, 764, 827] [114, 118, 140, 128, 244, 411,
457, 575, 602, 673]
some more including maintenance etc: [10, 14, 47, 81, 125, 133, 175, 328, 342]
[373, 410, 471, 599, 639, 228, 717] [732, 741, 740, 849, 828] [6, 215, 216, 350]
Overview: [334]
[473]
performance eval: [79]
Stacked views: [193]
recursion: [218]
with patterns (integration): [602], [217, 219], [200]

295
296CHAPTER 15. OPTIMIZING QUERIES WITH MATERIALIZED VIEWS
Chapter 16

Semantic Query Rewrite

16.1 Constraints and their impact on query opti-

mization
Using Constraints: [279, 321]

16.2 Semantic Query Rewrite

Semantic query rewrite exploits knowledge (semantic information) about the
content of the object base. This knowledge is typically specified by the user.
We already saw one example of user-supplied information: inverse relationships.
As we already saw, inverse relationships can be exploited for more efficient query
evaluation.
Another important piece of information is knowledge about keys. In con-
junction with type inference, this information can be used during query rewrite
to speed up query execution. A typical example is the following query
select distinct *
from Professor p1, Professor p2
where p1.university.name = p2.university.name
By type inference, we can conclude that the expressions p1.university and
p2.university are of type University. If we further knew that the name of uni-
versities are unique, that is the name is a candidate key for universities, then
the query could be simplified to
select distinct *
from Professor p1, Professor p2
where p1.university = p2.university
Evaluating this query does no longer necessitate accessing the universities to
retrieve their name.
Some systems consider even more general knowledge in form of equivalences
holding over user-defined functions [1, 245]. These equivalences are then used
to rewrite the query. Thereby, alternatives are generated all of which are sub-
sequently optimized.

297
298 CHAPTER 16. SEMANTIC QUERY REWRITE

Semantic Query Optimization: [114]

16.3 Exploiting Uniqueness in Query Optimization

[579]

16.4 Bibliography
[73] [65] [820] Foreign functions semantic rules rewrite: [128] Conjunctive Queries,
Branch Minimization: [633]
 Part IV

Plan Generation

299
Chapter 17

Current Search Space and Its

Limits

17.1 Plans with Outer Joins, Semijoins and Anti-

joins
outer join reordering [255, 254, 626, 263], outer join/antijoin plan generation
[611], semijoin reducer [725],

17.2 Expensive Predicates and Functions

17.3 Techniques to Reduce the Search Space

• join single row tables first

• push down SARGable predicates

• For large join queries do not apply transitivity of equality to derive new
predicates and disable cross products and possibly bushy trees.

17.4 Bibliography

301
302 CHAPTER 17. CURRENT SEARCH SPACE AND ITS LIMITS
Chapter 18

Optimizing Queries with

Disjunctions

18.1 Introduction
Simple rewrites as indicated in Section ?? for IN and OR predicates that boil
down to comparisons of a column with a set of constants can eliminate disjunc-
tion from the plan or push it into a multirange index access.
Another possibility that can be used for disjunctions on single columns is
to use DISJOINT UNION of plans. This is a special form of UNION where
conditions ensure that no phantom duplicates are produced. The DISJOINT
UNION operator merely concatenates the result tables without any further
overhead like duplicate elimination.
For example a predicate of the form x = c1 or y = c2 where x and y are
columns of the same table results in two predicates

1. x = c1

2. x <> c1 AND y = c2

Obviously, no row can satisfy both conditions. Hence, the query select *
from R where x = c1 or y = c2 can be safely rewritten to

(select * from R where x = c1 ) DISJOINT UNION (select * from

R where x <> c1 AND y = c2

In case there are indexes on x and y efficient plans do exist. If they don’t the
table R needs to be scanned twice. This problem is avoided by using bypass
plans.
DISJOIN UNIONs can also be used for join predicates. Consider the follow-
ing example query: select * from R, S where R.a = S.a OR R.b = S.a This
query can be rewritten to (select * from R, S where R.a = S.a) DISJOINT
UNION (select * from R, S where R.a <> S.a and R.b = S.b) The gen-
eral condition here is that all equality predicates have one side identical. Note
that both tables are scanned and joined twice. Bypass plans will eliminate this
problem.

303
304 CHAPTER 18. OPTIMIZING QUERIES WITH DISJUNCTIONS

Let us consider a more complex example: select * from R, S where R.a

= S.a AND h.b IN (c1,c2).
XXX

18.2 Using Disjunctive or Conjunctive Normal Forms

18.3 Bypass Plans

All the above approaches rely on conjunctive normal forms. However, in the
presence of disjunctions, this does not necessarily yield good plans. Using a
disjunctive normal form does not always solve the problem either and this
approach has its own problems with duplicates. This is why bypass plans where
developed [418, 724, 158]. The idea is to provide selection and join operators
with two different output streams: one for qualifying tuples and one for the
not qualifying tuples. We cannot go into the details of this approach and only
illustrate it by means of examples. Let us first consider a query with no join and
a selection predicate of the form a ∧ (b ∨ c). This selection predicate is already
in conjunctive normal form. The disjunctive normal form is (a ∧ b) ∨ (a ∧ c).
We first consider some DNF-based plans (Fig. 18.1). These plans generate
duplicates, if a tuple qualifies for both paths. Hence, some duplicate elimination
procedure is needed. Note that these duplicates have nothing to do with the
duplicates generated by queries. Even if the query does not specify distinct,
the duplicates generated must be eliminated. If there are duplicates, which is
quite likely, then the condition a is evaluted twice for those tuples qualifying
for both conjuncts (Plan a and b). Figure 18.2 presents two CNF plans.

b a b c b c

a c a a a

Ia Ib II

Figure 18.1: DNF plans

18.3. BYPASS PLANS 305

a b <
c

b <
c a

I II

Figure 18.2: CNF plans

CNF plans never produce duplicates. The evaluation of the boolean factors
can stop as soon as some predicate evaluates to true. Again, some (expensive)
predicates might be evaluted more than once in CNF plans. Figure 18.3 shows
some bypass plans. Note the different output streams. It should be obvious,
that a bypass plan can be more efficient than both a CNF or DNF plan. It

c b c a a
- + +
b c a a c a
c
-- + - + - +
a a b b b

I II III IV V

Figure 18.3: Bypass plans

is possible to extend the idea of bypass plans to join operators. However, this
and the algorithm to generate bypass plans is beyond the scope of the current
paper (see [418, 724, 158]).
306 CHAPTER 18. OPTIMIZING QUERIES WITH DISJUNCTIONS

18.4 Implementation remarks

The internal representation of execution plans during plan generation typically
differs from that used in Rewrite I. The reason is that many plans have to be
generated and space efficiency is a major concern. As in the query representa-
tion discussed earlier, the physical algebraic operators can be organized into a
hierarchy. Besides their arguments, they possibly contain backpointers to the
original query representation (e.g. for predicates). Sharing is a must for plan
generation. Hence, subplans are heavily shared. The plan nodes are enhanced
by so-called property vectors. These contain information about the plan:

• logical information

– the set of relations joined

– the set of predicates applied so far
– the set of IUs computed so far
– order information

• physical information

– costs
– cardinality information

For fast processing, the first three set-valued items in the logical information
block are represented as bit-vectors. However, the problem is that an upper
bound on the size of these bitvectors is not reasonable. Hence, they are of
variant size. It is recommendable, to have a plan node factory that generates
plan nodes of different length such that the bit-vectors are included in the plan
node. A special interpreter class then knows the offsets and lengths of the
different bitvectors and supplies the operations needed to deal with them. This
bit-vector interpreter can be attached to the plan generator’s control block as
indicated in Fig. 25.3.

18.5 Other plan generators/query optimizer

There are plenty of other query optimizers described in the literatur. Some of
my personal favorites not mentioned so far are the Blackboard query optimzer
[417], the Epoq optimizer [525, 523], the Genesis optimizer [50, 55], the Gral
query optimizer [60], the Lanzelotte query optimizer [451, 452, 453], the Orion
optimizer [45, 46, 423], the Postgres optimizer [400, 344, 342, 343], the Prima
optimizer [348, 346], the Probe optimizer [191, 190, 555], the Straube optimizer
[739, 769, 736, 737, 735, 738]. Highly recommended is a description of the DB2
query optimizer(s) [275].
Also interesting to read is the first proposal for a rule-based query optimizer
called Squirel [714] and other proposals for rule-based query optimizers [251,
668, 415, 414, 498].
18.6. BIBLIOGRAPHY 307

18.6 Bibliography
Disjunctive queries: P. Ciaccia and M. Scalas: Optimization Strategy for Re-
lational Queries. IEEE Transaction on Software Engineering 15 (10), pp 1217-
1235, 1989.
Kristofer Vorwerk, G. N. Paulley: On Implicate Discovery and Query Op-
timization. International Database Engineering and Applications Symposium
(IDEAS’02)
Jack Minker, Rita G. Minker: Optimization of Boolean Expressions-Historical
Developments. IEEE Annals of the History of Computing 2 (3), pp 227-238,
1980.
Chaudhuri: SIGMOD 03: [123]
Conjunctive Queries, Branch Minimization: [633]
Also Boolean Difference Calculus (?): [715]
308 CHAPTER 18. OPTIMIZING QUERIES WITH DISJUNCTIONS
Chapter 19

Grouping and Aggregation

19.1 Introduction
In general, join and grouping operations are not reorderable. Consider the fol-
lowing relations R and S

R A B S A C
a 5 a 7
a 6 a 8
Joining these relations R and S results in

R1S A B C
a 5 7
a 5 8
a 6 7
a 6 8
Applying ΓA;count(∗) to R and R 1 S yields

ΓA;count(∗) (R) A count (∗) ΓA;count(∗) (R 1 S) A count (∗)

a 2 a 4
Compare this to the result of ΓA;count(∗) (R) 1 S:

ΓA;count(∗) (R) 1 S A count (∗) C

a 2 7
a 2 8
Hence ΓA;count(∗) (R) 1 S 6= ΓA;count(∗) (R 1 S).
Since grouping and join operations are in general not reorderable, it is impor-
tant that a query language determines the order of grouping and join operators
properly. In SQL, the grouping operator is applied after the join operators of
a query block.
For example, given the relations schemata

Emp (eid, name, age, salary) and

309
 310 CHAPTER 19. GROUPING AND AGGREGATION

Sold (sid, eid, date, product id, price)

and the query

select e.eid, sum (s.price) as amount

from Emp e, Sold s
where e.eid = s.eid and
s.date between “2000-01-01” and “2000-12-31”
group by s.eid, s.name

results in the algebraic expression

Πe.eid,amount Γs.eid;amount:sum(s.price) (Emp[e] 1e.eid=s.eid σp (Sold[s]))

where p denotes

s.date ≥ ‘2000 − 01 − 010 ∧ s.date ≤ ‘2000 − 12 − 310

Figure 20.1 (a) shows this plan graphically. Note that the grouping operator
is executed last in the plan. This is the standard translation technique applied
to SQL. However, Yan and Larson discovered that under certain circumstances
grouping and join can be reordered [823]. In sequel work, Yan and Larson as
well as Chaudhuri and Shim extended the possibilities to group before or after
a join [129, 823, 824, 825, 826]. These extensions of the search space are the
topic of this chapter.
Before we delve into details, let us consider an alternative plan for the above
query. Here, we push down the grouping operator: The plan then becomes:

Πe.eid,amount Emp[e] 1e.eid=s.eid Γs.eid;amount:sum(s.price) (σp (Sold[s]))

This plan (see also Figure 20.1 (b)) is equivalent to the former plan. Moreover,
if the grouping operator strongly reduces the cardinality of

σs.date≥... (Sold[s])

because every employee sells many items, then the latter plan might become
cheaper since the join inputs are smaller than in the former plan. This moti-
vates the search for conditions under which join and grouping operators can be
reordered. Several papers discuss this reorderability and other kinds of search
space extensions [129, 823, 824, 825, 826]. We will summarize their results in
subsequent sections. Before that, we will take a look at aggregation functions
and their properties.
The plan for the rest of the chapter is the following. First, we take a closer
todo look at aggregate functions and their properties.

19.2 Aggregate Functions

SQL and many other query languages support at least five aggregation func-
tions. These are min, max, count, sum, and avg. In addition, SQL allows
19.2. AGGREGATE FUNCTIONS 311

project[e.eid, amount]

group by[e.eid; amount:sum(price)]

join[e.eid=s.eid]

Emp[e] select[s.date between ...]

Sold[s]
(a)

project[e.eid, amount]

join[e.eid = s.eid]

Emp[e] group by[e.eid, amount:sum(price)]

select[s.date ...]

Sold[s]
(b)

Figure 19.1: Two equivalent plans

to qualify whether duplicates are removed before computing the aggregate or

whether they are also considered by the aggregation function. For example,
we may specify sum(distinct a) or sum(all a) for some attribute a. The
term sum(a) is equivalent to sum(all a). From this follows that aggregation
functions can be applied to sets or bags. Other query languages (OQL and
XQuery) also allow lists as arguments to aggregation functions. Additionally,
OQL allows arrays. Hence, aggregation functions should be defined for any
bulk type.
Most query languages provide a special null value (SQL provides NULL,
OQL UNKNOWN). Typically, aggregation functions can safely ignore null
values. The only exception is count, all input is counted independent of whether
its value is null or not. If we want to count only non-null values, we could
imagine an expression of the form count(distinct not null a). Unfortunately,
this is not valid SQL. However, we will make use of a variant of count, that
does not count null values. Let us denote this function by countnn .
312 CHAPTER 19. GROUPING AND AGGREGATION

Let N denote either a numeral data type (e.g. integer or float) or a tuple
[a1 : τ1 , . . . , an : τn ] where each type τn is a numeral data type. Further, let N
contain a special value NULL denoted by N U LL.
A scalar aggregation function agg is a function with signature

agg : bulk(()τ ) → N

.
A scalar aggregation function agg : bulk(()τ ) → N is called decomposable if
there exist functions

aggI : bulk(()τ ) → N 0
aggO : bulk(()N 0 ) → N

with
agg(Z) = aggO (bulk(()aggI (X), aggI (Y )))
for all X and Y (not empty) with Z = X ∪Bulk Y . This condition assures that
agg(Z) can be computed on arbitrary subsets (-lists, -bags) of Z independently
and the (partial) results can be joined to yield the correct (total) result. If the
condition holds, we say that agg is decomposable with inner aggI and outer
aggO . Decomposability will also be applied to vectors of aggregate functions.
A decomposable scalar aggregation function agg : bulk(()τ ) → N is called
reversible if for aggO there exists a function (aggO )−1 : N 0 , N 0 → N 0 with

agg(X) = γ((aggO )−1 (aggI (Z), aggI (Y )))

for all X, Y , and Z with Z = X ∪Bulk Y . This condition assures that we can
compute agg(X) for a subset (-list, -bag) X of Z by “subtracting” its aggregated
complement Y from the “total” aggO (aggI (Z)) by using (aggO )−1 .
The fact that scalar aggregation functions can be decomposable and re-
versible is the basic observation upon which the efficient evaluation of aggrega-
tion functions builds.
As an example consider the scalar aggregation avg : {{(}}[a : f loat]) →
f loat averaging the values of the attributes a of a bag of tuples with a single
attribute a. It is reversible with

aggI : {[a : f loat]} → [sum : f loat, count : f loat]

O
agg : [sum : f loat, count : f loat], [sum : f loat, count : f loat] → [sum : f loat, count : f loat]
O −1
(agg ) : [sum : f loat, count : f loat], [sum : f loat, count : f loat] → [sum : f loat, count : f loat]
γ : [sum : f loat, count : f loat] → f loat

where

aggI (X) = [sum : sum(X.a), count : |X|]

O
agg ([sum : s1 , count : c1 ], [sum : s2 , count : c2 ]) = [sum : s1 + s2 , count : c1 + c2 ]
(aggO )−1 ([sum : s1 , count : c1 ], [sum : s2 , count : c2 ]) = [sum : s1 − s2 , count : c1 − c2 ]
γ([sum : s, count : c]) = s/c
19.3. NORMALIZATION AND TRANSLATION 313

sum(X.a) denotes the sum of all values of attribute a of the tuples in X, and aggregation
function!duplicated
|X| denotes the cardinality of X. Note that aggI (∅) = [sum : 0, count : 0], and duplicated
γ([sum : 0, count : 0]) is undefined as is avg(∅). aggregation
Not all aggregation functions are decomposable and reversible. For instance, function
min and max are decomposable but not reversible. If an aggregation function
is applied to a bag that has to be converted to a set, then decomposabili-
ty is jeopardized for sum and count. That is, in SQL sum(distinct) and
count(distinct) are not decomposable.
Let us look at the decomposition of our five aggregation functions. We can
decompose them as follows:

min(X ∪Bulk Y ) = min(min(X), min(Y ))

max(X ∪Bulk Y ) = max(max(X), max(Y ))
count(X ∪Bulk Y ) = sum(count(X), count(Y ))
sum(X ∪Bulk Y ) = sum(sum(X), sum(Y ))

Treatment of avg is slightly more complicated, as we have already seen above.

In the presence of null values, avg is defined as avg(X) = sum(X)/countNN (X).
Hence, we can decompose it on the basis of

avg(X ∪Bulk Y ) = sum(sum(X), sum(Y ))/(countNN (X) + countNN (Y ))

It is also useful to classify aggregation functions as follows [825]:

• Class C Aggregate Functions: sum, count

• Class D Aggregate Functions: sum(distinct), count(distinct), min, max,

avg(distinct)
Class C aggregation functions require a multiplication by the count of the inner
query block. Therefore, we sometimes need to replace the vector of aggregation
functions
F = [a1 : agg1 (e1 ), . . . , an : aggn (en )]
by the vector
F ∗c = [a1 : agg∗c ∗c
1 (e1 ), . . . , an : aggn (en )]

agg∗c
i (ei ) is defined as aggi (ei ) if aggi is a class D aggregate function. If aggi
is a Class C aggregate function, we define agg∗c i (ei ) as aggi (ei ) ∗ c where c is
a special attribute that contains the result of some count in a subquery block.
F ∗c is called duplicated aggregation function of F .

19.3 Normalization and Translation

19.3.1 Grouping and Aggregation in Different Query Languages
Conversion from bags to sets must be explicitly specified within the query lan-
guage. As we have seen, in SQL this is done by specifying distinct direct-
ly after the parenthesis following the name of the aggregation function. In
314 CHAPTER 19. GROUPING AND AGGREGATION

OQL, the conversion function distinct is used. For example, the OQL query
avg(distinct(bag(1,1,2,3,3))) return 2. Similarily for XQuery.
We now come to an essential difference between SQL and OQL/XQuery.
SQL allows expressions of the form sum(a) where a is a single-valued attribute.
Since aggregation functions take bulk types as arguments, this expression may
seem to contain a type error. Let us call this false aggregates. There are
two cases to consider depending on whether the block where the aggregation
function(s) occur exhibits a group by or not. . . .

19.3.2 Extensions to Algebra

19.3.3 Normalization
19.3.4 Translation

19.4 Lazy and eager group by

Lazy group by pulls a group operator up over a join operator [823, 824, 825, 826].
Eager group by does the opposite. This may also be called Push-Down Grouping
and Pull-Up Grouping.
Consider the query:

*
select[all | distinct] A, F (B)
from R, S
where pR ∧ pS ∧ pR,S
group by G

with
G = GR ∪ GS , GR ⊆ A(R), GS ⊆ A(S),

F(pR ) ⊆ A(R), F(pS ) ⊆ A(S)

F(pR,S ) ⊆ A(R) ∪ A(S)

B ⊆ A(R) A = AR ∪ AS , AR ⊆ GR , AS ⊆ GS

aggIR = GR ∪ F(pR,S ) \ A(S) κR key of R

aggIS = GS ∪ F(pR,S ) \ A(R) κS key of S

19.4. LAZY AND EAGER GROUP BY 315

We are interested in the conditions under which the query can be rewritten
into
select[all | distinct] A, F B
from R0 , S 0
where pR,S

with R0 (aggIR , F B) ≡
*
select all aggIR , F (B) as F B
from R
where pR
group by aggIR

and S 0 (aggIS ) ≡

select all aggIR

from S
where pS

The following equivalence expresses this rewrite in algebraic terms.

 
[d]
σpR (R) 1pR,S σpS (S) ≡


ΠA,F Γ *
G;F : F (B)

 
[d]
ΠA,F Γ * (σpR (R)) 1pR,S σpS (S)
aggIR ;F : F (B)

holds iff in σpR ∧pS ∧pR,S (R × S) the following functional dependencies hold:
F D1 : G → aggIR
F D2 : aggIR , GS → κS
Note that since GS ⊆ G, this implies G → κS .
F D2 implies that for any group there is at most one join partner in S.
Hence, each tuple in Γ I * (σpR (R)) contributes at most one row to the
aggR ;F : F (B)
overall result.
F D1 ensures that each group of the expression on the left-hand side corre-
sponds to at most one group of the group expression on the right-hand side.
We now consider queries with a having clause.
In addition to the assumptions above, we have that the tables in the from
clause can be partitioned into R and S such that R contains all aggregated
columns of both the select and the having clause. We further assume that
conjunctive terms in the having clause that do not contain aggregation func-
tions have been moved to the where clause.
Let the predicate of the having clause have the form HR ∧ H0 where HR ⊆
A(R) and H0 ⊆ R ∪ S where H0 only contains non-aggregated columns from S.
We now consider all queries of the form
316 CHAPTER 19. GROUPING AND AGGREGATION

*
select[all | distinct] A, F (B)
from R, S
where pR ∧ pS ∧ pR,S
group by G    
* *
having H0 F0 (B) ∧ HR FR (B)

* *
where F0 and FR are vectors of aggregation functions on the aggregated columns
B.
An alternative way to express such a query is

select[all | distinct] G, F B
from R0 , S
where cS ∧ cR,S ∧ H0 (F0 B)

R0 aggIR , F B, F0 B ≡


where
* *
select all aggIR , F (B) as F B, F0 (B) as F0 B
from R
where cR
group by aggIR 
*
having HR FR (B)

The according
 equivalence
 is [825]: 


ΠG,F σHR ∧H0 Γ * * * σpR ∧pS ∧pR,S (R × S)
G;F : F (B),FR :FR (B),F0 :F0 (B)
≡      
ΠG,F σpR,S ∧pS ∧H0 (F0 ) ΠG,F,F0 σHR Γ * * * (R) ×S
G;F : F (B),FR :FR (B)F0 :F0 (B)

19.5 Coalescing Grouping

In this section we introduce coalescing grouping which slightly generalizes simple
coalescing grouping as introduced in [129].
We first illustrate the main idea by means of an example.
Given two relation schemes

Sales (pid, deptid, total price)

Department (did, name, region)

the query

select region, sum (total price) as s

from Sales, Department
where did = deptid
group by region
19.5. COALESCING GROUPING 317

is straightforwardly translated into the following algebraic expression:

Γregion;s:sum(total price) (Sales 1deptid=did Department)

Note that Equivalence ?? cannot be applied here. However, if there are many
sales performed by a department, it might be worth reducing the cardinality of
the left join input by introducing an additional group operator. The result is

Γregion;s=sum(s0 ) Γdeptid;s0 :sum(total price) (Sales) 1deptid=did Department

Note that we must keep the outer grouping.

That is, we introduced an additional group operator to reduce the cardi-
nality of sales. This way, all subsequent joins (only one in this case) become
cheaper and the additional group operator may result in a better plan.
We have the following restrictions for this section:

1. There are no NULL-values allowed for attributes occurring in the query.

2. All queries are of the form select all.

That is select distinct is not allowed.

3. All aggregation functions agg must fulfill aggs1 ∪ s2 = agg{agg(s1 ), agg(s2 )}

for bags s1 and s2 .
This has two consequences:

• Allowed are only sum, min, max. Not allowed are avg and count.
• For any allowed aggregation function we only allow for agg(all . . .).
Forbidden is agg(distinct . . .).

4. The query is a single-block conjunctive query with no having and no

order by clause.

The above transformation is an application of the following equivalence,

where R1 and R2 can be arbitrary algebraic expressions:

ΓG;A (R1 1p R2 ) ≡ ΓG;A2 (ΓG1 ;A1 (R1 ) 1p R2 ) (19.1)

with

A = A1 : agg1 (e1 ) , . . . , An : aggn (en )

A1 = A11 : agg11 (e1 ) , . . . , A1n : aggn1 (en )
A2 = A1 : agg12 A11 , . . . , An : aggn2 A2n

G1 = (F (p) ∪ G) ∩ A (R1 )

Further, the following condition must hold for all i(1 ≤ i ≤ n):
! !
[ [
aggi Sk = aggi2 {aggi1 (Si )}
k k
318 CHAPTER 19. GROUPING AND AGGREGATION

In the above example, we had agg1 = agg11 = agg12 = sum.

We now prove the correctness of Equivalence 20.1.

Proof :
First, note that
[
R1 1p R2 = R1 1p {t2 } (19.2)
t2 ∈R2

Second, note that for a given t2

ΓG;A (R1 [t1 ]) 1p {t2 } = σp(t1 ◦t2 ) (ΓG;A (R1 [t1 ])) (19.3)


= ΓG;A σp(t1 ◦t2 ) (R1 [t1 ])
= ΓG;A (R1 [t1 ] 1p {t2 })

holds where we have been a little sloppy with t1 . Applying (20.2) and (20.3)
to ΓG1 ;A1 (R1 ) 1p R2 , the inner part of the right-hand side of the equivalence
yields:
[
ΓG1 ;A1 (R1 ) 1p R2 = ΓG1 ;A1 (R1 ) 1p {t2 } (19.4)
t2 ∈R2
[
= ΓG1 ;A1 (R1 1p {t2 })
t2 ∈R2

Call the last expression X.

Then the right-hand side of our equivalence becomes

ΓG;A2 (X) = {t ◦ a2 |t ∈ ΠG (X), a2 = A1 : a21 , . . . , An : a2n ,

(19.5)
a2i = aggi2 {s.A1i |s ∈ X, S|G = t} }

Applying (20.2) to the left-hand side of the equivalence yields:

 
[
ΓG;A (R1 1p R2 ) = ΓG;A  {t1 ◦ t2 |t1 ∈ R1 , p (t1 ◦ t2 )} (19.6)
t2 ∈R2

S
Abbreviate {t1 ◦ t2 |t1 ∈ R1 , p (t1 ◦ t2 )} by Y.
t2 ∈R2
Applying the definition of ΓG;A yields:

{t ◦ a | t ∈ ΠG (Y ), a = (A1 : e1 , . . . , An : en ) , (19.7)
ai = aggi ({ei (s)|s ∈ Y, S|G = t})}

Compare (20.5) and (20.7). Since ΠG (X) = ΠG (Y ), they can only differ in
their values of Ai .
19.6. MORE POSSIBILITIES 319

Hence, it suffices to prove that a2i = ai for 1 ≤ i ≤ n for any given t.

a2i = aggi2 ({s.A1i |s ∈ X, S|G = t})

[
= aggi2 ({s.A1i |s ∈ ΓG1 ;A1 (R1 1p {t2 }), S|G = t})
t2 ∈R2
[
= aggi2 ({s.A1i |s ∈ {t1 ◦ t2 ◦ a1 |t1 ∈ ΠG1 (R1 ), p(t1 ◦ t2 ),
t2 ∈R2
a1 = (A11 : a11 , . . . , A1n : a1n )
a1i = aggi1 ({ei (s1 ◦ t2 )|s1 ∈ R1 , S1 |G1 =t1 , p(s1 , t2 )})
S|G = t}})
[
= aggi2 ( {aggi1 ({ei (s1 ◦ t2 )|t1 ∈ ΠG1 (R1 ), p(t1 ◦ t2 ), s1 ∈ R1 , S1 |G1 = t1 ,
t2 ∈R2
p(s1 , t1 ), t1 ◦ t2 |G = t})})
[
= aggi2 ( {aggi1 ({ei (s1 ◦ t2 )|s1 ∈ R1 , s1 ◦ t2 |G = t, p(s1 ◦ t2 )})})
t2 ∈R2
[
= aggi2 ( {aggi1 ({ei (t1 ◦ t2 )|t1 ∈ R1 , t1 ◦ t2 |G = t, p(t1 ◦ t2 )})})
t2 ∈R2
[
= aggi ( {ei (t1 ◦ t2 )|t1 ∈ R1 , p(t1 ◦ t2 ), t1 ◦ t2 |G = t})
t2 ∈R2
[
= aggi ({ei (s)|s ∈ {t1 ◦ t2 |t1 ∈ R1 , p(t1 ◦ t2 )}, S|G = t})
t2 ∈R2
= ai

Equivalence 20.1 can be used to add an additional coalescing grouping in

front of any of a sequence of joins. Consider the schematic operator tree in
Figure 20.2(a). It is equivalent to the one in (b), which in turn is equivalent
to the one in (c) if the preconditions of Equivalence 20.1 hold. Performing a
similar operation multiple times, any of the join operations can be made to be
preceded by a coalescing grouping.

19.6 More Possibilities

Yan and Larson provide a whole set of possibilities to reorder grouping and join
[825]. The query they consider is one of the form

select [all|distinct] ~ 1, A
P1 , P2 , A ~2
from R1 , R2
where p1 and p1,2 and p2
group by G1 , G 2

The abbreviations used are explained below. Note that the order or grouping of
entries in the different clauses is of no relevance. It was just introduced by us for
convenience. An overview of all the different plans that can be produced from
an initial plan is given in Figure ??. Every of the subsequent equivalences has
the initial plan as its left-hand side and one of the other plans as its right-hand
320 CHAPTER 19. GROUPING AND AGGREGATION

Γ Γ Γ

1 1 1

1 a e 1 Γc 1

1 b 1 a e 1 a

ec c b c b

(a) (b) (c)

Figure 19.2: Applications of coalescing grouping

side. Before giving the equivalences together with their conditions, we define
some notation, some of them already used in the query above:

R1 is a relation that contains aggregation columns

R2 is a relation that may or may not contain aggregation columns

Pi are the selection columns of Ri . Define P = P1 ∪ P2 .

~ 1 is a possibly empty sequence of aggregation function calls on columns of R1 .
A
More specifically, we assume that A ~ 1 is of the form a1 : agg1 (e1 ), . . . , ak :
~ 1 ) ⊆ A(R1 )
aggk (ek ) and require that F(A
~ 2 is a possibly empty sequence of aggregation function calls on columns of R2 .
A
More specifically, we assume that A ~ 2 is of the form ak+1 : agg1 (ek+1 ), . . . , an :
~ 2 ) ⊆ A(R2 )
aggk (en ) and require that F(A
~ is the concatentation of A
A ~ 1 and A
~ 2. A
~ may be empty.

Fi are the aggregation columns of R1 and possibly R2 . That is, A~ I = F(A

~ 1)
~ O ~ ~ I ~ O
and A = F(A2 ). Define F = A ∪ A . Then, in case of eager/lazy
group-by, eager/lazy count, and double eager/lazy, F ⊆ A(R1 ).
~ O may con-
In case of eager/lazy group-by-count and eager/lazy split, A
~ I ~
tribute to F = A ∪ A . O
19.6. MORE POSSIBILITIES 321

Ai contains the columns defined by A ~ i . More precisely, A ~ 1 = a1 : agg1 (e1 ), . . . , ak :

~ 2 = a1 : agg1 (e1 ), . . . , ak : aggk (ek ). resulting columns of
aggk (ek ) and A
the application of F on AA in the first group-by when eager group-by is
performed on the above query.

pi is a selection predicate on columns of Ri

p1,2 is the join predicate with columns from R1 and R2 .

Gi are the grouping columns of Ri (Gi ⊆ A(Ri )). Define G = G1 ∪ G2 .

G+ +
i are the columns of Ri participating in join and grouping, i.e. Gi := (Gi ∪
F(p1,2 )) ∩ A(Ri )
The query can be translated into the algebra as follows:
(D)
ΠP,A (ΓG;A~ (σp1 ∧p1,2 ∧p2 (R1 × R2 )))

where the projection is duplicate eliminating if and only if the query specifies
select distinct. P is allowed to contain more columns than those in G if these
are functionally determined by G.
For the equivalences to follow, we assume that duplicates are preserved.
That is, the algebraic query representation is

ΠP,A (ΓG;A~ (σp1 ∧p1,2 ∧p2 (R1 × R2 )))

We will skip any leading Π from subsequent expressions.

19.6.1 Eager/Lazy Group-By-Count

In the following equivalence:
H1 denotes a set of columns in R1

c is the column produced by count(*) after grouping σp1 (R1 ) on H1

~ 1 in the first group-by of table σp (R1 )
A1 the rest of the columns produced by A 1
on H1

Fua the duplicated aggregation function of Fu

Further:

AA = AAd ∪ AAu
AAd = AA ∩ A(R1 )
AAu = AA ∩ A(R2 )
F = A1 ∪ A2

where A1 applies to AAd and A2 applies to AAu .

The expressions E1 :=

F [AAd , AAu ]ΠA [GAd , GAu , AAd , AAu ]G[GAd , GAu ]σ[p1 ∧ p1,2 ∧ p2 ](R1 × R2 )
322 CHAPTER 19. GROUPING AND AGGREGATION

and E2 :=

Πd [GAd , GAu , F AA]

(Fua [AAu , CN T ], Fd2 [F AAd ])ΠA [GAd , GAu , AAu , F AAd , CN T ]G[GAd , GAu ]
σ[p1,2 , p2 ](E3 )

with E3 :=

((Fd1 [AAd ], COU N T [])ΠA [H1 , GA+

d , AAd ]G[H1 ]σ[p1 ]R1 ) × R2 )

are equivalent if
1. A1 contains only decomposable aggregation functions and can be decom-
posed into Fd1 and Fd2

2. A2 contains Class C or Class D aggregation functions

3. H1 −−→ G+
1 holds in σ[p1 ]R1

Note that the equivalence assumes that duplicates are preserved (no ΠD (default
in paper is ΠA which is not written) at the beginning of E1 ).
The main theorem requires that the final selection columns are the same as
the grouping columns, and that the final projection must not remove duplicates.
This can be relaxed. The final selection columns may be a subset of the grouping
columns and the final projection may remove duplicates [822].
Eager/Lazy Group-By We consider the special case where G1 contains
all the aggregation columns. In the following:
H1 denotes a set of columns in R1

A1 denotes the columns produced by applying F[AA] after grouping table R1

on H1 .
Then, the expressions E1 :=

F [AA]ΠA [GAd , GAu , AA]G[GAd , GAu ]σ[p1 ∧ p1,2 ∧ p2 ](R1 × R2 )

and E2 :=
~ O [F AAd ]ΠA [GAd , GAu , F AAd ]G[GAd , GAu ]ΠA [GAd , GAu , F AAd ]σ[p1,2 ∧p2 ](E3 )
A

where E3 :=
~ I [AA]ΠA [H1 , GA+ , AA]G[H1 ]σ[p1 ]R1 ) × R2
(A d

are equivalent if
1. all aggregation functions in F[AA] are decomposable and can be decom-
posed into A~ I and A
~O

2. H1 −−→ G+
1 holds in σ[p1 ]R1

Proof:
19.6. MORE POSSIBILITIES 323

• Since AAu is empty, Fua [AAu , CN T ] is empty

• Deleting all terms related to AAu in E2 of the main theorem gives the E2
here.

Eager/Lazy Count and Eager/Lazy Distinct We consider the special

case where G2 contains all the aggregation columns. In the following equiva-
lence:

H1 denotes a set of grouping (!sic!in YaLa95 for the first time) columns in R1

CNT denotes the column produced by count(*) after grouping σ[p1 ]R1 on
H1

Then, the expressions E1 :=

F [AA]ΠA [GAd , GAu , AA]G[GAd , GAu ]σ[p1 ∧ p1,2 ∧ p2 ](R1 × R2 )

and E2 :=

Fa [AA, CN T ]ΠA [GAd , GAu , AA, CN T ]

G[GAd , GAu ]ΠA [GAd , GAu , AA, CN T ]σ[p1,2 ∧ p2 ](E3 )

where E3 :=
(COU N T []ΠA [H1 , GA+
d ]G[H1 ]σ[p1 ]R1 ) × R2

are equivalent if

1. F are Class C or Class D aggregation functions

2. H1 −−→ G+
1 holds in σ[p1 ]R1

COUNT[] means that we add CNT:COUNT(*) to the select list of the subquery
block.
If within the equivalence F only contains Class D aggregation functions, we
can simply use a distinct in the subquery block. We then call the transforma-
tion from E1 to E2 eager distinct and its reverse application lazy distinct. Note
that in this case Fa is the same as F .
Proof:

• Since AAd is empty, all of A1 , Fd1 , and Fd2 are empty.

• Removing all terms related to AAd in E2 of the main theorem gives the
E2 here.

Double Eager/Lazy In the following equivalence

H2 denotes a set of columns in R2

H1 denotes a set of grouping columns in R1

~ I in the first group-by of table σ[p1 ]R1
FFA denotes the columns produced by A
on H1
324 CHAPTER 19. GROUPING AND AGGREGATION

CNT denotes the column produced by count(*) after grouping σ[p2 ]R2 on
H2

Assume that AA belongs to R1 . Then, the expressions E1 :=

F [AA]ΠA [GAd , GAu , AA]G[GAd , GAu ]σ[p1 ∧ p1,2 ∧ p2 ](R1 × R2 )

and E2 :=
~ O [F AA], CN T ]ΠA [GAd , GAu , F AA, CN T ]G[GAd , GAu ]σ[p1,2 ](E3 × E4 )
Fa [A

where E3 :=
(COU N T []ΠA [H2 , GA+
u ]G[H2 ]σ[p2 ]R2 )

and E4 :=
~ I [AA]ΠA [H1 , GA+ , AA]G[H1 ]σ[p1 ]R1 )
(A d

are equivalent if

1. H2 −−→ G+
2 holds in σ[p1 ]R2

2. H1 −−→ G+
1 holds in σ[p1 ]R1

3. all aggregation functions in F are decomposable and can be decomposed

into A~ I and A
~O

4. all aggregation functions in F are Class C or Class D and its duplicated

aggregation function is Fa

If F contains only class D aggregation functions, we can use distinct in the

subquery block of R2 . In this case Fa is the same as F .
Proof:

• eager/lazy group-by, then eager/lazy count

Double Group-By Push-Down/Pull-Up

The following equivalence shows when a top group-by can be eliminated.
The equivalences E1 :=

F [AA]ΠA [GAd , GAu , AA]G[GAd , GAu ]σ[p1 ∧ p1,2 ∧ p2 ](R1 × R2 )

and E2 :=

ΠA [GAd , GAu , F AA ∗ CN T ]G[GAd , GAu ]σ[p1,2 ](E3 × E4 )

where E3 :=
(COU N T []ΠA [H2 , GA+
u ]G[H2 ]σ[p2 ]R2 )

and E4 :=
(F [AA]ΠA [H1 , GA+
d , AA]G[H1 ]σ[p1 ]R1 )

are equivalent if

1. H2 −−→ G+
2 holds in σp1 (R2 )
19.6. MORE POSSIBILITIES 325

2. H1 −−→ G+
1 holds in σp1 (R1 )

~ are decomposable and can be decomposed

3. all aggregation functions in A
~ I
into A and A ~ O

4. all aggregation functions in F are Class C or Class D and its duplicated

aggregation function is Fa

5. G+
1 −−→ H1 holds in σ[p1 ]R1

6. G+
2 −−→ H2 holds in σ[p2 ]R2

7. (G1 , G2 ) functionally determine the join columns in σ[p1 ∧ p1,2 ∧ p2 ](R1 ×

R2 )

Proof in [822].
Eager/Lazy Split In the following equivalence

H1 denotes a set of columns in R1

H2 denotes a set of columns in R2

c1 denotes the column produced by count(*) after grouping σ[p1 ]R1 on H1

c2 denotes the column produced by count(*) after grouping σ[p2 ]R2 on H2

A1 denotes the columns produced by A1 in the first aggregation of table σ[p1 ]R1
on H1

A2 denotes the columns produced by A2 in the first aggregation of table σ[p2 ]R2
on H2

Fda denotes the duplicated aggregation function of A1

Fua denotes the duplicated aggregation function of A2

Assume also that

1. AA = AAd ∪ AAu where AAd contains only columns of R1 and AAu

contains only columns of R2

2. F = A1 ∪ A2 where A1 applies to AAd and A2 applies to AAu

Then, the expressions E1 :=

F [AAd , AAu ]ΠA [GAd , GAu , AAd , AAu ]G[GAd , GAu ]σ[p1 ∧ p1,2 ∧ p2 ](R1 × R2 )

and E2 :=

Πd [GAd , GAu , F AA]

(Fua [Fu2 [F AAu ], CN T1 ], Fda [Fd2 [F AAd ], CN T2 ])
ΠA [GAd , GAu , F AAu , F AAd , CN T1 , CN T2 ]
G[GAd , GAu ]σ[p1,2 ∧ p2 ](E3 × E4 )
326 CHAPTER 19. GROUPING AND AGGREGATION

where E3 :=

(Fd1 [AAd ], COU N T [])ΠA [H1 , GA+

d , AAd ]G[H1 ]σ[p1 ]R1

and E4 :=

(Fu1 [AAu ], COU N T [])ΠA [H2 , GA+

u , AAu ]G[H2 ]σ[p2 ]R2

are equivalent, if the following conditions hold:

1. A1 contains only decomposable aggregation functions and can be decom-

posed into Fd1 and Fd2

2. A2 contains only decomposable aggregation functions and can be decom-

posed into Fu1 and Fu2

3. A2 and A1 contain Class C or Class D aggregation functions

4. H2 −−→ G+
2 holds in σ[p1 ]R2

5. H1 −−→ G+
1 holds in σ[p1 ]R1

Proof:

• perform eager/lazy group-by-count on R1 and then eager/lazy group-by-

count on R2

19.7 Translation into Our Notation

We define a special unary grouping operator Γ that more closely resembles
grouping/aggregation in relational systems. For that reason assume that ai
(1 ≤ i ≤ n) are attribute names and ei are expressions of the form agg i (e0i ) for
~ the sequence a1 : e1 , . . . , an : en .
some aggregation functions aggri . Denote by A
We then define

ΓG;A~ := {g ◦ [a1 : v1 , . . . , an : vn ]|g ∈ ΠD

G (e), vi = aggr i (Gg )}

where Gg := {t|t ∈ e, t.G = g}. Then

ΓG;A~ := ΠD (χ[g1 :g1 ,...,gk :gk ,a1 :g.a1 ,...,an :g.an ] (Γg;=G;[A]
~ (e)))

Translation Table:
Translation Table:
19.8. AGGREGATION OF NON-EQUI-JOIN RESULTS 327

YaLa95 we cmd comment

R rRx used in constructs like Ri
Rd R1 rRa relation R1
Ru R2 rRb relation R2
P aPx used in constructs like Pi
SGAd P1 aPa projected columns of R1
SGAu P2 aPb projected columns of R2
F ~
A fAx defined as A~ 1 ◦ f A2
Fd ~1
A fAxa vector of aggregate functions applied to attrs of R1
a1 : agg1 (e1 ), . . . , ak : aggk (ek ) fAax form of ”
Fu ~2
A fAb vector of aggregate functions applied to attrs of R2
ak+1 : agg1 (ek+1 ), . . . , an : aggk (en ) fAbx form of ”
AA F aFx defined as A~ I ∪ aF x
AAd ~I
A aFa ⊆ A(()R1 )
AAu ~O
A aFb ⊆ A(()R2 )
FAA A aAx defined as A1 ∪ A2
A1 aAa columns containing aggregation result
< a1 , . . . , ak > aAax form of ”
A2 aAb columns containing aggregation result
< ak+1 , . . . , an > aAbx form of ”
p pPx used in constructs like pi .
Cd p1 pPa selection predicate on relation R1
Cu p2 pPb selection predicate on relation R1
C0 p1,2 pPj join predicate for relations R1 and R2
G aGx defined as G1 ∪ G2
GAd G1 aGa grouping columns of R1
GAu G2 aGb grouping columns of R2
G+ aGpx defined as G+ 1 ∪ G2
+

GA+
d G+1 aGpa grouping columns plus join columns of R1
GA+
u G+2 aGpb grouping columns plus join columns of R2
H aNx set of attributes
NGAd H1 aNa
NGAu H2 aNb
CNT c c

19.8 Aggregation of Non-Equi-Join Results

19.9 Bibliography
The main source of information for this section are the papers by Yan and
Larson [823, 824, 825, 826]. These papers cover the material discussed in this
section although in a different notation. An informal description of some of the
ideas presented here can be found in a paper by Chaudhuri and Shim [129].
All of these papers somewhat discuss the the topic of introducing the optimal
placement of Grouping and Aggregation in a plan generator. Chaudhuri and
Shim devoted another paper to this important topic [131]. Duplicate removal
is a special case of grouping with no aggregation taking place. Already very
early on, Dayal, Goodman, and Katz observed that duplicate removal, can
be pushed down beneficially [189]. This finding was confirmed by Pirahesh,
328 CHAPTER 19. GROUPING AND AGGREGATION

Hellerstein, and Hasan [586]. Gupta, Harinarayan, and Quass [326] discusses
to push down duplicate elimination into a plan by counting the number of
occurring duplicates. That is, they change the representation of the bag. After
joins are performed, they reverse this represenatation change.
Pre-Aggregation: [365, 456] cardinality estimates for pre-aggregation: [366]
ToDo: [611], [634]
Aggregates: [15, 781, 130, 131, 133, 163, 164, 188] [226, 252, 313, 326, 327,
349, 421, 422] [431, 430, 527, 540, 542, 560, 690, 704, 717] [825, 847, 500]
Chapter 20

Grouping and Aggregation

20.1 Introduction
In general, join and grouping operations are not reorderable. Consider the fol-
lowing relations R and S

R A B S A C
a 5 a 7
a 6 a 8
Joining these relations R and S results in

R1S A B C
a 5 7
a 5 8
a 6 7
a 6 8
Applying ΓA;count(∗) to R and R 1 S yields

ΓA;count(∗) (R) A count (∗) ΓA;count(∗) (R 1 S) A count (∗)

a 2 a 4
Compare this to the result of ΓA;count(∗) (R) 1 S:

ΓA;count(∗) (R) 1 S A count (∗) C

a 2 7
a 2 8
Hence ΓA;count(∗) (R) 1 S 6= ΓA;count(∗) (R 1 S).
Since grouping and join operations are in general not reorderable, it is impor-
tant that a query language determines the order of grouping and join operators
properly. In SQL, the grouping operator is applied after the join operators of
a query block.
For example, given the relations schemata

Emp (eid, name, age, salary) and

329
330 CHAPTER 20. GROUPING AND AGGREGATION

Sold (sid, eid, date, product id, price)

and the query

select e.eid, sum (s.price) as amount

from Emp e, Sold s
where e.eid = s.eid and
s.date between “2000-01-01” and “2000-12-31”
group by s.eid, s.name

results in the algebraic expression

Πe.eid,amount Γs.eid;amount:sum(s.price) (Emp[e] 1e.eid=s.eid σp (Sold[s]))

where p denotes

s.date ≥ ‘2000 − 01 − 010 ∧ s.date ≤ ‘2000 − 12 − 310

Figure 20.1 (a) shows this plan graphically. Note that the grouping operator
is executed last in the plan.
Now consider the plan where we push the grouping operator down:

Πe.eid,amount Emp[e] 1e.eid=s.eid Γs.eid;amount:sum(s.price) (σp (Sold[s]))

This plan (see also Figure 20.1 (b)) is equivalent to the former plan. More-
over, if the grouping operator strongly reduces the cardinality of

σs.date≥... (Sold[s])

because every employee sells many items, then the latter plan might become
cheaper since the join inputs are smaller than in the former plan. This moti-
vates the search for conditions under which join and grouping operators can be
reordered. Several papers discuss this reorderability [129, 823, 824, 825, 826].
We will summarize their results in subsequent sections.

20.2 Lazy and eager group by

Lazy group by pulls a group operator up over a join operator [823, 824, 825, 826].
Eager group by does the opposite. This may also be called Push-Down Grouping
and Pull-Up Grouping.
Consider the query:

*
select[all | distinct] A, F (B)
from R, S
where pR ∧ pS ∧ pR,S
group by G
20.2. LAZY AND EAGER GROUP BY 331

project[e.eid, amount]

group by[e.eid; amount:sum(price)]

join[e.eid=s.eid]

Emp[e] select[s.date between ...]

Sold[s]
(a)

project[e.eid, amount]

join[e.eid = s.eid]

Emp[e] group by[e.eid, amount:sum(price)]

select[s.date ...]

Sold[s]
(b)

Figure 20.1: Two equivalent plans

with
G = GR ∪ GS , GR ⊆ A(R), GS ⊆ A(S),

F(pR ) ⊆ A(R), F(pS ) ⊆ A(S)

F(pR,S ) ⊆ A(R) ∪ A(S)

B ⊆ A(R) A = AR ∪ AS , AR ⊆ GR , AS ⊆ GS

αR = GR ∪ F(pR,S ) \ A(S) κR key of R

332 CHAPTER 20. GROUPING AND AGGREGATION

αS = GS ∪ F(pR,S ) \ A(R) κS key of S

We are interested in the conditions under which the query can be rewritten
into

select[all | distinct] A, F B
from R0 , S 0
where pR,S

with R0 (αR , F B) ≡
*
select all αR , F (B) as F B
from R
where pR
group by αR

and S 0 (αS ) ≡

select all αR
from S
where pS

The following equivalence expresses this rewrite in algebraic terms.

 
[d]
σpR (R) 1pR,S σpS (S) ≡


ΠA,F Γ *
G;F : F (B)

 
[d]
ΠA,F Γ * (σpR (R)) 1pR,S σpS (S)
αR ;F : F (B)

holds iff in σpR ∧pS ∧pR,S (R × S) the following functional dependencies hold:
F D1 : G → αR
F D2 : αR , GS → κS
Note that since GS ⊆ G, this implies G → κS .
F D2 implies that for any group there is at most one join partner in S.
Hence, each tuple in Γ * (σpR (R)) contributes at most one row to the
αR ;F : F (B)
overall result.
F D1 ensures that each group of the expression on the left-hand side corre-
sponds to at most one group of the group expression on the right-hand side.
We now consider queries with a having clause.
In addition to the assumptions above, we have that the tables in the from
clause can be partitioned into R and S such that R contains all aggregated
20.3. COALESCING GROUPING 333

columns of both the select and the having clause. We further assume that
conjunctive terms in the having clause that do not contain aggregate functions
have been moved to the where clause.
Let the predicate of the having clause have the form HR ∧ H0 where HR ⊆
A(R) and H0 ⊆ R ∪ S where H0 only contains non-aggregated columns from S.
We now consider all queries of the form
*
select[all | distinct] A, F (B)
from R, S
where pR ∧ pS ∧ pR,S
group by G    
* *
having H0 F0 (B) ∧ HR FR (B)

* *
where F0 and FR are vectors of aggregate functions on the aggregated columns
B.
An alternative way to express such a query is

select[all | distinct] G, F B
from R0 , S
where cS ∧ cR,S ∧ H0 (F0 B)

where R0 (αR , F B, F0 B) ≡
* *
select all αR , F (B) as F B, F0 (B) as F0 B
from R
where cR
group by αR  
*
having HR FR (B)

The according
 equivalence
 is [825]: 


ΠG,F σHR ∧H0 Γ * * * σpR ∧pS ∧pR,S (R × S)
G;F : F (B),FR :FR (B),F0 :F0 (B)
≡      
ΠG,F σpR,S ∧pS ∧H0 (F0 ) ΠG,F,F0 σHR Γ * * * (R) ×S
G;F : F (B),FR :FR (B)F0 :F0 (B)

20.3 Coalescing Grouping

In this section we introduce coalescing grouping which slightly generalizes simple
coalescing grouping as introduced in [129].
We first illustrate the main idea by means of an example.
Given two relation schemes

Sales (pid, deptid, total price)

Department (did, name, region)
334 CHAPTER 20. GROUPING AND AGGREGATION

the query
select region, sum (total price) as s
from Sales, Department
where did = deptid
group by region
is straightforwardly translated into the following algebraic expression:

Γregion;s:sum(total price) (Sales 1deptid=did Department)

Note that Equivalence ?? cannot be applied here. However, if there are many
sales performed by a department, it might be worth reducing the cardinality of
the left join input by introducing an additional group operator. The result is

Γregion;s=sum(s0 ) Γdeptid;s0 :sum(total price) (Sales) 1deptid=did Department

Note that we must keep the outer grouping.

That is, we introduced an additional group operator to reduce the cardi-
nality of sales. This way, all subsequent joins (only one in this case) become
cheaper and the additional group operator may result in a better plan.
We have the following restrictions for this section:
1. There are no NULL-values allowed for attributes occurring in the query.

2. All queries are of the form select all.

That is select distinct is not allowed.

3. All aggregate functions agg must fulfill aggs1 ∪ s2 = agg{agg(s1 ), agg(s2 )}

for bags s1 and s2 .
This has two consequences:

• Allowed are only sum, min, max. Not allowed are avg and count.
• For any allowed aggregate function we only allow for agg(all . . .).
Forbidden is agg(distinct . . .).

4. The query is a single-block conjunctive query with no having and no

order by clause.
The above transformation is an application of the following equivalence,
where R1 and R2 can be arbitrary algebraic expressions:

ΓG;A (R1 1p R2 ) ≡ ΓG;A2 (ΓG1 ;A1 (R1 ) 1p R2 ) (20.1)

with

A = A1 : agg1 (e1 ) , . . . , An : aggn (en )

A1 = A11 : agg11 (e1 ) , . . . , A1n : aggn1 (en )
A2 = A1 : agg12 A11 , . . . , An : aggn2 A2n

G1 = (F (p) ∪ G) ∩ A (R1 )
20.3. COALESCING GROUPING 335

Further, the following condition must hold for all i(1 ≤ i ≤ n):
! !
[ [
2 1
aggi Sk = aggi {aggi (Si )}
k k

In the above example, we had agg1 = agg11 = agg12 = sum.

We now prove the correctness of Equivalence 20.1.

Proof :
First, note that [
R1 1p R2 = R1 1p {t2 } (20.2)
t2 ∈R2

Second, note that for a given t2

ΓG;A (R1 [t1 ]) 1p {t2 } = σp(t1 ◦t2 ) (ΓG;A (R1 [t1 ])) (20.3)


= ΓG;A σp(t1 ◦t2 ) (R1 [t1 ])
= ΓG;A (R1 [t1 ] 1p {t2 })

holds where we have been a little sloppy with t1 . Applying (20.2) and (20.3)
to ΓG1 ;A1 (R1 ) 1p R2 , the inner part of the right-hand side of the equivalence
yields:
[
ΓG1 ;A1 (R1 ) 1p R2 = ΓG1 ;A1 (R1 ) 1p {t2 } (20.4)
t2 ∈R2
[
= ΓG1 ;A1 (R1 1p {t2 })
t2 ∈R2

Call the last expression X.

Then the right-hand side of our equivalence becomes

ΓG;A2 (X) = {t ◦ a2 |t ∈ ΠG (X), a2 = A1 : a21 , . . . , An : a2n ,

(20.5)
a2i = aggi2 {s.A1i |s ∈ X, S|G = t} }

Applying (20.2) to the left-hand side of the equivalence yields:

 
[
ΓG;A (R1 1p R2 ) = ΓG;A  {t1 ◦ t2 |t1 ∈ R1 , p (t1 ◦ t2 )} (20.6)
t2 ∈R2
S
Abbreviate {t1 ◦ t2 |t1 ∈ R1 , p (t1 ◦ t2 )} by Y.
t2 ∈R2
Applying the definition of ΓG;A yields:

{t ◦ a | t ∈ ΠG (Y ), a = (A1 : e1 , . . . , An : en ) , (20.7)
ai = aggi ({ei (s)|s ∈ Y, S|G = t})}

Compare (20.5) and (20.7). Since ΠG (X) = ΠG (Y ), they can only differ in
their values of Ai .
336 CHAPTER 20. GROUPING AND AGGREGATION

Hence, it suffices to prove that a2i = ai for 1 ≤ i ≤ n for any given t.

a2i = aggi2 ({s.A1i |s ∈ X, S|G = t})

[
= aggi2 ({s.A1i |s ∈ ΓG1 ;A1 (R1 1p {t2 }), S|G = t})
t2 ∈R2
[
= aggi2 ({s.A1i |s ∈ {t1 ◦ t2 ◦ a1 |t1 ∈ ΠG1 (R1 ), p(t1 ◦ t2 ),
t2 ∈R2
a1 = (A11 : a11 , . . . , A1n : a1n )
a1i = aggi1 ({ei (s1 ◦ t2 )|s1 ∈ R1 , S1 |G1 =t1 , p(s1 , t2 )})
S|G = t}})
[
= aggi2 ( {aggi1 ({ei (s1 ◦ t2 )|t1 ∈ ΠG1 (R1 ), p(t1 ◦ t2 ), s1 ∈ R1 , S1 |G1 = t1 ,
t2 ∈R2
p(s1 , t1 ), t1 ◦ t2 |G = t})})
[
= aggi2 ( {aggi1 ({ei (s1 ◦ t2 )|s1 ∈ R1 , s1 ◦ t2 |G = t, p(s1 ◦ t2 )})})
t2 ∈R2
[
= aggi2 ( {aggi1 ({ei (t1 ◦ t2 )|t1 ∈ R1 , t1 ◦ t2 |G = t, p(t1 ◦ t2 )})})
t2 ∈R2
[
= aggi ( {ei (t1 ◦ t2 )|t1 ∈ R1 , p(t1 ◦ t2 ), t1 ◦ t2 |G = t})
t2 ∈R2
[
= aggi ({ei (s)|s ∈ {t1 ◦ t2 |t1 ∈ R1 , p(t1 ◦ t2 )}, S|G = t})
t2 ∈R2
= ai

Equivalence 20.1 can be used to add an additional coalescing grouping in

front of any of a sequence of joins. Consider the schematic operator tree in
Figure 20.2(a). It is equivalent to the one in (b), which in turn is equivalent
to the one in (c) if the preconditions of Equivalence 20.1 hold. Performing a
similar operation multiple times, any of the join operations can be made to be
preceded by a coalescing grouping.

20.4 ToDo
[611]
20.4. TODO 337

Γ Γ Γ

1 1 1

1 a e 1 Γc 1

1 b 1 a e 1 a

ec c b c b

(a) (b) (c)

Figure 20.2: Applications of coalescing grouping

338 CHAPTER 20. GROUPING AND AGGREGATION
Chapter 21

Generating Plans for the Full

Algebra

339
340 CHAPTER 21. GENERATING PLANS FOR THE FULL ALGEBRA
Chapter 22

Generating DAG-structured
Plans

@misc{ roy-optimization,
author = "Prasan Roy",
title = "Optimization of DAG-Structured Query Evaluation Plans",
url = "citeseer.nj.nec.com/roy98optimization.html" }

341
342 CHAPTER 22. GENERATING DAG-STRUCTURED PLANS
Chapter 23

Deriving and Dealing with

Interesting Orderings and
Groupings

[This chapter was written by Thomas Neumann and Guido Moerkotte]

23.1 Introduction
The most expensive operations (e.g. join, grouping, duplicate elimination) dur-
ing query evaluation can be performed more efficiently if the input is ordered
or grouped in a certain way. Therefore, it is crucial for query optimization to
recognize cases where the input of an operator satisfies the ordering or group-
ing requirements needed for a more efficient evaluation. Since a plan generator
typically considers millions of different plans – and, hence, operators –, this
recognition easily becomes a performance bottleneck for plan generation, often
leading to heuristic solutions.
The importance of exploiting available orderings has already been recog-
nized in the seminal work of Selinger et al [672]. They presented the concept of
interesting orderings and showed how redundant sort operations could be avoid-
ed by reusing available orderings, rendering sort-based operators like sort-merge
join much more interesting.
Along these lines, it is beneficial to reuse available grouping properties, for
example for hash-based operators. While heuristic techniques to avoid redun-
dant group-by operators have been given [129], for a long time groupings have
not been treated as thoroughly as orderings. One reason might be that while
orderings and groupings are related (every ordering is also a grouping), group-
ings behave somewhat differently. For example, a tuple stream grouped on the
attributes {a, b} need not be grouped on the attribute {a}. This is different
from orderings, where a tuple stream ordered on the attributes (a, b) is also
ordered on the attribute (a). Since no simple prefix (or subset) test exists for
groupings, optimizing groupings even in a heuristic way is much more difficult
than optimizing orderings. Still, it is desirable to combine order optimization
and the optimization of groupings, as the problems are related and treated sim-

343
344CHAPTER 23. DERIVING AND DEALING WITH INTERESTING ORDERINGS AND GROUPIN

ilarly during plan generation. Recently, some work in this direction has been
published [790]. However, this only covers a special case of grouping. Instead,
in this chapter we follow the approach presented by Neumann and Moerkotte
[544, 543]
Other existing frameworks usually consider only order optimization, and
experimental results have shown that the costs for order optimization can have
a large impact on the total costs of query optimization [544]. Therefore, some
care is needed when adding groupings to order optimization, as a slowdown of
plan generation would be unacceptable.
In this chapter, we present a framework to efficiently reason about orderings
and groupings. It can be used for the plan generator described in Chapter ??,
but is actually an independent component that could be used in any kind of plan
generator. Experimental results show that it efficiently handles orderings and
groupings at the same time, with no additional costs during plan generation and
only modest one time costs. Actually, the operations needed for both ordering
and grouping optimization during plan generation can be performed in O(1),
basically allowing to exploit groupings for free.

23.2 Problem Definition

The order manager component used by the plan generator combines order op-
timization and the handling of grouping in one consistent set of algorithms and
data structures. In this section, we give a more formal definition of the prob-
lem and the scope of the framework. First, we define the operations of ordering
and grouping (Section 23.2.1 and 23.2.2). Then, we briefly discuss functional
dependencies (Section 23.2.3) and how they interact with algebraic operators
(Section 23.2.4). Finally, we explain how the component is actually used during
plan generation (Section 23.2.5).

23.2.1 Ordering
During plan generation, many operators require or produce certain orderings.
To avoid redundant sorting, it is required to keep track of the orderings a certain
plan satisfies. The orderings that are relevant for query optimization are called
interesting orders [672]. The set of interesting orders for a given query consists
of

1. all orderings required by an operator of the physical algebra that may be

used in a query execution plan for the given query, and

2. all orderings produced by an operator of the physical algebra that may

be used in a query execution plan for the given query.

This includes the final ordering requested by the given query, if this is specified.
The interesting orders are logical orderings. This means that they specify a
condition a tuple stream must meet to satisfy the given ordering. In contrast,
the physical ordering of a tuple stream is the actual succession of tuples in
the stream. Note that while a tuple stream has only one physical ordering,
23.2. PROBLEM DEFINITION 345

it can satisfy multiple logical orderings. For example, the stream of tuples
((1, 1), (2, 2)) with schema (a, b) has one physical ordering (the actual stream),
but satisfies the logical orderings a, b, ab and ba.
Some operators, like sort, actually influence the physical ordering of a
tuple stream. Others, like select, only influence the logical ordering. For
example, a sort[a] produces a tuple stream satisfying the ordering (a) by
actually changing the physical order of tuples. After applying select[a=b] to
this tuple stream, the result satisfies the logical orderings (a), (b), (a, b), (b, a),
although the physical ordering did not change. Deduction of logical orderings
can be described by using the well-known notion of functional dependency (FD)
[709]. In general, the influence of a given algebraic operator on a set of logical
orderings can be described by a set of functional dependencies.
We now formalize the problem. Let R = (t1 , . . . , tr ) be a stream (ordered
sequence) of tuples in attributes A1 , . . . , An . Then R satisfies the logical order-
ing o = (Ao1 , . . . , Aom ) (1 ≤ oi ≤ n) if and only if for all 1 ≤ i < j ≤ r the
following condition holds:

(ti .Ao1 ≤ tj .Ao1 )

∧ ∀1 < k ≤ m (∃1 ≤ l < k(ti .Aol < tj .Aol )) ∨
((ti .Aok−1 = tj .Aok−1 ) ∧
(ti .Aok ≤ tj .Aok ))

Next, we need to define the inference mechanism. Given a logical ordering

o = (Ao1 , . . . , Aom ) of a tuple stream R, then R obviously satisfies any logical
ordering that is a prefix of o including o itself.
Let R be a tuple stream satisfying both the logical ordering o = (A1 , . . . , An )
and the functional dependency f = B1 , . . . , Bk → Bk+1 1 with Bi ∈ {A1 . . . An }.
Then R also satisfies any logical ordering derived from o as follows: add Bk+1
to o at any position such that all of B1 , . . . , Bk occurred before this position
in o. For example, consider a tuple stream satisfying the ordering (a, b); after
inducing the functional dependency a, b → c, the tuple stream also satisfies the
ordering (a, b, c), but not the ordering (a, c, b). Let O0 be the set of all logical
orderings that can be constructed this way from o and f after prefix closure.
Then, we use the following notation: o `f O0 . Let e be the equation Ai = Aj .
Then, o `e O0 , where O0 is the prefix closure of the union of the following three
sets. The first set is O1 defined as o `Ai →Aj O1 , the second is O2 defined as
o `Aj →Ai O2 , and the third is the set of logical orderings derived from o where a
possible occurrence of Ai is replaced by Aj or vice versa. For example, consider
a tuple stream satisfying the ordering (a); after inducing the equation a = b,
the tuple stream also satisfies the orderings (a, b), (b) and (b, a). Let e be an
equation of the form A = const. Then O0 (o `e O0 ) is derived from o by inserting
A at any position in o. This is equivalent to o `∅→A O0 . For example, consider a
tuple stream satisfying the ordering (a, b); after inducing the equation c = const
the tuple stream also satisfies the orderings (c, a, b), (a, c, b) and (a, b, c).
1
Any functional dependency which is not in this form can be normalized into a set of FDs
of this form.
346CHAPTER 23. DERIVING AND DEALING WITH INTERESTING ORDERINGS AND GROUPIN

Let O be a set of logical orderings and F a set of functional dependen-

cies (and possibly equations). We define the sets of inferred logical orderings
Ωi (O, F ) as follows:

Ω0 (O, F ) := O
Ωi (O, F ) := Ωi−1 (O, F ) ∪
[
O0 with o `f O0
f ∈F,o∈Ωi−1 (O,F )
S∞
Let Ω(O, F ) be the prefix closure of i=0 Ωi (O, F ). We write o `F o0 if and
only if o0 ∈ Ω(O, F ).

23.2.2 Grouping
It was shown in [790] that, similar to order optimization, it is beneficial to
keep track of the groupings satisfied by a certain plan. Traditionally, group-by
operators are either applied after the rest of the query has been processed or
are scheduled using some heuristics [129]. However, the plan generator could
take advantage of grouping properties produced e.g. by avoiding re-hashing if
such information was easily available.
Analogous to order optimization, we call this grouping optimization and
define that the set of interesting groupings for a given query consists of

1. all groupings required by an operator of the physical algebra that may be

used in a query execution plan for the given query

2. all groupings produced by an operator of the physical algebra that may

be used in a query execution plan for the given query.

This includes the grouping specified by the group-by clause of the query, if any
exists.
These groupings are similar to logical orderings, as they specify a condition
a tuple stream must meet to satisfy a given grouping. Likewise, functional
dependencies can be used to infer new groupings.
More formally, a tuple stream R = (t1 , . . . , tr ) in attributes A1 , . . . , An
satisfies the grouping g = {Ag1 . . . , Agm } (1 ≤ gi ≤ n) if and only if for all
1 ≤ i < j < k ≤ r the following condition holds:

∀1 ≤ l ≤ m ti .Agl = tk .Agl
⇒ ∀1 ≤ l ≤ m ti .Agl = tj .Agl

Two remarks are in order here. First, note that a grouping is a set of
attributes and not – as orderings – a sequence of attributes. Second, note
that given two groupings g and g 0 ⊂ g and a tuple stream R satisfying the
grouping g, R need not satisfy the grouping g 0 . For example, the tuple stream
((1, 2), (2, 3), (1, 4)) with the schema (a, b) is grouped by {a, b}, but not by {a}.
This is different from orderings, where a tuple stream satisfying an ordering o
also satisfies all orderings that are a prefix of o.
23.2. PROBLEM DEFINITION 347

New groupings can be inferred by functional dependencies as follows: Let R

be a tuple stream satisfying both the grouping g = {A1 , . . . , An } and the func-
tional dependency f = B1 , . . . , Bk → Bk+1 with {B1 , . . . , Bk } ⊆ {A1 , . . . , An }.
Then R also satisfies the grouping g 0 = {A1 , . . . , An } ∪ {Bk+1 }. Let G0 be the
set of all groupings that can be constructed this way from g and f . Then we
use the following notation: g `f G0 . For example {a, b} `a,b→c {a, b, c}. Let e
be the equation Ai = Aj . Then g `e G0 where G0 is the union of the follow-
ing three sets. The first set is G1 defined as g `Ai →Aj G1 , the second is G2
defined as g `Aj →Ai G2 , and the third is the set of groupings derived from g
where a possible occurrence of Ai is replaced by Aj or vice versa. For example,
{a, b} `b=c {a, c}. Let e be an equation of the form A = const. Then g `e G0 is
defined as g `∅→A G0 . For example, {a, b} `c=const {a, b, c}.
Let G be a set of groupings and F be a set of functional dependencies (and
possibly equations). We define the set of inferred groupings Ωi (G, F ) as follows:

Ω0 (G, F ) := G
Ωi (G, F ) := Ωi−1 (G, F ) ∪
[
G0 with g `f G0
f ∈F,g∈Ωi−1 (G,F )

S∞
Let Ω(G, F ) be i=0 Ωi (G, F ). We write g `F g 0 if and only if g 0 ∈ Ω(G, F ).

23.2.3 Functional Dependencies

The reasoning about orderings and groupings assumes that the set of func-
tional dependencies is known. The process of gathering the relevant functional
dependencies is described in detail in [709, 710]. Predominantly, there are three
sources of functional dependencies:

1. key constraints

2. join predicates [references constraints]

3. filter predicates

4. simple expressions

However, the algorithm makes no assumption about the functional dependen-

cies. If for some reason an operator induces another kind of functional depen-
dency (e.g., when using TID-based optimizations [506]), this can be handled
the same way. The only important fact is that we provide the set of functional
dependencies as input to the algorithm.

23.2.4 Algebraic Operators

To illustrate the propagation of orderings and groupings during query optimiza-
tion, we give some rules for concrete (physical) operators in Figure 23.1. As a
 348CHAPTER 23. DERIVING AND DEALING WITH INTERESTING ORDERINGS AND GROUPIN

operator requires produces

scan(R) - O(R)
indexscan(Idx) - O(Idx)
map(S,a = f (b)) - Ω(O(S), b → a)
select(S,a = b) - Ω(O(S), a = b)
bnl-join(S1 ,S2 ) - O(S1 )
indexnl-join(S1 ,S2 ) - O(S1 )
djoin(S1 ,S2 ) - O(S1 )
sort(S,a1 , . . . , an ) - (a1 , . . . , an )
group-by(S,a1 , . . . , an ) - {a1 , . . . , an }
hash(S,a1 , . . . , an ) - {a1 , . . . , an }
sort-merge(S1 ,S2 ,~a = ~b) ~a ∈ O(S1 ) ∧ ~b ∈ O(S2 ) Ω(O(S1 ), ~a = ~b)
hash-join(S1 ,S2 ,~a = ~b) ~a ↓∈ O(S1 ) ∧ ~b ↓∈ O(S2 ) Ω(O(S1 ), ~a = ~b)

Figure 23.1: Propagation of orderings and groupings

shorthand, we use the following notation:

O(R) set of logical orderings and groupings satisfied by the physical order-
ing of the relation R
O(S) inferred set of logical orderings and groupings satisfied by the tuple
stream S
x↓ {y|y ∈ x}
Note that these rules somewhat depend on the actual implementation of the
operators, e.g. a blockwise nested loop join might actually destroy the ordering
EXC if the blocks are stored in hash tables. The rules are also simplified: For exam-
ple, a group-by will probably compute some aggregate functions, inducing new
functional dependencies. Furthermore, additional information can be derived
from schema information: If the right-hand side of a dependent join (index
nested loop joins are similar) produces at most one tuple, and the left-hand
side is grouped on the free attributes of the right-hand side (e.g. if they do not
contain duplicates) the output is also grouped on the attributes of the right-
hand side. This situation is common, especially for index nested loop joins,
and is detected automatically if the corresponding functional dependencies are
considered. Therefore, it is important that all operators consider all functional
dependencies they induce.

23.2.5 Plan Generation

To exploit available logical orderings and groupings, the plan generator needs
access to the combined order optimization and grouping component, which we
describe as an abstract data type (ADT). An instance of this abstract data
type OrderingGrouping represents a set of logical orderings and groupings,
and wherever necessary, an instance is embedded into a plan note. The main
operations the abstract data type OrderingGrouping must provide are

1. a constructor for a given logical ordering or grouping,

23.3. OVERVIEW 349

2. a membership test (called containsOrdering(LogicalOrdering)) which

tests whether the set contains the logical ordering given as parameter,

3. a membership test (called containsGrouping(Grouping)) which tests

whether the set contains the grouping given as parameter, and

4. an inference operation (called infer(set<FD>)). Given a set of functional

dependencies and equations, it computes a new set of logical orderings and
groupings a tuple stream satisfies.

These operations can be implemented by using the formalism described

before: containsOrdering tests for o ∈ O, containsGrouping tests for o ∈ G
and infer(F) calculates Ω(O, F ) respectively Ω(G, F ). Note that the intuitive
approach to explicitly maintain the set of all logical orderings and groupings
is not useful in practice. For example, if a sort operator sorts a tuple stream
on (a, b), the result is compatible with logical orderings {(a, b), (a)}. After a
selection operator with selection predicate x = const is applied, the set of logical
orderings changes to {(x, a, b), (a, x, b), (a, b, x), (x, a), (a, x), (x)}. Since the
size of the set increases quadratically with every additional selection predicate
of the form v = const, a naive representation as a set of logical orderings is
problematic. This led Simmen et al. to introduce a more concise representation,
which is discussed in the related work section. Note that Simmen’s technique is
not easily applicable to groupings, and no algorithm was proposed to efficiently
maintain the set of available groupings. The order optimization component
described here closes this gap by supporting both orderings and groupings.
The problem of quadatic growth is avoided by only implicitly representing the
set.

23.3 Overview
As we have seen, explicit maintenance of the set of logical orderings and group-
ings can be very expensive. However, the ADT OrderingGrouping required
for plan generation does not need to offer access to this set: It only allows to
test if a given interesting order or grouping is in the set and changes the set
according to new functional dependencies. Hence, it is not required to explicitly
represent this set; an implicit representation is sufficient as long as the ADT
operations can be implemented atop of it. In other words, we need not be able
to reconstruct the set of logical orderings and groupings from the state of the
ADT. This gives us room for optimizations.
The initial idea (see [544]) was to represent sets of logical orderings as states
of a finite state machine (FSM). Roughly, a state of the FSM represents a
current physical ordering and the set of logical orderings that can be inferred
from it given a set of functional dependencies. The edges (transitions) in the
FSM are labeled by sets of functional dependencies. They lead from one state
to another, if the target state of the edge represents the set of logical orderings
that can be derived from the orderings the edge’s source node represents by
applying the set of functional dependencies the edge is labeled with. We have
350CHAPTER 23. DERIVING AND DEALING WITH INTERESTING ORDERINGS AND GROUPIN

abcd

ǫ {b → d}
ǫ ǫ
abc ab a

{b → d} ǫ {b → d}
ǫ
abdc abd

Figure 23.2: Possible FSM for orderings

to use sets of functional dependencies, since a single algebraic operator may

introduce more than one functional dependency.
Let us illustrate the idea by a simple example and then discuss some prob-
lems. In Figure 23.2, an FSM for the interesting order (a, b, c) and its prefixes
(remember that we need prefix closure) and the set of functional dependencies
{b → d} is given. When a physical ordering satisfies (a, b, c), it also satisfies
its prefixes (a, b) and (a). This is indicated by the  transitions. The func-
tional dependency b → d allows to derive the logical orderings (a, b, c, d) and
(a, b, d, c). This is handled by assuming that the physical ordering changes to
either (a, b, c, d) or (a, b, d, c). Hence, these states have to be added to the FSM.
We further add the transitions induced by {b → d}. Note that the resulting
FSM is a non-deterministic finite state machine (NFSM).
Assume we have an NFSM as above. Then (while ignoring groupings) the
state of the ADT is a state of the NFSM and the operations of the ADT can
easily be mapped to the FSM. Testing for a logical ordering can be performed
by checking if the node with the ordering is reachable from the current state
by following  edges. If the set must be changed because of a functional de-
pendency the state is changed by following the edge labeled with the functional
dependency. Of course, the non-determinism is in our way.
While remembering only the active state of the NFSM avoids the problem
of maintaining a set of orderings, the NFSM is not really useful from a prac-
tical point of view, since the transitions are non-deterministic. Nevertheless,
the NFSM can be considered as a special non-deterministic finite automaton
(NFA), which consumes the functional dependencies and ”recognizes” the pos-
sible physical orderings. Further, an NFA can be converted into a deterministic
finite automaton (DFA), which can be handled efficiently. Remember that the
construction is based on the power set of the NFA’s states. That is, the states
of the DFA are sets of states of the NFA [476]. We do not take the deviation
over the finite automaton but instead lift the construction of deterministic finite
automatons from non-deterministic ones to finite state machines. Since this is
not a traditional conversion, we give a proof of this step in Section ??.
Yet another problem is that the conversion from an NFSM to a deterministic
FSM (DFSM) can be expensive for large NFSMs. Therefore, reducing the size
of the NFSM is another problem we look at. We introduce techniques for
reducing the set of functional dependencies that have to be considered and
23.3. OVERVIEW 351

{b → d}
abc abcd

Figure 23.3: Possible FSM for groupings

ǫ

{b → d}
abcd abc abcd
ǫ
ǫ {b → d}
ǫ ǫ
abc ab a

{b → d} ǫ {b → d}
ǫ
abdc abd

Figure 23.4: Combined FSM for orderings and groupings

further techniques to prune the NFSM in Section 23.4.7.

The idea of a combined framework for orderings and groupings was presented
in [543]. Here, the main point is to construct a similar FSM for groupings and
integrate it into the FSM for orderings, thus handling orderings and groupings
at the same time. An example of this is shown in Figure 23.3. Here, the
FSM for the grouping {a, b, c} and the functional dependency b → c is shown.
We represent states for orderings as rounded boxes and states for groupings
as rectangles. Note that although the FSM for groupings has a start node
similar to the FSM for orderings, it is much smaller. This is due to the fact
that groupings are only compatible with themselves, no nodes for prefixes are
required. However, the FSM is still non-deterministic: given the functional
dependency b → c, the grouping {a, b, c, d} is compatible with {a, b, c, d} itself
and with {a, b, c}; therefore, there exists an (implicit) edge from each grouping
to itself.
The FSM for groupings is integrated into the FSM for orderings by adding
 edges from each ordering to the grouping with the same attributes; this is
due to the fact that every ordering is also a grouping. Note that although the
ordering (a, b, c, d) also implies the grouping {a, b, c}, no edge is required for
this, since there exists an  edge to (a, b, c) and from there to {a, b, c}.
After constructing a combined FSM as described above, the full ADT sup-
porting both orderings and groupings can easily be mapped to the FSM: The
state of the ADT is a state of the FSM and testing for a logical ordering or

{b → d} a,ab,abc
a,ab,abc,{ab} abd,abcd,
abdc,{abd}

Figure 23.5: Possible DFSM for Figure 23.4

352CHAPTER 23. DERIVING AND DEALING WITH INTERESTING ORDERINGS AND GROUPIN

grouping can be performed by checking if the node with the ordering or group-
ing is reachable from the current state by following  edges (as we will see, this
can be precomputed to yield the O(1) time bound for the ADT operations). If
the state of the ADT must be changed because of functional dependencies, the
state in the FSM is changed by following the edge labeled with the functional
dependency.
However, the non-determinism of this transition is a problem. Therefore, for
practical purposes the NFSM must be converted into a DFSM. The resulting
DFSM is shown in Figure 23.5. Note that although in this simple example the
DFSM is very small, the conversion could lead to exponential growth. There-
fore, additional pruning techniques for groupings are presented in Section 23.4.7.
However, the inclusion of groupings is not critical for the conversion, as the
grouping part of the NFSM is nearly independent of the ordering part. In
Section 23.5 we look at the size increase due to groupings. The memory con-
sumption usually increases by a factor of two, which is the minimum expected
increase, since every ordering is a grouping.
Some operators, like sort, change the physical ordering. In the NFSM, this
is handled by changing the state to the node corresponding to the new physical
ordering. Implied by its construction, in the DFSM this new physical ordering
typically occurs in several nodes. For example, (a, b, c) occurs in both nodes of
the DFSM in Figure 23.5. It is, therefore, not obvious which node to choose.
We will take care of this problem during the construction of the NFSM (see
Section 23.4.3).

23.4 Detailed Algorithm

23.4.1 Overview
Our approach consists of two phases. The first phase is the preparation step
taking place before the actual plan generation starts. The output of this phase
are the precomputed values used to implement the ADT. Then the ADT is used
during the second phase where the actual plan generation takes place. The first
phase is performed exactly once and is quite involved. Most of this section covers
the first phase. Only Section 23.4.6 deals with the ADT implementation.
Figure 23.6 gives an overview of the preparation phase. It is divided into
four major steps, which are discussed in the following subsections. Subsection
23.4.2 briefly reviews how the input to the first phase is determined and, more
importantly, what it looks like. Section 23.4.3 describes in detail the construc-
tion of the NFSM from the input. The conversion from the NFSM to the DFSM
is only briefly sketched in Section 23.4.4, for details see [476]. From the DFSM
some values are precomputed which are then used for the efficient implemen-
tation of the ADT. The precomputation is described in Section 23.4.5, while
their utilization and the ADT implementation are the topic of Section 23.4.6.
Section 23.4.7 contains some important techniques to reduce the size of the
NFSM. They are applied in Steps 2 (b), 2 (c) and 2 (e). During the discussion,
we illustrate the different steps by a simple running example. More complex
examples can be found in Section 23.5.
23.4. DETAILED ALGORITHM 353

1. Determine the input

(a) Determine interesting orders

(b) Determine interesting groupings
(c) Determine set of functional dependencies

2. Construct the NFSM

(a) Construct states of the NFSM

(b) Filter functional dependencies
(c) Build filters for orderings and groupings
(d) Add edges to the NFSM
(e) Prune the NFSM
(f) Add artificial start state and edges

3. Convert the NFSM into a DFSM

4. Precompute values

(a) Precompute the compatibility matrix

(b) Precompute the transition table

Figure 23.6: Preparation steps of the algorithm

23.4.2 Determining the Input

Since the preparation step is performed immediately before plan generation, it
is assumed that the query optimizer has already determined which indices are
applicable and which algebraic operators can possibly be used to construct the
query execution plan.
Before constructing the NFSM, the set of interesting orders, the set of in-
teresting groupings and the sets of functional dependencies for each algebraic
operator are determined. We denote the set of sets of functional dependencies
by F. It is important for the correctness of our algorithms that we note which
of the interesting orders are (1) produced by some algebraic operator or (2) only
tested for. Note that the interesting orders which satisfy (1) may additionally
be tested for as well. We denote those orderings under (1) by OP , those under
(2) by OT . The total set of interesting orders is defined as OI = OP ∪ OT .
The orders produced are treated slightly differently in the following steps. The ToDo: details
groupings are classified similarly to the orderings: We denote the grouping pro- on determining
duced by some algebraic operator by GP , and those just tested for by GT . The interesting or-
total set of interesting groupings is defined as GI = GP ∪GT . More information ders?
on how to extract interesting groupings can be found in [790]. Furthermore,
for a sample query the extraction of both interesting orders and groupings is
illustrated in Section 23.5.
To illustrate subsequent steps, we assume that the set of sets of functional
354CHAPTER 23. DERIVING AND DEALING WITH INTERESTING ORDERINGS AND GROUPIN

dependencies
F = {{b → c}, {b → d}},
the interesting groupings

GI = {{b}} ∪ {{b, c}}

and the interesting orders

OI = {(b), (a, b)} ∪ {(a, b, c)}

have been extracted from the query. We assume that those in OT = {(a, b, c)}
and GT = {{b, c}} are tested for but not produced by any operator, whereas
those in OP = {(b), (a, b)} and GP = {{b}} may be produced by some algebraic
operators.

23.4.3 Constructing the NFSM

An NFSM consists of a tuple (Σ, Q, D, qo ), where

• Σ is the input alphabet,

• Q is the set of possible states,

• D ⊆ Q × (Σ ∪ {}) × Q is the transition relation, and

• q0 is the initial state.

Coarsely, Σ consists of the functional dependencies, Q of the relevant or-

derings and groupings, and D describes how the orderings or groupings change
under a given functional dependency. Some refinements are needed to provide
efficient ADT operations. The details of the construction are described now.
For the order optimization part the states are partitioned in Q = QI ∪ QA ∪
{q0 }, where q0 is an artificial state to initialize the ADT, QI is the set of states
corresponding to interesting orderings and QA is a set of artificial states only
required for the algorithm itself. QA is described later. Furthermore, the set
QI is partitioned in QPI and QTI , representing the orderings in OP and OT ,
respectively. To support groupings, we add to QPI states corresponding to the
groupings in GP and to QTI states corresponding to the groupings in GT .
The initial NFSM contains the states QI of interesting groupings and order-
ings. For the example, this initial construction not including the start state qo is
shown in Figure 23.7. The states representing groupings are drawn as rectangles
and the states representing orderings are drawn with rounded corners.
When considering functional dependencies, additional groupings and order-
ings can occur. These are not directly relevant for the query, but have to be
represented by states to handle transitive changes. Since they have no direct
connection to the query, these states are called artificial states. Starting with
the initial states QI , artificial states are constructed by considering functional
dependencies
QA = (Ω(OI , F) \ OI ) ∪ (Ω(GI , F) \ GI ).
23.4. DETAILED ALGORITHM 355

b b

a,b b,c

a,b,c

Figure 23.7: Initial NFSM for sample query

In our example, this creates the states (b, c) and (a), as (b, c) can be inferred
from (b) when considering {b → c} and (a) can be inferred from (a, b), since (a)
is a prefix of (a, b). The result is show in Figure 23.8 (ignore the edges).
Sometimes the ADT has to be explicitly initialized with a certain ordering
or grouping (e.g. after a sort). To support this, artificial edges are added
later on. These point to the requested ordering or grouping (states in QPI ) and
are labeled with the state that they lead to. Therefore, the input alphabet
Σ consists of the sets of functional dependencies and produced orderings and
groupings:
Σ = F ∪ QPI ∪ {}.
In our example, Σ = {{b → c}, {b → d}, (b), (a, b), {b}}.
Accordingly, the domain of the transition relation D is

D⊆ ((Q \ {q0 }) × (F ∪ {}) × (Q \ {q0 }))

∪ ({qo } × QPI × QPI ).

The edges are formed by the functional dependencies and the artificial edges.
Furthermore,  edges exist between orderings and the corresponding groupings,
as orderings are a special case of grouping:
DF D = {(q, f, q 0 ) | q ∈ Q, f ∈ F ∪ {}, q 0 ∈ Q, q ` f q 0 }
DA = {(q0 , q, q) | q ∈ QP
I }
DOG = {(o, , g) | o ∈ Ω(OI , F), g ∈ Ω(GI , F), o ≡ g}
D = DF D ∪ DA ∪ DOG

First, the edges corresponding to functional dependencies are added (DF D ).

In our example, this results in the NFSM shown in Figure 23.8.
Note that the functional dependency b → d has been pruned, since d does
not occur in any interesting order or grouping. The NFSM can be further
simplified by pruning the artificial state (b, c), which cannot lead to a new
interesting order. The result is shown in Figure 23.9. A detailed description of
these pruning techniques can be found in Section 23.4.7.
The artificial start state q0 has emanating edges incident to all states rep-
resenting interesting orders in OIP and interesting groupings in GPI (DA ). Also,
the states representing orderings have edges to their corresponding grouping
356CHAPTER 23. DERIVING AND DEALING WITH INTERESTING ORDERINGS AND GROUPIN

{b → c}

b b,c b
ǫ
{b → c}
ǫ
q0 a,b a b,c

{b → c} ǫ
a,b,c

Figure 23.8: NFSM after adding DF D edges

b b

{b → c}
ǫ
q0 a,b b,c
a

{b → c} ǫ
a,b,c

Figure 23.9: NFSM after pruning artificial states

states (DOG ), as every ordering is also a grouping. The final NFSM for the
example is shown in Figure 23.10. Note that the states representing (a, b, c)
and {b, c} are not linked by an artificial edge since it is only tested for, as they
are in QTI .

23.4.4 Constructing the DFSM

The construction of the DFSM from the NFSM follows the standard power
set construction that is used to translate an NFA into a DFA [476]. A formal

{b}

ǫ
b b
(b)
{b → c}
(a,b)
ǫ
qo a,b a b,c

{b → c} ǫ
a,b,c

Figure 23.10: Final NFSM

23.4. DETAILED ALGORITHM 357

{b → c}
{b} 1:{b} 4:{b},{b,c}

(b) {b → c}
qo 2:(b),{b} 5:(b),{b},{b,c}

(a,b)
{b → c}
3:(a),(a,b) 6:(a),(a,b),(a,b,c)

Figure 23.11: Resulting DFSM

state 1: 2: 3: 4: 5: 6:
(a) (a,b) (a,b,c) (b) {b} {b,c}
1 0 0 0 0 1 0
2 0 0 0 1 1 0
3 1 1 0 0 0 0
4 0 0 0 0 1 1
5 0 0 0 1 1 1
6 1 1 1 0 0 0

Figure 23.12: contains Matrix

description and a proof of correctness is given in Section ??. It is important

to note that this construction preserves the start state and the artificial edges.
The resulting DFSM for the example is shown in Figure 23.11.

23.4.5 Precomputing Values

To allow for an efficient precomputation of values, every occurrence of an inter-
esting order, interesting grouping or set of functional dependencies is replaced
by integers. This allows comparisons in constant time (equivalent entries are
mapped to same integer). Further, the DFSM is represented by an adjacency
matrix.

state 1: 2: 3: 4:
{b → c} (a, b) (b) {b}
qo - 3 2 1
1 4 - - -
2 5 - - -
3 6 - - -
4 4 - - -
5 5 - - -
6 6 - - -

Figure 23.13: transition Matrix

358CHAPTER 23. DERIVING AND DEALING WITH INTERESTING ORDERINGS AND GROUPIN

The precomputation step itself computes two matrices. The first matrix
denotes whether an NFSM state in QI is active, i.e. an interesting order or an
interesting grouping, is contained in a specific DFSM state. This matrix can
be represented as a compact bit vector, allowing tests in O(1). For our running
example, it is given (in a more readable form) in Figure 23.12. The second
matrix contains the transition table for the DFSM relation D. Using it, edges
in the DFSM can be followed in O(1). For the example, the transition matrix
is given in Figure 23.13.

23.4.6 During Plan Generation

During plan generation, larger plans are constructed by adding algebraic op-
erators to existing (sub-)plans. Each subplan contains the available orderings
and groupings in the form of the corresponding DFSM state. Hence, the state
of the DFSM, a simple integer, is the state of our ADT OrderingGrouping.
When applying an operator to subplans, the ordering and grouping require-
ments are tested by checking whether the DFSM state of the subplan contains
the required ordering or grouping of the operator. This is done by a simple
lookup in the contains matrix.
If the operator introduces a new set of functional dependencies, the new
state of the ADT is computed by following the according edge in the DFSM.
This is performed by a quick lookup in the transition matrix.
For “atomic” subplans like table or index scans, the ordering and grouping
is determined explicitly by the operator. The state of the DFSM is determined
by a lookup in the transition matrix with start state qo and the edge annotated
by the produced ordering or grouping. For sort and group-by operators the
state of the DFSM is determined as before by following the artificial edge for
the produced ordering or grouping and then reapplying the set of functional
dependencies that currently hold.
In the example, a sort on (b) results in a subplan with ordering/grouping
state 2 (the state 2 is active in the DFSM), which satisfies the ordering (b)
and the grouping {b}. After applying an operator which induces b → c, the
ordering/grouping changes to state 5 which also satisfies {b, c}.

23.4.7 Reducing the Size of the NFSM

Reducing the size of the NFSM is important for two reasons: First, it reduces
the amount of work needed during the preparation step, especially the con-
version from NFSM to DFSM. Even more important is that a reduced NFSM
results in a smaller DFSM. This is crucial for plan generation, since it reduces
the search space: Plans can only be compared and pruned if they have compa-
rable ordering and a comparable set of functional dependencies (see [709, 710]
for details). Reducing the size of the DFSM removes information that is not
relevant for plan generation and, therefore, allows a more aggressive pruning of
plans.
At first, the functional dependencies are pruned. Here, functional dependen-
cies which can never lead to a new interesting order or grouping are removed.
23.4. DETAILED ALGORITHM 359

For convenience, we extend the definition of Ω(O, F ) and define

Ω(O, ) := Ω(O, ∅).

Then the set of prunable functional dependencies FP can be described by

ΩN (o, f ) := Ω({o}, {f }) \ Ω({o}, )

FP := {f |f ∈ F ∧ ∀o ∈ OI ∪ GI :
(Ω(ΩN (o, f ), F ) \ Ω({o}, )) ∩ (OI ∪ GI ) = ∅}.

Pruning functional dependencies is especially useful, since it also prunes artifi-

cial states that would be created because of the dependencies. In the example,
this removed the functional dependency b → d, since d does not appear in
any interesting order or grouping. This step also removes the artificial states
containing d.
The artificial states are required to build the NFSM, but they are not visible
outside the NFSM. Therefore, they can be pruned and merged without affecting
plan generation. Two heuristics are used to reduce the set of artificial states:

1. All artificial nodes that behave exactly the same (that is, their edges lead
to the same states given the same input) are merged and

2. all edges to artificial states that can reach states in QI only through 
edges are replaced with corresponding edges to the states in QI .

More formally, the following pairs of states can be merged:

{(o1 , o2 ) | o1 ∈ QA , o2 ∈ QA ∧ ∀f ∈ F :
(Ω({o1 }, {f }) \ Ω({o1 }, )) =
(Ω({o2 }, {f }) \ Ω({o2 }, ))}.

The following states can be replaced with the next state reachable by an  edge:

{o | o ∈ QA ∧ ∀f ∈ F :
Ω(Ω({o}, ), {f }) \ {o} =
Ω(Ω({o}, ) \ {o}, {f })}.

In the example, this removed the state (b, c), which was artificial and only led
to the state (b).
These techniques reduce the size of the NFSM, but still most states are
artificial states, i.e. they are only created because they can be reached by con-
sidering functional dependencies when a certain ordering or grouping is avail-
able. But many of these states are not relevant for the actual query processing.
For example, given a set of interesting orders which consists only of a single
ordering (a) and a set of functional dependencies which consists only of a → b,
the NFSM will contain (among others) two states: (a) and (a, b). The state
(a, b) is created since it can be reached from (a) by considering the functional
dependency, however, it is irrelevant for the plan generation, since (a, b) is not
360CHAPTER 23. DERIVING AND DEALING WITH INTERESTING ORDERINGS AND GROUPIN

an interesting order and is never created nor tested for. Actually, in the ex-
ample above, the whole functional dependency would be pruned (since b never
occurs in an interesting order), but the problem remains for combinations of
interesting orders: Given the interesting orders (a), (b) and (c) and the func-
tional dependencies {a → b, b → a, b → c, c → b}, the NFSM will contain states
for all permutations of a, b and c. But these states are completely useless, since
all interesting orders consist only of a single attribute and, therefore, only the
first entry of an ordering is ever tested.
Ideally, the NFSM should only contain states which are relevant for the
query; since this is difficult to ensure, a heuristic can be used which greatly
reduces the size of the NFSM and still guarantees that all relevant states are
available: When considering a functional dependency of the form a → b and
an ordering o1 , o2 , . . . , on with oi = a for some i (1 ≤ i ≤ n), the b can be
inserted at any position j with i < j ≤ n + 1 (for the special case of a condition
a = b, i = j is also possible). So, an entry of an ordering can only affect entries
on the right of its own position. This means that it is unnecessary to consider
those parts of an ordering which are behind the length of the longest interesting
order; since that part cannot influence any entries relevant for plan generation,
it can be omitted. Therefore, the orderings created by functional dependencies
can be cut off after the maximum length of interesting orders, which results in
less possible combinations and a smaller NFSM.
The space of possible orderings can be limited further by taking into account
the prefix of the ordering: before inserting an entry b in an ordering o1 , o2 , . . . , on
at the position i, check if there is actually an interesting order with the prefix
o1 , o2 , ...oi−1 , b and stop inserting if no interesting order is found. Also limit the
new ordering to the length of the longest matching interesting order; further
attributes will never be used. If functional dependencies of the form a = b occur,
they might influence the prefix of the ordering and the simple test described
above is not sufficient. Therefore, a representative is chosen for each equivalence
class created by these dependencies, and for the prefix test the attributes are
replaced with their representatives. Since the set of interesting orders with
a prefix of o1 , . . . , on is a superset of the set for the prefix o1 , ...on , on+1 , this
heuristic can be implemented very efficiently by iterating over i and reducing
the set as needed.
Additional techniques can be used to avoid creating superfluous artifical
states for groupings: First, in Step 2.3 (see Figure 23.6) the set of attributes
occurring in interesting groupings is determined:
AG = {a | ∃g ∈ GI : a ∈ g}
Now, for every attribute a occurring on the right-hand side of a functional
dependency the set of potentially reachable relevant attributes is determined:
r(a, 0) = {a}
r(a, n) = r(a, n − 1) ∪
{a0 | ∃(a1 . . . am → a0 ) ∈ F :
{a1 . . . am } ∩ r(a, n − 1) 6= ∅}
r(a) = r(a, |F|) ∩ AG
23.4. DETAILED ALGORITHM 361

This can be used to determine if a functional dependency actually adds

useful attributes. Given a functional dependency a1 . . . an → a and a grouping
g with {a1 . . . an } ⊆ g, a should only be added to g if r(a) 6⊆ g, i.e. the
attribute might actually lead to a new interesting grouping. For example, given
the interesting groupings {a}, {a, b} and the functional dependencies a → c, a →
d, d = b. When considering the grouping {a}, the functional dependency a → c
can be ignored, as it can only produce the attribute c, which does not occur in
an interesting grouping. However, the functional dependency a → d should be
added, since transitively the attribute b can be produced, which does occur in
an interesting grouping.
Since there are no  edges between groupings, i.e. groupings are not com-
patible with each other, a grouping can only be relevant for the query if it is
a subset of an interesting ordering (as further attributes could be added by
functional dependencies). However, a simple subset test is not sufficient, as
equations of the form a = b are also supported; these can effectively rename
attributes, resulting in a slightly more complicated test:
In Step 2.3 (see Figure 23.6) the equivalence classes induced by the equations
in F are determined and for each class a representative is chosen (a and a1 . . . an
are attributes occuring in the GI ):
E(a, 0) = {a}
E(a, n) = E(a, n − 1) ∪
{a0 | ((a = a0 ) ∈ F) ∨ ((a0 = a) ∈ F)}
E(a) = E(a, |F|)
e(a) = a representative choosen from E(A)
e({a1 . . . an }) = {e(a1 ) . . . e(an )}.
Using these equivalence classes, a mapped set of interesting groupings is
produced that will be used to test if a grouping is relevant:
GE
I = {e(g) | g ∈ GI }

Now a grouping g can be pruned if 6 ∃g 0 ∈ GE 0

I : e(g) ⊆ g . For example,
given the interesting grouping {a} and the equations a = b, b = c, the grouping
{d} can be pruned, as it will never lead to an interesting grouping; however, the
groupings {b} and {c} have to be kept, as they could change to an interesting
grouping later on.
Note that although they appear to test similar conditions, the first pruning
technique (using r(a)) is not dominated by the second one (using e(a)). Con-
sider e.g. the interesting grouping {a}, the equation a = b and the functional
dependency a → b. Using only the second technique, the grouping {a, b} would
be created, although it is not relevant.

23.4.8 Complex Ordering Requirements

Specifying the ordering requirements of an operator can be surprisingly difficult.
Consider the following SQL query:
362CHAPTER 23. DERIVING AND DEALING WITH INTERESTING ORDERINGS AND GROUPIN

select *
from S s, R r
where r.a=s.a and r.b=s.b and
r.c=s.c and r.d=s.d

When answering this query using a sort-merge join, the operator has to
request a certain odering. But there are many orderings that could be used:
The intuitive ordering would be abcd, but adcb or any other premutation could
have been used as well. This is problematic, as checking for an exponential
number of possibilities is not acceptable in general. Note that this problem is
not specific to our approach, the same is true, e.g., for Simmen’s approach.
The problem can be solved by defining a total ordering between the at-
tributes, such that a canonical ordering can be constructed. We give some rules
how to derive such an ordering below, but it can happen that such an order-
ing is unavailable (or rather the construction rules are ambiguous). Given, for
example, two indices, one on abcd and one on adcb, both orderings would be a
reasonable choice. If this happens, the operators have two choices: Either they
accept all reasonable orderings (which could still be an exponential number,
but most likely only a few orderings remaing) or they limit themselves to one
ordering, which could induce unnecessary sort operators. Probably the second
choice is preferable, as the ambiguous case should be rare and does not justify
the complex logic of the first solution.
The attribute ordering can be derived by using the following heuristical
rules:

1. Only attributes that occur in sets without natural ordering (i.e. complex
join predicates or grouping attributes) have to be ordered.

2. Orderings that are given (e.g., indices, user-requested orderings etc.) or-
der some attributes.

3. Small orderings should be considered first. If an operator requires an or-

dering with the attributes abc, and another operator requires an ordering
with the attributes bc, the attributes b and c should come before a.

4. The attributes should be ordered according to equivalence classes. If a

is ordered before b, all orderings in E(a) should be ordered before all
orderings in E(b).

5. Attributes should be ordered according to the functional dependencies,

i.e. if a → b, a should come before b. Note that a = b suggests no
ordering between a and b.

6. The remaining unordered attributes can be ordered in an arbitrary way.

The rules must check if they create contradictions. If this happens. the
contradicting ordering must be omitted, resulting in potentially superfluous sort
operators. Note that in some cases these sort operators are simply unavoidable:
If for the example query one index on R exists with the ordering abcd and one
23.5. EXPERIMENTAL RESULTS 363

n #Edges t (ms) #Plans t/plan t (ms) #Plans t/plan % t % #Plans %. t/plan

5 n-1 2 1541 1.29 1 1274 0.78 2.00 1.21 1.65
6 n-1 9 7692 1.17 2 5994 0.33 4.50 1.28 3.55
7 n-1 45 36195 1.24 12 26980 0.44 3.75 1.34 2.82
8 n-1 289 164192 1.76 74 116562 0.63 3.91 1.41 2.79
9 n-1 1741 734092 2.37 390 493594 0.79 4.46 1.49 3.00
10 n-1 11920 3284381 3.62 1984 2071035 0.95 6.01 1.59 3.81
5 n 4 3060 1.30 1 2051 0.48 4.00 1.49 2.71
6 n 21 14733 1.42 4 9213 0.43 5.25 1.60 3.30
7 n 98 64686 1.51 20 39734 0.50 4.90 1.63 3.02
8 n 583 272101 2.14 95 149451 0.63 6.14 1.82 3.40
9 n 4132 1204958 3.42 504 666087 0.75 8.20 1.81 4.56
10 n 26764 4928984 5.42 2024 2465646 0.82 13.22 2.00 6.61
5 n+1 12 5974 2.00 1 3016 0.33 12.00 1.98 6.06
6 n+1 69 26819 2.57 6 12759 0.47 11.50 2.10 5.47
7 n+1 370 119358 3.09 28 54121 0.51 13.21 2.21 6.06
8 n+1 2613 509895 5.12 145 208351 0.69 18.02 2.45 7.42
9 n+1 27765 2097842 13.23 631 827910 0.76 44.00 2.53 17.41
10 n+1 202832 7779662 26.07 3021 3400945 0.88 67.14 2.29 29.62

Figure 23.14: Plan generation for different join graphs, Simmen’s algorithm
(left) vs. our algorithm (middle)

index on S with the ordering dcba, the heuristical rules detect a contradiction
and choose one of the orderings. This results in a sort operator before the
(sort-merge) join, but this sort could not have been avoided anyway.

23.5 Experimental Results

The framework described in this chapter solves two problems: First, it provides
an efficient representenation for reasoning about orderings and second, it allows
keeping track of orderings and groupings at the same time. Since these topics
are treated separately in the related work, the experimental results are split in
two sections: In Section 23.6 the framework is compared to another published
framework while only considering orderings, and in Section 23.7 the influence
of groupings is evaluated.

23.6 Total Impact

We now consider how order processing influences the time needed for plan
generation. Therefore, we implemented both our algorithm and the algorithm
proposed by Simmen et al. [709, 710] and integrated them into a bottom-up
plan generator based on [488].
To get a fair comparison, we tuned Simmen’s algorithm as much as possible.
The most important measure was to cache results in order to eliminate repeated
calls to the very expensive reduce operation. Second, since Simmen’s algorithm
requires dynamic memory, we implemented a specially tailored memory man-
agement. This alone gave us a speed up by a factor of three. We further tuned
the algorithm by thoroughly profiling it until no more improvements were possi-
ble. For each order optimization framework the plan generator was recompiled
to allow for as many compiler optimizations as possible. We also carefully ob-
served that in all cases both order optimization algorithms produced the same
optimal plan.
We first measured the plan generation times and memory usage for TPC-
R Query 8. A detailed discussion of this query follows in Section 23.7, here
364CHAPTER 23. DERIVING AND DEALING WITH INTERESTING ORDERINGS AND GROUPIN

we ignored the grouping properties to compare it with Simmen’s algorithm.

The result of this experiment is summarized in the following table. Since or-
der optimization is tightly integrated with plan generation, it is impossible to
exactly measure the time spent just for order optimization during plan gener-
ation. Hence, we decided to measure the impact of order optimization on the
total plan generation time. This has the advantage that we can also (for the
first time) measure the impact order optimization has on plan generation time.
This is important since one could argue that we are optimizing a problem with
no significant impact on plan generation time, hence solving a non-problem. As
we will see, this is definitely not the case.
In subsequent tables, we denote by t(ms) the total execution time for plan
generation measured in milliseconds, by #Plans the total number of subplans
generated, by t/plan the average time (in microseconds) needed to introduce
one plan operator, i.e. the time to produce a single subplan, and by Memory
the total memory (in KB) consumed by the order optimization algorithms.
Simmen Our algorithm
t (ms) 262 52
#Plans 200536 123954
t/plan (µs) 1.31 0.42
Memory (KB) 329 136
From these numbers, it becomes obvious that order optimization has a signif-
icant influence on total plan generation time. It may come as a surprise that
fewer plans need to be generated by our approach. This is due to the fact
that the (reduced) FSM only contains the information relevant to the query,
resulting in fewer states. With Simmen’s approach, the plan generator can only
discard plans if the ordering is the same and the set of functional dependen-
cies is equal (respectively a subset). It does not recognize that the additional
information is not relevant for the query.
In order to show the influence of the query on the possible gains of our
algorithm, we generated queries with 5-10 relations and a varying number of
join predicates —that is, edges in the join graph. We always started from
a chain query and then randomly added some edges. For small queries we
averaged the results of 100 queries and averaged 10 queries for large queries.
The results of the experiment can be found in Fig. 23.14. In the second column,
we denote the number of edges in terms of the number of relations (n) given in
the first column. The next six columns contain (1) the total time needed for
plan generation (in ms), (2) the number of (sub-) plans generated, and (3) the
time needed to generate a subplan (in µs), i.e. to add a single plan operator, for
(a) Simmen’s algorithm (columns 3-5) and our algorithm (columns 6-8). The
total plan generation time includes building the DFSM when our algorithm is
used. The last three columns contain the improvement factors for these three
measures achieved by our algorithm. More specifically, column % x contains
the result of dividing the x column of Simmen’s algorithm by the corresponding
x column entry of our algorithm.
Note that we are able to keep the plan generation time below one second
in most cases and three seconds in the worst case, whereas when Simmen’s
23.7. INFLUENCE OF GROUPINGS 365

n #Edges Simmen Our Algorithm DFSM

5 n-1 14 10 2
6 n-1 44 28 2
7 n-1 123 77 2
8 n-1 383 241 3
9 n-1 1092 668 3
10 n-1 3307 1972 4
5 n 27 12 2
6 n 68 36 2
7 n 238 98 3
8 n 688 317 3
9 n 1854 855 4
10 n 5294 2266 4
5 n+1 53 15 2
6 n+1 146 49 3
7 n+1 404 118 3
8 n+1 1247 346 4
9 n+1 2641 1051 4
10 n+1 8736 3003 5

Figure 23.15: Memory consumption in KB for Figure 23.14

algorithm is applied, plan generation time can be as high as 200 seconds. This
observation leads to two important conclusions:

1. Order optimization has a significant impact on total plan generation time.

2. By using our algorithm, significant performance gains are possible.

For completeness, we also give the memory consumption during plan gen-
eration for the two order optimization algorithms (see Fig. 23.15). For our
approach, we also give the sizes of the DFSM which are included in the to-
tal memory consumption. All memory sizes are in KB. As one can see, our
approach consumes about half as much memory as Simmen’s algorithm.

23.7 Influence of Groupings

Integrating groupings in the order optimization framework allows the plan gen-
erator to easily exploit groupings and, thus, produce better plans. However,
order optimization itself might become prohibitively expensive by considering
groupings. Therefore, we evaluated the costs of including groupings for different
queries.
Since adding support for groupings has no effect on the runtime behavior
of the plan generator (all operations are still one table lookup), we measured
the runtime and the memory consumption of the preparation step both with
and without considering groupings. When considering groupings, we treated
each interesting ordering also as an interesting grouping, i.e. we assumed that
a grouping-based (e.g. hash-based) operator was always available as an alter-
native. Since this is the worst-case scenario, it should give an upper bound for
366CHAPTER 23. DERIVING AND DEALING WITH INTERESTING ORDERINGS AND GROUPIN

the additional costs. All experiments were performed on a 2.4 GHz Pentium
IV, using the gcc 3.3.1.

To examine the impact for real queries, we choose a more complex query
from the well-known TPC-R benchmark ([762], Query 8):

select
o year,
sum(case when nation = ’[NATION]’
then volume
else 0
end) / sum(volume) as mkt share
from
(select
extract(year from o orderdate) as o year,
l extendedprice * (1-l discount) as volume,
n2.n name as nation
from part,supplier,lineitem,orders,customer,
nation n1,nation n2,region
where
p partkey = l partkey and
s suppkey = l suppkey and
l orderkey = o orderkey and
o custkey = c custkey and
c nationkey = n1.n nationkey and
n1.n regionkey = r regionkey and
r name = ’[REGION]’ and
s nationkey = n2.n nationkey and
o orderdate between date ’1995-01-01’ and
date ’1996-12-31’ and
p type = ’[TYPE]’
) as all nations
group by o year
order by o year;

When considering this query, all attributes used in joins, group-by and
order-by clauses are added to the set of interesting orders. Since hash-based
solutions are possible, they are also added to the set of interesting groupings.
23.7. INFLUENCE OF GROUPINGS 367

This results in the sets

OIP = {(o year), (o partkey), (p partkey),

(l partkey), (l suppkey), (l orderkey),
(o orderkey), (o custkey), (c custkey),
(c nationkey), (n1.n nationkey),
(n2.n nationkey), (n regionkey),
(r regionkey), (s suppkey), (s nationkey)}
OIT = ∅
GPI = {{o year}, {o partkey}, {p partkey},
{l partkey}, {l suppkey}, {l orderkey},
{o orderkey}, {o custkey}, {c custkey},
{c nationkey}, {n1.n nationkey},
{n2.n nationkey}, {n regionkey},
{r regionkey}, {s suppkey}, {s nationkey}}
GTI = ∅

Note that here OIT and GTI are empty, as we assumed that each ordering
and grouping would be produced if beneficial. For example, we might assume
that it makes no sense to intentionally group by o year: If a tuple stream is
already grouped by o year it makes sense to exploit this, however, instead of
just grouping by o year it could make sense to sort by o year, as this is required
anyway (although here it only makes sense if the sort operator performs early
aggregation). In this case, {o year} would move from GPI to GTI , as it would
be only tested for, but not produced.
The set of functional dependencies (and equations) contains all join condi-
tions and constant conditions:

F = {{p partkey = l partkey}, {∅ → p type},

{o custkey = c custkey}, {∅ → r name},
{c nationkey = n1.n nationkey},
{s nationkey = n2.n nationkey},
{l orderkey = o orderkey},
{s suppkey = l suppkey},
{n1.n regionkey = r regionkey}}

To measure the influence of groupings, the preparation step was executed

twice: Once with the data as given above and once with GPI = ∅ (i.e. groupings
were ignored). The space and time requirements are shown below:
With Groups Without Groups
Duration [ms] 0.6ms 0.3ms
DFSM [nodes] 63 32
Memory [KB] 5 2
368CHAPTER 23. DERIVING AND DEALING WITH INTERESTING ORDERINGS AND GROUPIN

preparation time

10 o+g (n-1)
o (n-1)
o+g (n)
o (n)
8 o+g (n+1)
o (n+1)
duration (ms)

0
4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11
no of relations

Figure 23.16: Time requirements for the preparation step

Here time and space requirements both increase by a factor of two. Since
all interesting orderings are also treated as interesting groupings, a factor of
about two was expected.

While Query 8 is one of the more complex TPC-R queries, it is not overly
complex when looking at order optimization. It contains 16 interesting order-
ings/groupings and 8 functional dependencies, but they cannot be combined in
many reasonable ways, resulting in a comparatively small DFSM. In order to
get more complex examples, we produced randomized queries with 5 − 10 rela-
tions and a varying number of join predicates. We always started from a chain
query and then randomly added additional edges to the join graph. The results
are shown for n − 1, n and n + 1 additional edges. In the case of 10 relations,
this means that the join graph consisted of 18, 19 and 20 edges, respectively.

The time and space requirements for the preparation step are shown in
Figure 23.16 and Figure 23.17, respectively. For each number of relations, the
requirements for the combined framework (o+g) and the framework ignoring
groupings (o) are shown. The numbers in parentheses (n − 1, n and n + 1) are
the number of additional edges in the join graph.

As with Query 8, the time and space requirements roughly increase by a

factor of two when adding groupings. This is a very positive result, given that a
factor of two can be estimated as a lower bound (since every interesting ordering
is also an interesting grouping here). Furthermore, the absolute time and space
requirements are very low (a few ms and a few KB), encouraging the inclusion
of groupings in the order optimization framework.
23.8. ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY 369

memory consumption of precomputed values

10 o+g (n-1)
o (n-1)
o+g (n)
o (n)
8 o+g (n+1)
o (n+1)
memory (KB)

0
4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11
no of relations

Figure 23.17: Space requirements for the preparation step

23.8 Annotated Bibliography

Very few papers exist on order optimization. While the problem of optimizing
interesting orders was already introduced by Selinger et al. [672], later papers
usually concentrated on exploiting, pushing down or combining orders, not on
the abstract handling of orders during query optimization.
Papers by Simmen, Shekita, and Malkemus [709, 710] introduced a frame-
work based on functional dependencies for reasoning about orderings. Since
this is the only paper which really concentrates on the abstract handling orders
and our approach is similar in the usage of functional dependencies, we will
describe their approach in some more detail.
For a plan node they keep just a single (physical) ordering. Additional-
ly, they associate all the applicable functional dependencies with a plan node.
Hence, the lower-bound space requirement for this representation is essential-
ly Ω(n), where n is the number of functional dependencies derived from the
query. Note that the set of functional dependencies is still (typically) much
smaller than the set of all logical orderings. In order to compute the function
containsOrdering, Simmen et al. apply a reduction algorithm on both the
ordering associated with a plan node and the ordering given as an argument
to containsOrdering. Their reduction roughly does the opposite of deducing
more orderings using functional dependencies. Let us briefly illustrate the re-
duction by an example. Assume the physical ordering a tuple stream satisfies
is (a), and the required ordering is (a, b, c). Further assume that there are two
functional dependencies available: a → b and a, b → c. The reduction algorithm
is performed on both orderings. Since (a) is already minimal, nothing changes.
Let us now reduce (a, b, c). We apply the second functional dependency first.
Using a, b → c, the reduction algorithm yields (a, b) because c appears in (a, b, c)
370CHAPTER 23. DERIVING AND DEALING WITH INTERESTING ORDERINGS AND GROUPIN

after a and b. Hence, c is removed. In general, every occurrence of an attribute

on the right-hand side of a functional dependency is removed if all attributes
of the left-hand side of the functional dependency precede the occurrence. Re-
duction of (a, b) by a → b yields (a). After both orderings are reduced, the
algorithm tests whether the reduced required ordering is a prefix of the reduced
physical ordering. Note that if we applied a → b first, then (a, b, c) would re-
duce to (a, c) and no further reduction would be possible. Hence, the rewrite
system induced by their reduction process is not confluent. This problem is not
mentioned by Simmen et al., but can have the effect that containsOrdering
returns false whereas it should return true. The result is that some orderings
remain unexploited; this could be avoided by maintaining a minimal set of func-
tional dependencies, but the computation costs would probably be prohibitive.
This problem does not occur with our approach. On the complexity side, every
functional dependency has to be considered by the reduction algorithm at least
once. Hence, the lower time bound is Ω(n).
In case all functional dependencies are introduced by a single plan node and
all of them have to be inserted into the set of functional dependencies associated
with that plan node, the lower bound for inferNewLogicalOrderings is also
Ω(n).
Overall, Simmen et al. proposed the important framework for order opti-
mization utilizing functional dependencies and nice algorithms to handle order-
ings during plan generation, but the space and time requirements are unfortu-
nate since plan generation might generate millions of subplans. Also note that
the reduction algorithm is not applicable for groupings (which, of course, was
never intended by Simmen): Given the grouping {a, b, c} and the functional
dependencies a → b and b → c, the grouping would be reduced to {a, c} or
to {a}, depending on the order in which the reductions are performed. This
problem does not occur with orderings, as the attributes are sorted and can be
reduced back to front.
A recent paper by Wang and Cherniack [790] presented the idea of combining
order optimization with the optimization of groupings. Based upon Simmen’s
framework, they annotated each attribute in an ordering with the information
whether it is actually ordered by or grouped by. For a single attribute a, they
write OaO (R) to denote that R is ordered by a, OaG (R) to denote that R is
grouped by a and OaO →bG to denote that R is first ordered by a and then
grouped by b (within blocks of the same a value). Before checking if a required
ordering or grouping is satisfied by a given plan, they use some inference rules to
get all orderings and groupings satisfied by the plan. Basically, this is Simmen’s
reduction algorithm with two extra transformations for groupings. In their
paper the check itself is just written as ∈, however, at least one reduction on
the required ordering would be needed for this to work (and even that would
not be trivial, as the stated transformations on groupings are ambiguous). The
promised details in the cited technical report are currently not available, as the
report has not appeared yet. Also note that, as explained above, the reduction
approach is fundamentally not suited for groupings. In Wang’s and Cherniack’s
paper, this problem does not occur, as they only look at a very specialized
kind of grouping: As stated in their Axiom 3.6, they assume that a grouping
23.8. ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY 371

OaG →bG is first grouped by a and then (within the block of tuples with the same
a value) grouped by b. However, this is a very strong condition that is usually
not satisfied by a hash-based grouping operator. Therefore, their work is not
general enough to capture the full functionality offered by a state-of-the-art
query execution engine.
In this chapter, we followed [544, 543].
372CHAPTER 23. DERIVING AND DEALING WITH INTERESTING ORDERINGS AND GROUPIN
Chapter 24

Cardinality and Cost

Estimates

24.1 Introduction
The plan generator relies on a cost function to evaluate the different plans and to
determine the cheapest one. This chapter is concerned with the development of
cost functions. The main input to cost functions are cardinalities. For example,
assume a scan of a relation, which also applies a selection predicate. Clearly,
the cost of scanning the relation depends on the physical layout of the relation
on disk. Further, the CPU cost for evaluating the predicate depends on the
number of tuples in the relation. Note that the cardinality of a relation is
independent of its physical layout.
In general, the cost of an algebraic operator is estimated by using a profile of
the database. The profile must be small, e.g. a couple of kilobytes per relation1 .
According to the above lines, we distuinguish between the logical and physical
profile. For each database item and its constituents, there exist specialized
logical and physical profiles. They exist for relations, indices, attributes, and
sets of attributes. Fig. ?? shows the typical classes and their associations for the
different profiles. The minimal logical profile of a relation R is its cardinality ToDo
|R|. Its minimal physical profile consists of the number of pages ||R|| on which
it is stored. In Chapter 4, we saw more advanced physical profiles.
The DBMS must be capable to perform several operations to derive profiles
and to deal with them. Fig. 24.1 gives an overview. This figure roughly follows
the approach of Mannino et al. [501, ?]. The first operation is the build op-
eration, that takes as input a specification of the profiles to be build (because
there are many different alternatives, as we will see) and the database. From
that, it builds the according profiles for all database items of all the different
granularities. When updates arrive, the profiles must be updated. This can
either be done by a complete recalculation or by an incremental update opera-
tion on the profiles themselves. The latter is reflected in the operation update.
Unfortunately, not all profiles can have an update operation. Within this book,
1
Given today’s cost for main memory, it may also be reasonable to use a couple of
megabytes.

373
374 CHAPTER 24. CARDINALITY AND COST ESTIMATES

profile specification logical profile

build
physical profile
update profile
update
profile

logical profile cardinality

calculus or cardinality estimate
estimation
algebraic expression
cardinality estimation
cost cost
physical profiles estimation
algebraic expression

logical profile profile

calculus or logical profile
propagation
algebraic expression

physical profile establishing

logical profile(s) physical physical profile(s)
algebraic operator profiles

Figure 24.1: Overview of operations for cardinality and cost estimations

we will not be too concerned about building and updating profiles. At the end
of this chapter, we will provide some references.
The main operations this chapter deals with are among the remaining ones.
The first of them is cardinality estmation. Given an algebraic expression or a
calculus expression together with a logical profile of the database, we estimate
the output/result cardinality of the expression. Why do we say algebraic or
calculus expression? Remember that plan generators generate plans for plan
classes. Each plan class corresponds to a set of equivalent plans. They all pro-
duce the same result and, hence, the same number of output tuples. Thus, one
arbitrary representative of the class of equivalent algebraic expressions should
suffice to calculate the logical profile, as a logical profile depends only on the
outcome. On the other hand, the plan class more directly corresponds to a
calculus expression. Hence, estimating the result cardinality of a calculus ex-
pression is a viable alternative. In the literature, most papers deal with the
first approach while only a few deal with the latter (e.g. [194]).
The second operation we will be concerned with is cost estimation. Given
logical and physical profiles for all inputs and an algebraic operator (tree), this
operation calculates the actual costs.
The third major task is profile propagation. Given a logical or physical
profile and an expression, we must be able to calculate the profile of the result,
since this may be the input to other expressions and thus be needed for further
cardinality estimates. The estimation of a physical profile occurs mostly in
cases where operators write to disk. Given Chapter 4, this task is easy enough
24.1. INTRODUCTION 375

to be left to the reader.

Since we follow the algebraic approach, we must be able to calculate the
output cardinality of every operator occurring in the algebra. This task is
vastly simplified by observing the following, where we have been quite sloppy
with the subscripts of the operations.

|χa:e2 (e1 )| = |e1 |

|Γg;f (e)| = |ΠD
g (e)|
|e1 Γe2 | = |e1 |
|e1 . e2 | = |e1 | − |e1 < e2 |
|e1 1 e2 | = |e1 1 e2 | + |e1 . e2 |
|e1 1 e2 | = |e1 1 e2 | + |e1 . e2 | + |e2 . e1 |
|e1 1 e2 | = |ΠD
A(e1 )∪A(e2 ) (e1 1̄e2 )|
|Sort(e)| = |e|
|Tmp(e)| = |e|
|e1 × e2 | = |e1 | ∗ |e2 |
|ΠA (e)| = |e| (bag sematics)
|e1 ∪ e2 | = |ΠD ¯
A(e1 ) (e1 ∪e2 )| (bag vs. set semantics)
|e1 ∩ e2 | = |e1 1 e2 | equijoin over all attributes
|e1 \ e2 | = |e1 | − |e1 ∩ e2 |
¯ e2 | = |e1 | + |e2 | bag semantics
|e1 ∪
|ΠD D
α∪β (R)| = |Πα (R)| if there is an FD α → β

This shows that we can go a far way if we are able to estimate the output
cardinality for duplicate eliminating projections, selections, (bag) joins, and
semijoins. For a certain class of profiles, Richard shows that a profile consist-
ing ‘only’ of the sizes of all duplicate eliminating projections on all subsets of
attributes of all relations is a complete profile under certain assumptions [621].
Since the set of subsets of a set of attributes can be quite large, Richard ex-
ploits functional dependencies to reduce this set by exploiting the fact that
|ΠD D
α∪β (R)| = |Πα (R)| if there exists a functional dependency α → β.
A major differenciator for logical attribute profiles is the kind of the domain
of the attribute. We distinguish between categorial attributes (e.g. color), dis-
crete ordered domains (e.g. integer attributes, decimals, strings), and continous
ordered domains (e.g. float). Categorial domains may be ordered or unordered.
In the first case they are called ordinal, in the latter nominal . We will be main-
ly concerned with integer attributes. Strings are special, and we discuss some
approaches in Sec. ??. Continous domains are also special. The probability
of occurrence of any value in a continous domain in a finite set is zero. The
techniques developed in this section can often easily be adopted to continous
domains, even if we do not mention this explicitly.
376 CHAPTER 24. CARDINALITY AND COST ESTIMATES

24.2 A First Approach

The first approach to cost and cardinality estimation integrated into a dynamic
programming based plan generator was presented by Selinger et al. [672]. We
will use it as the basis for this section.

24.2.1 Top-Most Cost Formula (Overall Costs)

Their top-most cost formula states that the total cost of a query evaluation
plan equals the weighted sum of the I/O and CPU costs:

C = CI/O + wCcpu (24.1)

where w is the weight which can be adapted to different situations. If, for
example, the system is CPU bound, we should increase w and if it is I/O
bound, we decrease w.
However, it is not totally clear what we are going to optimize under this cost
formula. One interpretation could be the following. Assume w = 0.5. Then,
we could interprete the total costs as response time under the assumption that
fifty percent of the CPU time can be executed in parallel with I/O. Accordingly,
we find other top-most cost formulas. For example, the weight is sometimes
dropped [351]:
C = CI/O + Ccpu (24.2)
Under the above interpretation, this would mean that concurrency is totally
absent. The opposite, total concurrency between I/O and CPU, can also be
found [144]:
C = max(CI/O , Ccpu ) (24.3)
In these green days, an alternative is to calculate the power consumption
during query execution.

24.2.2 Summation of Operator Costs

Given a query evaluation plan, the task is to calculate its I/O and CPU costs.
This can be done by calculating the costs for each operator (op) occurring in
the query evaluation plan (QEP) and adding up the according costs:
X
CI/O = CI/O (op)
op∈QEP
X
Ccpu = Ccpu (op)
op∈QEP

However, these formula sometimes raise a problem. For example, the nested
loop join method requires multiple evalutions of its inner part.
Further, in order to count the I/O cost correctly, it is necessary to make
some assumptions when intermediate results are written to and read from disk.
We will use the following assumption: Every operator is responsible for passing
its result to the next operator via main memory. For example, a sort merge
24.2. A FIRST APPROACH 377

join may require sorting its inputs. The sort operators are then responsible for
handing over their result to the merge join via main memory. This means that
the merge join may not require any I/O if the merge can be done purely in
main memory.

24.2.3 CPU Cost

To get an estimate of the CPU costs, Selinger et al. simply count the number
of calls to the tuple oriented interface (called RSI). This roughly corresponds
to the number of next calls in an iterator-based implementation of algebraic
operators (for details on the Research Storage Engine (RSS) and its interface
RSI see [37]). Hence, what needs to be known is the output cardinality of each
operator in the query plan.
Given the input and output cardinalities, it is often quite straightforward
to calculate the CPU costs. Take, for example, a selection operator. Clearly,
the selection predicate is called n times if n is the input cardinality. The selec-
tion predicate itself consists of several calls to comparison functions, Boolean
operators, arithmetic operators and the like. The CPU cost of each of these
operators can easily be determined (by counting CPU cycles or measurements),
and thus the total CPU cost of a selection operator can be determined easily.
Other operators are also straightforward. A problem only arises if functions
are called whose CPU costs can not easily be determined since they depend on
their parameters. A typical example are string comparisons, where the CPU
costs depend on the length of the string. Another example are user-defined
functions. The framework presented in [?] can be used for all more complex
functions. Another possibility is to use simplifying assumptions. The functions
we are talking about are executed on a per tuple basis. As there are typically
many tuples, using the average execution time for cost calculations is not a bad
idea.

24.2.4 Abbreviations
We need some abbreviations to state our cost formulas. A first bunch of them
is summarized in Table 24.1. There, we assume that an index is always a B +
tree.

24.2.5 I/O Costs

Selinger et al. measure I/O costs in the number of pages read. Let us first discuss
the different possible access paths to a single relation. Clearly, for a simple scan
of a relation R, ||R|| pages have to be read. The next access path is composed
of an access to a non-clustered index I to retrieve the tuple identifiers of those
tuples that satisfy a predicate p followed by an access to the base relation R.
Let F (p) be the fraction of tuples satisfying a certain predicate p. F (p) is called
the selectivity of p. It is the main focus of the next subsection. Selinger et al.
distinguish two cases. In the first case, all pages containing qualifying tuples fit
into main memory. For this case, they estimate the number of pages accessed
 378 CHAPTER 24. CARDINALITY AND COST ESTIMATES

R,S,T relations
I index
A,B,C attributes or sets of attributes
DA ΠD A (R)
dA |DA |
minA min ΠD A (R) for an attribute A of R
maxA max ΠD A (R) for an attribute A of R
|R| number of tuples of R
||R|| number of pages on which R is stored
||A||B average length of a value of attribute A of R (in bytes)
||A(R)||B average length of a tuple in bytes
||I|| number of leave pages of an index
H(I) depth of the index I minus 1

Table 24.1: Notational conventions

by
H(T ) + F (p) ∗ (||I|| + ||R||).
EXC Note that with the help of Chapter 4, we can already do better. In the second
case, where the pages containing qualifying tuples do not fit into main memory,
they give the estimate

H(T ) + F (p) ∗ (||I|| + |R|)

for the number of pages read.

In case of a clustered index, they estimate the number of pages read by

H(T ) + F (p) ∗ (||I|| + ||R||).

Next, we have to discuss the costs of different join methods. Selinger et al.
propose cost formulas for the simple nested loop join (1nl ) and the sort merge
join (1sm ). Since summing up the costs of all operators in a tree results in
some problems for nested loop joins, they adhere to a recursive computation of
total costs. Let e1 and e2 be two algebraic expressions. Then they estimate the
cost of the simple nested loop join as follows:

CI/O (e1 1nl e2 ) = CI/O (e1 ) + |e1 | ∗ CI/O (e2 )

where |e1 | denotes the number of tuples produced by the expression e1 .

As the cost calculation for the sort merge join is not convincing, we follow
our own very simple approach here. We split the costs into the sort costs and
the merge costs. Given today’s memory sizes, it is not unlikely that we need
a single merge phase. Hence, the I/O cost for sorting consists of writing and
reading the result of ei if it needs to be sorted. This can be estimated as

CI/O (sort(ei )) = CI/O (ei ) + 2 ∗ d1.2||A(ei )||B ∗ |ei |/pagesizee

where pagesize is the page size in bytes. The factor 1.2 is called the universal
fudge factor . In the above case, it takes care of the storage overhead incurred
24.2. A FIRST APPROACH 379

by using slotted pages. If we assume that the merge phase of the sort merge
join can be performed in main memory, no additional I/O costs occur and we
are done.
Clearly, in the light of Chapter 4, counting the numbers of pages read is not
sufficient as the discrepancy between random and sequential I/O is tremendous.
Thus, better cost functions should use a more elaborate I/O cost model along
the lines of Chapter 4. In any case, note that the calculation of the I/O or CPU
costs of any operator highly depends on its input and output cardinalities.

24.2.6 Cardinality Estimates

Given a predicate p, we want to estimate its selectivity, which is defined as the
fraction of qualifying tuples. If p is a selection predicate applied to a relation
R, the selectivity of p is defined as

|σp (R)|
s(p) = .
|R|

If we know the selectivity of p, we can then easily calculate the result size of a
selection:
|σp (R)| = s(p)|R|
Similarly for joins. Given a join predicate p and two relations R and S, we
define the selectivity of p as

|R 1p S| |R 1p S|
s(p) = =
|R × S| |R| ∗ |S|

and can calculate the result size of a join by

|R 1p S| = s(p) |R| |S|.

The idea of the approach of Selinger et al. is to calculate the result cardinal-
ity for a plan class by the following procedure. First, the sizes of all relations
represented by the plan class are multiplied. This is the result of their cross
product. In a second step, they take a look at the predicate p applied to the
relations in the plan class. For p they calculate a selectivity estimate s(p) and
multiply it with the result of the first step. This then gives the result. Hence,
if a plan class represents the algebraic expression

σp (×ni=1 Ri ),

the cardinality estimate is

n
Y
s(p) |Ri |.
i=1

Since p can be a complex predicate involving boolean operators, they have to

deal with them. Table 24.2 summarizes the proposed selectivity estimation. A
and B denote attributes, c, c1 , c2 denote constants, L denotes a list of values, Q
denotes a subquery. In System R, the number of distinct values for an attribute
380 CHAPTER 24. CARDINALITY AND COST ESTIMATES

predicate s(p) comment

not(p1 ) 1 − s(p1 )
p1 ∧ p2 s(p1 ) ∗ s(p2 ) independence
p1 ∨ p2 s(p1 ) + s(p2 ) − s(p1 )s(p2 )
A=c 1/dA if dA is known, uniformity
1/10 else
A=B 1/ max(dA , dB ) if dA and dB are known, uniformity
1/dX if only dX , X ∈ {A, B} is known
1/10 else
maxA −c
A>c maxA − minA if min and max are known, uniformity
1/3 else
c2 −c1
c1 ≤ A ≤ c2 maxA − minA if min and max are known, uniformity
1/4 else
A IN L min(1/2, s(A = c)|L|)
A IN Q |Q| ∗ |X| X is cross product of all relations
in Q’s from clause

Table 24.2: Selectivity estimation as proposed by Selinger et al.[672]

(dA , dB ) is only known if there exists an according index on the attribute. Let
us give some rational for the selectivity estimation of A IN Q for an attribute A
and a subquery Q. Assume that A is an attribute of relation R and the subquery
Q is of the form select B from S .... Further assume that ΠA (R) ⊆ ΠB (S),
i.e. referential integrity holds. Clearly, if all tuples of S are in the result of Q,
the selectivity is equal to 1. If the output cardinality of Q is restricted by a
factor s0 = |Q|/|S|, then we may assume that the number of distinct values in
Q’s result is restricted by the same factor. Hence, the selectivity factor of the
total predicate is also s0 . Selinger et al. now continue as follows: “With a little
optimism, we can extend this reasoning to include subqueries which are joins
and subqueries in which column [B] is replaced by an arithmetic expression
involving column names. This leads to the formula given above.”

Discussion Taking a broad view at the above model, we see that

• the estimates for CPU and I/O times are quite rough,
• the approach is not complete, especially projection and semijoin are not
treated,
• profile propagation is not discussed.
Further, the uniformity and independence assumptions are applied. This has
been shown to be quite inaccurate in many cases. More specifically, apply-
ing these and other assumptions often leads to an overestimate of real result
cardinalities [151, ?].
How bad is it in terms of plan generation if we under- or overestimate the
cardinalities of intermediate results? As Ioannidis and Christodoulakis pointed
24.3. A FIRST LOGICAL PROFILE AND ITS PROPAGATION 381

out, errors propagate multiplicatively through joins [384]. Assume we want to

join eight relations R1 , . . . , R8 and that the cardinality estimates of Ri are each
a factor of 5 off. Then the cardinality estimation of R1 1 R2 1 R3 will be a
factor of 125 off. Clearly, this can affect the subsequent join ordering. If we
were only a factor of 2 off, the cardinality estimation of R1 1 R2 1 R3 could be
only a factor of eight off. This shows that minimizing the multiplicative error
is a serious intention.
The effect of misestimating cardinalities on plan quality has not been thor-
oughly investigated. There exists a study by Kumar and Stonebraker, which
concludes that it does not matter [444]. However, we do not trust this con-
clusion. In the distributed context, it has been shown by XXX that wrong
cardinality estimates lead to bad plans [?]. This may also be true in the central ToDo
case. Swami and Schiefer give a query and its profiles for which bad cardinality
estimates lead to a very bad plan [751]. Later, we will give two further examples
showing that good cardinality estimation is vital for generation of good plans
(see Sec. ??). Hence, we are very sure that accurate estimation is vital for plan
generation. We suggest to the reader to find examples, using the simple Cout
cost function, where wrong cardinality estimates lead to bad plans. EXC

24.3 A First Logical Profile and its Propagation

We call a logical profile complete if it allows us to perform cardinality estima-
tion and logical profile propagation for all algebraic operators. In this section,
we present an almost complete logical profile and describe the procedure of
profile propagation. The main components are the cumulated frequency, i.e.
the number of tuples, and the number of distinct values for each attribute in a
relation. It is easy to see that we cannot do without either of them. Further,
an upper and lower bound for values of an attribute is needed. Again, we will
see that we cannot do without them. Hence, the following profile is minimal.

24.3.1 The Logical Profile

For every attribute A of a relation, we define its logical profile as a four tuple

bA = [lA , uA , fA , dA ]

where lA is a lower and uA is an upper bound for the values of A. Further, fA

is the cumulated frequency, i.e. the number of tuples with an A value within the
bounds, and dA is the number of distinct values occurring as A’s values within
the given bounds.
For the purpose of this section, we can define

lA = min(ΠA (R))
uA = max(ΠA (R))
fA = |R|
dA = |ΠD
A (R)|
382 CHAPTER 24. CARDINALITY AND COST ESTIMATES

If the attribute A is implicit from the context or does not matter, we may omit
it in the subscript.

24.3.2 Assumptions
The first two assumptions we make are:

1. All attribute values are uniformely distributed, and

2. the values of all attributes are drawn independently.

Other assumptions will follow.

Often in the formulas developed below, we talk about the domain of the
attributes. This is the potential set of values from which a given attribute
takes its values. In case of integer attributes, it is easy to see that the domain
of attribute A is [lA , uA ]. The size of the domain, denoted by nA , then is
nA = uA − lA + 1. For real values, the size is (almost) infinite. Thus, only some
of the formulas given below may carry over to attributes whose type is real.
Let us take a closer look at the assumptions. The uniform distribution
assumption means that every value occurs about the same number of times.
However, this cannot mean that every value of the domain does so, since dA may
be much smaller than nA . Hence, we refine the uniform distribution assumption
(UDA) by assuming that every distinct value occurs about fA /dA times,
We still need another assumption: the equal spread assumption [595]. It
is used to answer the question where the occurring distinct values are in the
domain. The equal spread assumption states that they occur at equal distance.
Let us elaborate a little on this.
For integers, we know the number nA of possible values from which A can
be drawn. It is nA = uA − lA + 1. Let us assume that we have only a few
distinct values, that is dA << nA . This is not strictly necessary but is good for
our intuition. We can now define the spread between two values occurring in A.
Let DA = ΠD A (R) = {x1 , . . . , xdA } where xi < xi+1 be the sorted set of values
occuring for attribute A, also known as active domain. Then we can define the
spread as
∆i = xi+1 − xi
The equal spread assumption (ESA) states that ∆i = ∆j for all 1 ≤ i, j ≤ dA .
Denote this value by ∆A .
There are three subtypes of the equal spread assumption, depending on
whether we assume the lower and upper bounds lA and uA belong to DA . Type
I assumes lA , uA ∈ DA . Then ∆A becomes (uA − lA )/(dA − 1). In case of type
II, where lA ∈ DA and uA 6∈ DA holds, we have ∆A = (uA − lA )/dA . For type
III, where lA 6∈ DA and uA 6∈ DA we get ∆A = (uA − lA )/(dA + 1). As an
example, take lA = 1, uA = 13, and dA = 3. Then for the three types we have
the different values 12/2 = 6, 12/3 = 4, and 12/4 = 3. It should be clear that
the difference is small if dA is sufficiently large. If dA is small, we can store the
frequency of each value explicitly. Otherwise, it is large, and it does not matter
which type we use. We will mainly use type II.
24.3. A FIRST LOGICAL PROFILE AND ITS PROPAGATION 383

Given the above assumptions (and one more to come), the task is to establish
the operations cardinality estimation and logical profile propagation. The latter
implies that we can calculate the logical profile of all attributes of any result
relation established by applying some algebraic operator. Assume we have
solved this task. Then it is clear that the cumulated frequency fA , which equals
|R| in this section, solves the task of cardinality estimation. Hence, we consider
this as done. The use of the cumulated frequency fA instead of the seemingly
simpler cardinality notation |R| is motivated by the fact that a single attribute
will have multiple profiles if histograms are applied. To make the formulas of
this section readily available for histogram use is the main motivation for using
the cumulated frequency.

24.3.3 Propagation for Selections

We start with the selection operation. Let R be a relation and A, C ∈ A(R)
be two attributes of R. We are given the profiles bA = [lA , uA , fA , dA ] and
bC = [lC , uC , fC , dC ] and have to calculate the profiles b0A = [lA 0 , u0 , f 0 , d0 ]
A A A
and b0C = [lC
0 , u0 , f 0 , d0 ] for σ
C C C p(A) (R) for various selection predicates p(A) in
attribute A. We assume that the attribute values of A and C are uniformly
distributed and that A and C are independent. If a selection predicate uses
two attributes A and B, we again need to give the profile propagation for all
attributes C, which are different from them.

Exact match queries The first case we consider is σA=c for a constant c.
0 = c, u0 = c. Further,
Clearly, lA A

0 1 if c ∈ ΠA (R)
dA =
0 else

We cannot be sure whether the first or second case occurs. Since no reasonable
cardinality estimation should ever return zero, we always assume c ∈ ΠA (R).
More generally, we assume that all constants in a query are contained in the
database in the according attributes.
As every distinct value occurs about fA /dA times, we conclude that fA0 =
fA /dA . A special case occurs if A is the key. Then, we can immediately conclude
that fA0 = 1.
Let us now consider another attribute C ∈ A(R), C 6= A. Since fC0 = fA0 ,
we only need to establish d0C . For the lack of any further knowledge, we keep
the lower and upper bounds, i.e. lC 0 = l and u0 = u . To derive the number of
C C C
distinct values remaining for attribute B, we can use the formula by Yao/Waters
(see Sec. 4.16.1) Denote by s(p) = |σA=c (R)|/|R| = fA0 /fA the fraction of tuples
that survives the selection with predicate p ≡ A = c. Fix a distinct value for
C. Using the uniform distribution assumption, it occurs in fC /dC tuples of R.
Then, for this value we have fA −ff C0 /dC possibilities to chose fA0 tuples without


A
it. The total number of possibilities to chose fA0 tuples is ffA0 . Thus, we may


A
conclude that
d0C = dC YffCA/dC (fA0 )
384 CHAPTER 24. CARDINALITY AND COST ESTIMATES

Alternatively, we could use

d0C = dC ∗ (1 − (1 − s(p))fC /dC )

or any other good approximation (see Section 4.16.1).

Range queries Let us now turn to range queries, i.e. selection predicates of
the form c1 ≤ A ≤ c2 , where lA ≤ c1 < c2 ≤ uA . In all of them, the lower
0 = c and u0 = c . Using the
and upper bounds are given by the range, i.e. lA 1 A 2
System R approach, we can estimate
c2 − c1
fA0 = ∗ fA
uA − lA
c2 − c1
d0A = ∗ dA
uA − lA

This estimate is good for real values.

We could also rewrite the above estimate for the number of distinct values
d0A to
c2 − c1
d0A =
∆A
As soon as we have estimated the number of distinct values in a given range,
we can easily derive the cumulated frequency, as every distinct value occurs as
often as it did in R. Thus fA0 = fA ∗ (d0A /dA ).
For another attribute C, C 6= A, the profile propagation is the same as in
the case for A = c. We only need to define s(p) = |σc1 ≤A≤c2 (R)|/|R|.

Equality-based correlation The next case we consider is a predicate of the

form A = B. If uA < lB or uB < lA , the result is empty. If lA 6= lB or uA 6= uB ,
we first apply a selection with predicate max(lA , lB ) ≤ A ≤ min(uA , uB ) and
max(lA , lB ) ≤ B ≤ min(uA , uB ). So assume w.l.o.g. that lA = lB and uA = uB .
Note that fA = fB . Denote this number by f . Define n to be the number
of values in the domain of attributes A and B. For integers, this number is
n = uA − lA + 1. To refer to the elements of the domain, we assume that it is
{x1 , . . . , xn } with xi < xi+1 .
Let x be a value in the domain. Then we say that R has a hole at x in
attribute A, if x 6∈ ΠA (R). Consider a value x in the domain. The probability
of not having a hole at x in A is
n−1


d −1 dA
p(x ∈ A) = An
=
d
n
A

In general, we have
n
X
fA0 = fB0 = fA p(xi = A)p(xi = B|xi = A) (24.4)
i=1
24.3. A FIRST LOGICAL PROFILE AND ITS PROPAGATION 385

where fA = f /dA is the average frequency of a distinct value in ΠA (R), p(xi =

A) = dA /n is the probability that a tuple has xi as its value for attribute A,
and p(xi = B|xi = A) is the conditional probability that a tuple has xi in its
B value if it is known that it has an A value xi .
Let us first consider the special case where ΠA (R) ⊆ ΠB (R). Then p(xi =
B|xi = A) becomes 1/dB . Hence,
n
X f dA 1
fA0 = fB0 = = f /dB
dA n dB
i=1

For ΠB (R) ⊆ ΠA (R), we get fA0 = fB0 = f /dA . Summarizing these cases, we
may conclude that
f
fA0 = fB0 =
max(dA , dB )
which is the formula applied in System R if indices exist on A and B. Clearly,
we can calculate an upper bound on the number of distinct values as
d0A = d0B = min(dA , dB ).
Let us estimate the cumulated frequency after the selection if none of the
above conditions hold and independence of A and B holds. Then, the condi-
tional probability p(xi = B|xi = A) becomes p(xi = B) = 1/n. Thus
n
X f dA 1 f
fA0 = fB0 = =
dA n n n
i=1

If A and B are independent and uniformly distributed, the number of dis-

tinct values d0A = d0B can be estimated as follows. According to Section 4.16.1,
we can estimate the number of distinct values in ΠAB (R) as D(n∗n, |R|), where
|R| = fA = fB . Since out of the n ∗ n possible pairs of values only n are of the
form (xi , xi ), only n/(n ∗ n) = 1/n tuples are of the qualifying form. Using this
factor, we derive
D(n ∗ n, fA )
d0A = d0B =
n
In case of ΠA (R) ⊆ ΠB (R), only dA such pairs out of dA ∗ dB exist. Thus, the
factor becomes dA /(dA ∗ dB ) = 1/dB . For ΠB (R) ⊆ ΠA (R), we have the factor
1/dA . Both cases can be summarized as in
D(n ∗ n, fA )
d0A = d0B =
max(dA , dB )
In case the domain size n is not available, we could estimate it by |ΠD A (R) ∪
D
ΠB (S)|. If this number is not available either, we could hesitatingly use dA dB .
An alternative is to use
d0A = d0B = dA ∗ YffAA/dA (fA0 )
or some of its approximations like
d0A = d0B = dA ∗ (1 − (1 − s(A = B)fA /dA )),
where s(A = B) = fA0 /fA .
 386 CHAPTER 24. CARDINALITY AND COST ESTIMATES

Inequality-based correlation As a last exercise, let us calculate the profile

for selections of the form σA≤B (R). For simplicity, we assume lA = lB and
uA = uB . Thus, lA 0 = l0 = l and u0 = u0 = u . To calculate the cumulative
B A A B A
frequency of the result under independence of A and B, we apply the type I
equal spread assumption, with ∆A = (uA − lA )/(dA − 1). Hence, we assume
that xi = lA + (i − 1)∆A . This gives us

dA
X
fA0 = fA p(xi ≤ B|xi = A)
i=1
XdA
= fA p(xi ≤ B)
i=1
dA
X xi − lB
= fA
uB − lB
i=1
dA
1 X
= fA (( xi ) − dA lB )
uB − lB
i=1
dA dA − 1
= fA (lA − lB + ∆A )
uB − lB 2
dA (uA − lA ) (dA − 1)
= fA
uB − lB (dA − 1) 2
uA − lA dA
= fA
uB − lB 2
fA dA
=
dA 2
fA
=
2

As an exercise the reader may verify that fA0 = (dA − 1)fA /(2dA ) under the
type II equal spread assumption. As an additional exercise the reader should
EXC derive d0A and d0B . We conjecture that

d0A = D(nA , fA0 )

or
d0A = dA ∗ YffAA/dA (fA0 ).
The following observation is crucial: Even if in the original relations the values
of A and B are uniformely distributed, which typically is not the case, the
distribution of the values A and B after the selection with A ≤ B is non-
uniform. For example,
xi − lB
p(xi ≤ B) =
uB − lB
for lB ≤ xi ≤ uB . Table 24.3 summarizes our findings about profile propagation
for selections.
24.3. A FIRST LOGICAL PROFILE AND ITS PROPAGATION 387

predicate f0 d0 comment

A=c fA0 = fA /dA d0A = 1

c2 −c1 c2 −c1
c1 ≤ A ≤ c2 fA0 = uA −lA ∗ fA d0A = uA −lA ∗ dA
(c2 −c1 )
fA0 = d0A ∗ (fA /dA ) d0A = ∆A
⊆
A=B fA0 = f
max(dA ,dB ) d0A = dA ∗ YffAA/dA (fA0 ) ΠA (R) ⊇ ΠB (R)

fA0 = fB0 = fA
n d0A = dA ∗ YffAA/dA (fA0 ) else

A≤B fA0 = fB0 = fA

2 d0A = dA ∗ YffAA/dA (fA0 )

p(A) fC0 = fA d0C = dC ∗ YdfCA/fC (fA0 )

C 6∈ A = F(p)

Table 24.3: Profile propagation for selection

Open ranges and functions There are plenty of other cases for selection
predicates, which we have not discussed. Let us briefly mention a few of them.
Clearly, we have:

|σA6=c (R)| = |R| − |σA=c (R)|

|σc1 <A≤c2 (R)| = |σc1 ≤A≤c2 (R)| − |σA=c1 (R)|
|σc1 ≤A<c2 (R)| = |σc1 ≤A≤c2 (R)| − |σA=c2 (R)|
|σc1 <A<c2 (R)| = |σc1 ≤A≤c2 (R)| − |σA=c1 (R)| − |σA=c2 (R)|
|σc1 ≤A (R)| = |σc1 ≤A≤uA (R)|
|σc1 <A (R)| = |σc1 ≤A<uA (R)|
|σA≤c2 (R)| = |σlA ≤A≤c2 (R)|
|σA<c2 (R) | = |σlA ≤A<c2 (R)|

This helps to estimate the fA0 . The d0A are left to the reader. EXC
Estimating selectivities for (user defined) functions and expressions can be
done by using computed attributes. For example, cardinalities for selections
with predicates like g(A) = c for a function g can be treated by introducing an
additional attribute gA for which a profile can be established.

24.3.4 Profile Propagation for Joins

Semijoin Let us now turn to the join operator and its variants. We start with
the left-semijoin and consider expressions of the type R<A=B S. If ΠA (R) ⊆
388 CHAPTER 24. CARDINALITY AND COST ESTIMATES

ΠB (S), then R<A=B S = R, and no profiles change. If ΠA (R) ⊇ ΠB (S), then

fA0 = fA dB /dA and d0A = dB . If A and B are independent, we calculate
n n
X fA X fA dA dB fA dB
fA0 = p(xi = A)p(xi ∈ B) = = .
dA dA n n n
i=1 i=1

and
dA dB
d0A =
.
n
For an attribute C ∈ A(R) \ {A, B}, we have fC0 = fA0 and

d0C = dC ∗ YffCA/dC (fA0 ).

Regular Join For the regular join R 1A=B S. Let us start with an at-
tribute C ∈ A(R) \ {A, B}. We can apply the formulas for the semijoin because
ΠDC (R 1A=B S) = ΠC (R< S). For attributes C ∈ A(S) \ {A, B} remember
D

that the join commutes.

We turn to the case where ΠA (R) ⊆ ΠB (S). In this case, it is easy to see
that fA0 = fB0 = fA fB /dB and d0A = d0B = dA . If ΠA (R) ⊇ ΠB (S), we have just
to exchange the roles of R and S.
If A and B are independent, we proceed as follows. Denote again by n the
domain size of A and B and the values of DA = ΠA (R) by {x1 , . . . , xdA }. Then,
we can argue that
n n
X fA fB X fA fB dA dB fA fB
fA0 = fB0 = p(xi = A)p(xi ∈ B) = = .
dA dB dA dB n n n
i=1 i=1

Rosenthal showed that this result also holds if the condition of fairness holds
for at least one relation [624]. A relation is called fair with respect to an
attribute A if for the expected value E(|σA=x (R)|) = |R|/nA holds. In this
case, the expected value for the result of the join is (|R||S|)/n. Note that
ΠDA (R 1A=B S) = Π (R<A=B S). Thus, we can estimate the number of
D

distinct values as
dA dB
d0A = d0B = .
n

Selfjoin The above formulas only apply if we are not dealing with a selfjoin.
Of course, R 1A=B R does not pose any problems. However, R 1A=A R does,
because all tuples find a join partner. The estimates are easy to derive:
fA fA
fA0 =
dA
d0A = dA

For all attributes C other than A, fC0 = fA0 and d0C = dC .

As pointed out by [24], selfjoin sizes can be used to derive an upper bound
for general joins:
|R 1A=A R| + |S 1B=B S|
|R 1A=B S| ≤ .
2
24.3. A FIRST LOGICAL PROFILE AND ITS PROPAGATION 389

join f’ d’ comment

R<A=B S fA0 = fA d0A = dA ΠA (R) ⊆ ΠB (S)

fA0 = fAdAdB d0A = dB ΠA (R) ⊇ ΠB (S)
fA0 = fAndB d0A = dAndB else

fC0 = fA0 d0C = dC ∗ YdfCA/fC (fA0 ) for C ∈ A(R) \ {A, B}

fA fB
R 1A=B S fA0 = dB d0A = dA ΠA (R) ⊆ ΠB (S)
fA fB
fA0 = n d0A = dAndB else

fA fA
R 1A=A R fA0 = dA d0A = dA

Table 24.4: Profile propagation for joins

This bound, which is an immediate consequence of the Cauchy Schwarz in-

equality, can be used as a sanity check. Table 24.4 summarizes our findings for
joins.

24.3.5 Profile Propagation for Projections

The next operator we deal with is the duplicate eliminating projection. Given
our work from Chapter 4, it is not surprising, that we simply have to apply the
D function. For single attributes A, we have

fA0 = d0A = dA

For a set of attributes A = {A1 , . . . , An }, the result cardinality of ΠD

A (R) is

n
Y
D( nAi , |R|),
i=1

if nAi , the size of the domain of Ai , is known. Otherwise, we can use the
estimate
n
Y
D( dAi , |R|)
i=1

The number of distinct values in any attribute does not change, i.e. d0Ai = dAi .
If we have a functional dependencies and κ → A for a set of attributes A
and κ ⊂ A, then
ΠD D
A (R) = Πκ (R).

Further, if |ΠD D 0 0
A (R)| = |R|, we have |ΠA0 (R)| = |R| for all A with A ⊇ A.
The above estimates for the result size of a duplicate eliminating projection
assumes that the attribute values are uniformly distributed, i.e., every distinct
value occurs with the same probability. As we will not deal with projections any
390 CHAPTER 24. CARDINALITY AND COST ESTIMATES

more in this part of the book, let us complete the subject by giving an approach
where each attribute value can have its own probability of occurrence. This is
not unlikely, and for attributes with few possible values the following approach
proposed by Yu, Zuzarte, and Sevcik is quite reasonable [?]. The assumptions
are that the attributes are independent and the values of each of them are
drawn by independent Bernoulli trials. Under these assumptions, they derive
the following three results: a lower bound, an upper bound, and an estimate
for the expected number of distinct values in the projection. In order to state
these results, we need some additional notation. Let R be a relation and define
N = |R|. Further let G = {A1 , . . . , An } be a subset of the attributes of R.
Define di = |ΠD Ai (R)| to be the number of distinct values occurring in attribute
Ai . We denote values of Ai by ai,1 , . . . , ai,di .
We wish to derive an estimate for DG = |ΠD G (R)|. Therefore, we model each
attribute Ai by a frequency vector fi = (fi,1 , . . . , fi,di ) where fi,j is the number
of occurrences of the j-th distinct value ai,j of Ai divided by N . If, for example,
A1 has three distinct values which occur 90, 9, and 1 times in a relation with
N = 100 elements, then f1 becomes (0.9, 0.09, 0.01).
Let us first look at bounds for DG . Trivially, DG is bounded from above by
n
Y
DG ≤ min{N, di }
i=1
and from below by
n
DG ≥ max di .
i=1
These bounds are very rough. This motivated Yu et al. to derive better ones.
Before we proceed, let us consider another example. Assume we have three
attributes A1 , A2 , and A3 all with frequency vectors fi = (0.9, 0.09, 0.01) for a
relation of size N = 100. Since we assume attribute independence, the proba-
bility of (a1,3 , a2,3 , a3,3 ) is 0.01 ∗ 0.01 ∗ 0.01. Thus, its occurrence in a relation of
size 100 is highly unlikely. Hence, we expect DG to be less than 27 = 3*3*3. In
general, we observe that the probability of occurrence of a tuple (a1,j1 , . . . , an,jn )
is the product of the relative frequencies f1,j1 ∗ . . . ∗ fn,jn . From this, the ba-
sic idea of the approach of Yu et al. becomes clear: we have to systematically
consider all the different possibilities to multiply relative frequencies. This is
nicely captured by the Kronecker product (tensor product).
Before we proceed, let us state the upper and lower bounds in case of two
attributes by giving two theorems developed by Yu et al. [?].
Theorem 24.3.1 (lower bound) For a set of attributes {A1 , A2 } of a rela-
tion R and its frequency vectors, we define li,j for i = 1, 2 and 1 ≤ j ≤ di as the
minimum number of different values that have to be combined with fi,j given
the marginals, i.e.
li,j = min{|F | | F ⊆ {1, . . . , di0 }, ∀q 6∈ F S(F ) ≤ fi,j < S(F ) + fi0 ,q }
where i0 = 3 − i and S(F ) = p∈F fi0 ,p . Further define
P

di
X
⊥
DG = max li,j .
i=1,2
j=1
24.3. A FIRST LOGICAL PROFILE AND ITS PROPAGATION 391

CalculateLowerBoundForNumberOfDistinctValues(f1 , f2 )
/* frequency vectors f1 and f2 */
sort fi (i = 1, 2) in descending order;
for i = 1, 2 {
i0 = 3 − i;
for j = 1, . . . di {
k = 1;
while (fi,j > kl=1 fi0 ,l )
P
++k;
li,j = k;
}
lbi = dj=1
Pi
li,j ;
}
DG⊥ = max
i=1,2 lbi ;
return DG ⊥

⊥
Figure 24.2: Calculating the lower bound DG

⊥ is a lower bound for D and D ⊥ ≥ max

Then DG G G d1 ,d2 .

Theorem 24.3.2 (upper bound) For a set of attributes {A1 , A2 } of a rela-

tion R and its frequency vectors, we define ui,j for i = 1, 2 and 1 ≤ j ≤ di as
the maximum number of different values that can be combined with fi,j given
the marginals, i.e.
ui,j = min{di0 , fi,j N }
where i0 = 3 − i. Further define
di
X
>
DG = min ui,j .
i=1,2
j=1

> is a lower bound for D and D > ≤ min{N,

Qn
Then DG G G i=1 di }.

The algorithm in Fig. 24.2 calculates the lower bound DG ⊥ . Calculating the
>
upper bound DG is much easier. For each fi,j , we compute ui,j by simply
comparing fi,j N and di0 . Adding up the ui,j for each attribute and taking the
lesser of the two sums gives the desired result.
Let us start by repeating the definition of the Kronecker product of two
matrices A = (ai,j ) and B = (bi,j ) of dimension n × m and n0 × m0 . The result
A ⊗ B is a matrix of dimension nn0 × mm0 . The general definition is
 
a1,1 B a1,2 B . . . a1,m B
 a2,1 B a2,2 B . . . a2,m B 
A⊗B =  ...
.
... ... ... 
an,1 B an,2 B . . . an,m B
The estimate can not be calculated easily. First, we calculate the Kronecker
product fG = f1 ⊗ . . . ⊗ fn of all frequency vectors. Note that to every value
392 CHAPTER 24. CARDINALITY AND COST ESTIMATES

combination v ∈ ΠD D
A1 (R) × . . . × ΠAn (R) there corresponds exactly one compo-
nent in fG , which contains its probability of occurrence. With this observation,
it is easy to derive the following theorem, in whichQwe denote by fG,i the i-th
component of fG and by M its length, i.e. M = ni=1 di . Further remember
that N = |R|.

Theorem 24.3.3 (estimate) Let the following assumptions hold:

1. The data distributions of individual attributes in G are independent.

2. For the value combinations vi , its occurrence is the result of an indepen-

dent Bernoulli trial, with the success (occurrence) probability fG,i .

3. The occurrences of individual possible value combinations are independent.

Then, the expected number of distinct values DG is

M
X
E[DG ] = M − (1 − fG,i )N .
i=1

The algorithm for computing the estimate is given in Fig. 24.3. In the first,
most expensive phase, it constructs the Kronecker product. Then, the simple
calculations according to the theorem follow. A more efficient implementation
would calculate the Kronecker product only implicitly. Further, the frequency
vectors may not be completely known but only a part of it via some histogram.
As was also shown by Yu et al., end-biased histograms (coming soon) are opti-
mal under the following error metrics. Let D̂G,hist be the estimate derived for
a histogram. The error function they consider is

Eabs = |D̂G − D̂G,hist |.

24.3.6 Profile Propagation for Division

As a starting point, we use an observation made by Merrett and Otoo [?].
Assume we are given two sets X and Y , which are both subsets of a finite
domain D with |D| = n elements. Then |X| < |Y | implies that X 6⊆ Y .
Otherwise, we can calculate the probability of X ⊇ Y as
   
|X| n
p(X ⊇ Y ) = /
|Y | |Y |

Now let R and S be two relations with A(R) = {A, B} and A(S) = {B}. A
value a ∈ ΠD
A (R) is contained in the result of R÷B if and only if ΠB (σA=a (R)) ⊇
S. Hence, for any such a, fA = fA /dA and nB equal to the size of the common
domain of R.B and S.B, we can calculate the survival probability as
   
fA nB
/
|S| |S|
24.3. A FIRST LOGICAL PROFILE AND ITS PROPAGATION 393

EstimateNumberOfDistinctValues(f1 , . . . , fn )
/* frequency vectors fi */
/* step 1: calculate fG = f1 ⊗ . . . ⊗ fn */
fG = f1 ;
for (i = 2; i ≤ n; ++i) {
f old = fG ;
fG = ; // empty vector
for (j = 1; j ≤ |f old |; ++j) {
for (k = 1; k ≤ di ; ++k) {
fG = push back(fG , fjold × fi,j ); // append a value to a vector
}
}
}
/* step 2: compute the expected number of distinct value combinations */
S = 0;
for (j = 1, j ≤ M ; ++j) { // M = length(fG )
S += (1 − fj )N ;
}
D̂G = M − S;
return D̂G ;

Figure 24.3: Calculating the estimate for DG

provided that fA ≥ |S| and R is a set. Denote by fA0 and d0A the cumulated
frequency and the number of distinct values for attribute A in the result of
R ÷ S. Then we have the estimate
   
0 0 fA nB
fA = dA = dA ∗ /
|S| |S|
in case R is a set.
If R is a bag, we must be prepared to see duplicates in σA=a (R). In this
case we can adjust the above formula to
   
0 0 xA n
fA = dA = dA ∗ /
|S| |S|

where xA = D(xA , nA ), and nA is the size of the domain of R.A.

If there is some variance among the number of distinct values associated
with the a ∈ ΠD A (R), the estimate will be rough. To cure this, we need better
information. Define for each a ∈ ΠD A (R) the number ha to be the number of
distinct b values occurring for it, i.e. ha = |ΠD B (σA=a (R))|. Then we could
estimate fA0 and d0A as follows:
X  ha   n 
0 0
fA = dA = /
D
|S| |S|
a∈ΠA (R)
394 CHAPTER 24. CARDINALITY AND COST ESTIMATES

Name Definition Error minimized


x(n+1)/2 n odd Pn
median(x̃) E1 = i=1 |xi − x̂|
(xn/2 + xn/2+1 )/2 n even
Pn pPn
mean(x̄) 1/n i=1 xi E2 = i=1 (xi − x̂)2

middle (max(x) + min(x))/2 E∞ = maxni=1 |xi − x̂|

p
q-value max(X) min(X) Eq = maxni=1 max{xi /x̂, x̂/xi }

Table 24.5: Approximations of a set of numbers by a single number

Keeping ha for every possible a may not be practical. However, if the number
of distinct values in H = {ha |a ∈ ΠDA (R)} is small, we can keep the number of
distinct a values for each possible ha . Assume H = {h1 , . . . , hk } and define

gi = |{a ∈ ΠD
A (R)|ha = hi }|,

then we have the estimate

k    
X hi n
fA0 = d0A = gi / .
|S| |S|
i=0,hi ≥|S|

24.3.7 Remarks
NULL Values Our profile is not really complete for attributes which can
have NULL values. To deal with these, we need to extend our profiles by the
frequency d⊥A with which NULL occurs in an attribute A of some relation. It is
straightforward to extend the above profile to deal with this additional count.

Uniformity is not sufficient As we have seen, even if all attributes are

uniformly distributed, which is rarely the case in practice, the result of algebraic
operators may no longer be uniformly distributed. As a consequence, we need
to be concerned with the approximation of the true distribution of values.

Sets of Attributes Note that nothing prevents us to use the formulas de-
veloped above for selections and joins if A and B are attribute sets instead of
single attributes. We just have to know or calculate dA for sets of attributes A.

24.4 Approximation of a Set of Values

24.4.1 Approximations and Error Metrics
Assume we have a set of values x = {x1 , . . . , xn }. The task we want to tackle
is to approximate this set of values by a single value. The left two columns
24.4. APPROXIMATION OF A SET OF VALUES 395

of Table 24.5 show the names and definitions of some possible approximations.
Whereas mean and median are well known, the other two may be not. The
middle is defined as the value exactly between the minimum and maximum of
X. Hence, the distance from the middle to either extreme is the same. The q-
value needs some further restriction: the values in X must be larger than zero.
For our purposes, this restriction is not bad since execution costs are typically
larger than zero and frequencies are mostly larger than zero if they are not
exactly zero. The latter case needs some special attention if we use something
like the q-value, which we could also term geometric or multiplicative middle.
Let us take a look at a simple example. Assume X = {1, 2, 9}. Then we
can easily calculate the approximations summarized in the following table:
median mean middle q-value
2 4 5 3
Which of these approximations is the best one? The answer depends on the error
function we wish to minimize. Therefore, the rightmost column of Table 24.5
shows some error functions, which are minimized by the approximation defined
in the same line. The variable x̂ denotes the estimate whose error is to be
calculated. For E2 there exist plenty of equivalent formulations, where we think
of two error measures as being equivalent, if andPonly if they result inPthe same
minimum. Some important alternatives are 1/n (xi − x̂)2 , 1/(n−1) (xi − x̂)2
(empirical variance), and simply (xi − x̂)2 .
P
A nice property half of the approximations give us are error bounds. These
are E∞ and Eq . Define the spread s of x as max(x) − min(x). Then, given the
middle m of x, we have for every xi ∈ x that
m − s/2 ≤ xi ≤ m + s/2.
Thus, we have a symmetric, additive
p error bound for all elements in x. Define
the geometric spread as s = max(x)/ min(x). Then we have a symmetric,
multiplicative error bound for all elements xi in x given by
(1/s)q ≤ xi ≤ sq
if q is the geometric middle. The following table shows the possible errors for
all approximations of our example set X = {1, 2, 9}:
median mean middle geo. mean
2 4 5 3
E1 8 10 11 9
E2 7.1 6.2 6.4 6.4
E∞ 7 5 4 6
Eq 4.5 4 5 3
Which of these error metrics and, hence, which approximation is the best?
Obviously, this depends on the application. In the query compiler context, E1
plays no role that we are aware of. E2 plays a predominant role as it is used to
approximate values in a given histogram bucket. This has not come by sharp
reasoning about the best possibility but merely by the existence of a huge body
of literature in this area. Currently, the other two error metrics, E∞ and Eq ,
play minor roles. But this will change.
396 CHAPTER 24. CARDINALITY AND COST ESTIMATES

24.4.2 Example Applications

Let us discuss some example applications relevant to building a query compiler.
Assume we have to come up with the execution time (CPU usage) for some
function. This could be a simple arithmetic function built into our system,
a hash function executed for a hash-join, the CPU time used to dereference
a TID if the according page is in memory, the CPU time needed to search a
B-tree page residing in the buffer, or the CPU time needed to load a page from
secondary storage into the buffer. Careful as we are, we measure the function’s
execution time several times. Almost certainly, the numbers will not be same
for every execution, except maybe for the simplest functions. To come up within
a single number, we need to approximate the set of numbers derived from our
measurements. If the function is going to be executed many times within a
query execution plan (in which it occurs), we need to cost the average case and
the mean is the approximation of choice. We will see other applications when
we discuss histograms.

24.5 Approximation with Linear Models

24.5.1 Linear Models
In this section, we want to approximate a given set of points (xi , yi ) (1 ≤ i ≤ m)
by a linear combination fˆ of given functions Φj , 1 ≤ j ≤ n. The general
assumption is that m > n. We define the estimation function fˆ as
n
X
fˆ(x) := cj Φj (x)
j=1

for coefficients cj ∈ R. The estimates yˆi for yi are then derived from fˆ by
n
X
yˆi := fˆ(xi ) = cj Φj (xi ).
j=1

Note that the functions Φj are not necessarily linar functions. For example, we
could use polynomials Φj (x) = xj−1 . Further, there is no need for x to be a
single number. It could as well be a vector ~x.
It is convenient to state our approximation problem in terms of vectors and
matrices. Let (xi , yi ) be the points we want to approximate and Φj , 1 ≤ j ≤ n
be some functions. We define the design matrix A ∈ Rm×n , A = (ai,j ) by

ai,j = Φj (xi )

or, equivalently, as an explicit matrix

 
Φ1 (x1 ) Φ2 (x1 ) Φ3 (x1 ) . . . Φn (x1 )
 Φ1 (x2 ) Φ2 (x2 ) Φ3 (x2 ) . . . Φn (x2 ) 
A=  (24.5)
 ... 
Φ1 (xm ) Φ2 (xm ) Φ3 (xm ) . . . Φn (xm )
24.5. APPROXIMATION WITH LINEAR MODELS 397

Assume we wish to approximate the points by a polynomial of degree n − 1.

Then, Φi (x) = xi−1 and the design matrix becomes

1 (x1 )1 (x1 )2 . . . (x1 )n−1

 
1 (x2 )1 (x2 )2 . . . (x2 )n−1 
A= .
 ... 
1 2
1 (xm ) (xm ) . . . (xm ) n−1

In the simplest case, where we want to use a linear function fˆ(x) = c1 + c2 x to

approximate the points, the design matrix becomes
 
1 x1
1 x2 
A=  ... .


1 xm
As an example consider the three points

(1, 20), (2, 10), (3, 60).

The design matrix becomes  

1 1
A = 1 2 (24.6)
1 3
For every column vector ~c = (c1 , c2 )T

A~c

gives the result of fˆ for all points. Clearly, ~c should be determined such that
the deviation of A~c from ~y = (y1 , . . . , ym )T becomes minimal.
The deviation could be zero, that is A~c = ~y . However, remember our as-
sumption that m > n. This means that we have more equations than variables.
Thus, we have an overdetermined system of equations and it is quite unlikely
that a solution to this system of equations exists. This motivates our goal to
find an approximation as good as possible. Next, we formalize this goal.
Often used measures for deviations or distances of two vectors are based on
norms.
Definition 24.5.1 (norm) Let S be a linear space. Then a function ||x|| :
S → R is called a norm if and only if it has the following three properties:
1. ||x|| > 0 unless x = 0
2. ||λx|| = |λ| ||x||
3. ||x + y|| ≤ ||x|| + ||y||
Various norms, called p norms can be found in the literature. Let x ∈ Rn
and p ≥ 1 where p = ∞ is possible. Then
n
X 1
||x||p = ( |xi |) p .
i=0
398 CHAPTER 24. CARDINALITY AND COST ESTIMATES

The most important norms are the l1 , l2 , and l∞ norms:

||x||1 = |x1 | + . . . + |xn |

p
||x||2 = (x1 )2 + . . . + (xn )2
n
||x||∞ = max |xi |
i=1

Using these norms, we can define distance functions d1 , d2 , and d∞ . For two
vectors x and y in Rn , we define

d1 (x, y) = ||x − y||1

d2 (x, y) = ||x − y||2
d∞ (x, y) = ||x − y||∞

It should be clear, that these define the error measures E1 , E2 , and E∞ , which
we used in Sec. 24.4. The only missing error function is Eq . We immediately
fill this gap, and start with the one dimensional case.

Definition 24.5.2 (Q-paranorm in R) Define for x ∈ R,


 ∞ if x ≤ 0
||x||Q = 1/x if 0 < x ≤ 1
x if 1 ≤ x


|| · ||Q is called Q-paranorm.

Note that for x > 0, ||x||Q = max(x, 1/x). The multivariate case is a straight-
forward extension using the maximum over all components:

Definition 24.5.3 (Q-paranorm in Rn ) For x ∈ Rn , define

n
||x||Q = max ||xi ||Q .
i=1

We denote this paranorm by lq .

Definition 24.5.4 (paranorm) Let S be a linear space. Then a function

||x|| : S → R is called a paranorm if and only if the following two properties
hold:

1. ||x|| ≥ 0

2. ||x + y|| ≤ ||x|| + ||y||

The Q-paranorm is a norm, hence the name. The only missing part is the
distance function stated next. Let x and y be two vectors in Rn , where y =
(y1 , . . . , yn )T with yi > 0. Then we define

dq (x, y) = ||x/y||Q
24.5. APPROXIMATION WITH LINEAR MODELS 399

where we define x/y for two column vectors x, y ∈ Rn as follows:

x/y = (x1 /y1 , . . . , xn /yn )T .

Between norms there exist some inequalities. For all vectors x ∈ Rn , we

have √
||x||2 ≤ ||x||1 ≤ n||x||2
√
||x||∞ ≤ ||x||2 ≤ n||x||∞
||x||∞ ≤ ||x||1 ≤ n||x||∞
For lq , no such inequality exists as ||x||Q approaches infinity as x approaches
zero.
We can now formally state the approximation problem. Let A ∈ Rm×n
be the design matrix and (xi , yi ), 1 ≤ i ≤ m be a set of points, and ~y =
(y1 , . . . , ym ). The goal is to find a vector ~a∗ ∈ Rn minimizing d(A~a, ~y ). That
is, we look for ~a∗ ∈ Rn such that

d(A~a∗ , ~y ) − minn d(A~a, ~y ) (24.7)

~a∈R

~c∗ is then called solution of the approximation problem or best approximation.

For different l (d), we get different problems. For l1 the problem is called
quantile regression. We will not deal with it here, since we do not know of any
application of it in the database context. The solutions for the problems for l2 ,
l∞ , and lq are discussed in subsequent sections, after we have given some exam-
ple applications of what needs to be approximated in a DBMS. Before we pro-
ceed, let us give the solutions for approximating the points (1, 20), (2, 10), (3, 60)
with a linear function α + βx. The following table shows the values of x, y
and estimates for y produced by the best approximations fˆl2 , fˆl∞ , fˆlq , which
minimize l2 , l∞ , and lq , resp. Additionally, we give the α and β of the best
approximations as well as their quality measured by l1 , l2 and lq .

x y fˆl2 fˆl∞ fˆlq

1 20 10 5 10
2 10 30 25 20
3 60 50 45 30
α 20 20 10
β -10 -15 0
l2 14.1421 15 19.1485
l∞ 20 15 30
lq 3 4 2
Let us repeat some general insights into approximation problems as defined
above. Thereby, we follow the exposition of Watson [?]. We start with stating
theorems on the existence of a solution. The following two theorems only apply
to norms. That is, they do not apply to lq . However, as we will see later,
solutions under lq exist.
Theorem 24.5.5 (Existence 1) Let M denote a compact set in a normed
linear space. Then to each point g of the space there exists a point of M closest
to g.
 400 CHAPTER 24. CARDINALITY AND COST ESTIMATES

Compactness is a sufficient but not necessary condition.

Theorem 24.5.6 (Existence 2) Let M be a finite dimensional subspace of a

normed linear space S. Then there exists a best approximation in M to any
point of S.

The next point to consider is the uniqueness of a solution. Proving the unique-
ness of a solution is easy, if the norm is strictly convex.

Definition 24.5.7 ((strictly) convex) Let f (x) be a function on the ele-

ments x of a linear space S. Then f (x) is convex if

f (λx1 + (1 − λ)x2 ) ≤ λf (x1 ) + (1 − λ)f (x2 )

for all x1 , x2 ∈ S and 0 ≤ λ ≤ 1.

If 0 < λ < 1 implies strict inequality in the above inequality, f (x) is called
strictly convex.

It is easy to show that all lp norms for p 6= ∞ are strictly convex and that l∞
and lq are convex, but not strictly convex. For strictly convex norms, it is easy
to show that a solution is unique.

Theorem 24.5.8 In a strictly convex normed linear space S, a finite dimen-

sional subspace M contains a unique best approximation to any point of S.

Although l∞ and lq are not strictly convex, under certain circumstances a unique
best approximation exists for them. This is discussed in subsequent sections.
Considering the above, one might conjecture that l2 approximation is much
simpler than l∞ or lq approximation. This is indeed the case. We will not repeat
all the findings from approximation theory and the algorithms developed. There
are plenty of excellent textbooks on this matter. We highly recommend the
excellent book of Golub and van Loan [?], which discusses l2 approximation and
several algorithms to solve them (e.g. QR factorization and SVD). Other good
books to refresh one’s knowledge on matrix algebra are [?, ?, ?, ?]. Überhuber
wrote another good book discussing l2 approximation, QR factorization and
SVD [?]. In the context of statistics, many different regression models exist
ToDo to approximate a given set of data. An excellent overview is provided by [?].
Another good reading, not only in this context, is the book by Press, Teukolsky,
Vetterling, and Flannery [597]. Before reading these books, it might be helpful
to repeat some linear algebra and some basics of matrices. An excellent book
for doing so was written by Schmidt and Trenkler [?]. The only book we know
of that discusses approximation under l∞ , is the one by Watson, already cited
above [?]. Approximation under lq is not discussed in any textbook. Hence, we
must refer to the original article [?, ?]. In any case, since mathematics is quite
involved at times, we give explicit algorithms only for the approximation by a
linear function. For all other cases, we refer to the literature.
24.5. APPROXIMATION WITH LINEAR MODELS 401

24.5.2 Example Applications

In this section, we give some examples of approximation problems occurring
in the database context. As we will see, different problems demand different
norms. Additionally, we sketch how to use approximations. The details are left
to the reader as an exercise.

Disk seek times

There exist small benchmarks, which measure the disk seek time for travelling
n cylinders (see Sec. 4.1). To cover for random errors, many measurements are
taken. The task is to find the parameters d and c0 , 1 ≤ i ≤ 4, for the disk seek
time formula from Sec. 4.1:
 √
c1 + c2 d d <= c0
seektime(d) =
c3 + c4 d d > c0

Since many seeks occur during the processing of a single query, l2 is the appro-
priate norm. On the surface, we seem to have a problem √ using a simple linear
model. However, we can approximate the parts c1 +c2 d and c3 +c4 d for sever-
al distinct c0 either by trying a full range of values for c0 or by a binary search.
The solution for c0 we then favor is the one in which the maximum of the errors √
on both parts becomes minimal. A second problem is the occurrence of d,
√
since this does not look linear. However, choosing Φ1 = 1 and Φ2 (x) = x will
work fine.
Another method is to transform a set of points (xi , yi ) with two (injective)
transformation functions tx and ty into the set of points (tx (xi ), ty (yi )). Then
this set is approximated and the result is transformed back. While using this
approach, special attention has to be paid to the norm, as it can change due to
the transformation. We see examples of this later on in Sec. 24.5.6.

Functions sensitive to parameter size

Another example is to approximate the execution time of a hash function on
string values. As its calculation depends on the length of the input string,
measurements can be taken for various lengths. Using l2 as a norm is perfect,
because the hash function is typically executed many times during a hash join
or hash group [?].

Approximation of frequency densities and distributions

We start by demonstrating the usage of approximating functions for cardinal-
ity estimation. Then, we look at the choice of error metrics for estimating
selectivity results and the influence of cardinality estimation errors on joins.
Let R be a relation and A one of its attributes. Let (xi , fi ) denote the
frequency fi with which the value xi occurs in attribute A. Typically, only
those values xi are written down and approximated for which fi 6= 0. We
further assume that the xi are sorted, i.e. xi < xi+1 . Using the methods to
come, we can approximate this set of points by a function fˆ(x). To calculate
 402 CHAPTER 24. CARDINALITY AND COST ESTIMATES

the output cardinality of a selection σA=c (R), we can simply return fˆ(c) as an
estimate. Hence it is a good choice to use lq (see below for strong arguments).
To calculate the result cardinality for a range query of the form σc1 ≤A≤c2 (R),
we distinguish several cases. First, assume that the domain of A is discrete and
the number of values between c1 and c2 is small. Then, we can calculate the
result quite efficiently by X
fˆ(x).
c1 ≤x≤c2

If the number of values between c1 and c2 is too large for an explicit summation,
we can apply speed-up techniques if the function fˆ has a simple form. For
example, if fˆ is a linear function fˆ(x) = α+βx, the above sum can be calculated
EXC very efficiently . If the number of values between c1 and c2 is very large and no
efficient form for the above sum can be found, or if we do not have a discrete
domain, we can use the integral to approximate the sum. Thus, we use the
right-hand side of Z c2
X
ˆ
f (x) ≈ fˆ(x)dx
c1 ≤x≤c2 c1

to approximate the sum by evaluating an expression which is hopefully less

expensive to evaluate.
Yet another solution is the following. InsteadP of approximating (xi , fi ) di-
rectly, we approximate (xi , gi ) where gi = j≤i (fi ). Let us denote the ap-
proximation of this cumulated frequency distribution by ĝ. Then the result
cardinality of a range query of the form σc1 ≤A≤c2 (R) can be simply calculated
by
ĝ(c2 ) − ĝ(c1 ).

Minimizing error propagation. Let us assume that the purpose of our

approximation is to estimate the output cardinalities of selections on relations
Ri , i.e. σpi (Ri ) for i = 1, . . . , n. The results of these cardinality estimations
are then used to find the optimal order of subsequent joins. More specifically,
assume we have to find the optimal query execution plan for the following
expression:
σp1 (R1 ) 1 . . . 1 σpn (Rn ), (24.8)
where we intentionally left out all the join predicates. Ioanidis and Christo-
doulakis pointed out that errors propagate exponentially through joins [384].
Denote by si the cardinality of σpi (Ri ) and by ŝi its estimate. Further assume
that independence holds. This means, that si can be written as fi |Ri |, where
fi is the selectivity of pi . Denote by fi,j the selectivity of the join predicate
between Ri and Rj , if it exists. Otherwise we define fi,j = 1. The result of
joining a subset x ⊆ {R1 , . . . , Rn } has cardinality
Y Y Y
sx = ( fi )( fi,j )( |Ri |)
Ri ∈x Ri ,Rj ∈x Ri ∈x

Denote by fˆi the estimate for the selectivities of the pi and assume that the
join selectivities have been estimated correctly (which, of course, is difficult in
24.5. APPROXIMATION WITH LINEAR MODELS 403

practice). Then the estimated cardinality of the result of joining the relations
in x is
Y Y Y
ŝx = ( fˆi )( fi,j )( |Ri |)
Ri ∈x Ri ,Rj ∈x Ri ∈x
Y Y Y Y
= ( fi /fi )( fˆi )( fi,j )( |Ri |)
Ri ∈x Ri ∈x Ri ,Rj ∈x Ri ∈x
Y Y Y Y
= ( fˆi /fi )( fi )( fi,j )( |Ri |)
Ri ∈x Ri ∈x Ri ,Rj ∈x Ri ∈x
Y
= ( fˆi /fi )sx
Ri ∈x

where some i belong to the category with fˆi /fi < 1 and others to the one
with fˆi /fi > 1. Remember that during dynamic programming, all subsets of
relations are considered. Especially those subsets occur in which all relations
belong to one category only. Hence, building on the cancellation of errors by
mixing them from different categories is not a true option. Instead, we should
minimize Y
max{fi /fˆi , fˆi /fi }
Ri ∈x

in order to minimize errors and error propagation. This product can be mini-
mized by minimizing each of its factors. This means that if we want to minimize
error propagation, we have to minimize the multiplicative error Eq for estimat-
ing the cardinalities of selections based on equality. This finding can obviously
be generalized to any kind of selections. Thus, for cardinality estimations for
selections (and joins, or cardinality estimation in general) the q-error is the
error and the geometric middle the approximation of choice.

Error bounds guaranteeing plan optimality. Let us give another strong

argument for minimizing the multiplicative error Eq . Let us consider again the
join expression given in 24.8. Further, denote by fi the correct selectivity of
σAi =ci and by fˆi some estimate. If the plan generator uses the correct cardi-
nalities, it produces the optimal plan. Given the estimates, it might produce
another plan. The question is, how far can the cardinality estimates deviate
from the true cardinalities and the opimal plan remains the same. More formal-
ly, denote by P the optimal plan under the correct cardinalities f and by P̂ the
optimal plan under the estimates fˆ. Then, we can restate the above question
to whether there exists a condition on fˆ such that if this condition holds then
P̂ = P. The nice truth is that such conditions exist and they involve the Q
paranorm.
In the simplest case, let us assume that the expression given in 24.8 is used
to evaluate a star query under an ASI cost function without considering cross
products. From Sec. 3.2.2 we can conclude that the optimal join order for
star queries starts with the center relation and orders the satellite relations
according to their rank. The rank of a relation R is defined as rank(Ri ) =
(T (Ri ) − 1)/C(Ri ), where C(S) are some fixed per tuple costs and T (Ri ) =
404 CHAPTER 24. CARDINALITY AND COST ESTIMATES

f0,i fi |R|, if f0,i is the join selectivity of the join of Ri with the center relation
R0 . Thus, P̂ = P if f and fˆ result in the same ordering of the relations. Since
f (x) = (x − 1)/c is monotonically increasing for constants c, we can conclude
that the ordering is indeed the same as long as for all i 6= j we have

f0,i fi |Ri | < f0,j fj |Rj | ⇐⇒ f0,i fˆi |Ri | < f0,j fˆj |Rj |

which is equivalent to
fi ri fˆi ri
< 1 ⇐⇒ <1
fj rj fˆj rj
for ri = f0,i |Ri |. We now show that if
s
fi fi ri
|| ||Q < min || ||Q
fˆi i6=j fj rj

for all i, then P = P̂ . This condition implies the much weaker condition that
for all i 6= j
fˆi fˆj fi ri
|| ||Q || ||Q < || ||Q (24.9)
fi fj fj rj

To show the claim, it suffices to show that (fi ri )/(fj rj ) < 1 implies (fˆi ri )/(fˆj rj ) <
1. This follows from

fˆi ri fˆi fj fi ri
=
fˆj rj fi fˆj fj rj
fˆi fj fi ri
= ( )/(|| ||Q ) (∗)
fi fˆj fj rj
fˆi fj fi ri
≤ (|| ||Q || ||Q )/(|| ||Q )
fi fˆj fj rj
< 1

where (*) follows from (fi ri )/(fj rj ) < 1.

For chain queries,
s
fˆi fi fi,i+1 |Ri |
|| ||Q < min || ||Q
fi i6=j−1 fj fj,j−1 |Rj |

implies P̂ = P . For tree queries, things are a little more complex. In the
following, we assume that Ri0 is a relation connected to Ri , which we denote
by Ri0 − Ri . Then
s
fˆi fi fi,i0 |Ri |
|| ||Q < min || ||Q
fi i6=j,Ri0 −Ri ,Rj 0 −Rj fj fj,j 0 |Rj |

implies P̂ = P .
24.5. APPROXIMATION WITH LINEAR MODELS 405

chain query
12 star query

10

0
1 1.2 1.4 1.6 1.8 2 2.2 2.4

Figure 24.4: Q-error and plan optimality

From cardinality estimation error bounds to cost error bounds.

Positions of interesting values

Consider an integer attribute A of a relation R with values in [l, u]. Imagine a

situation where almost all values in [l, u] occur with some frequency in A. Only
few holes exist. Denote by W the set of values in [l, u] that do not occur in
A. Again, the selection is of the form σc1 ≤A≤c2 (R). In the case of holes, the
above summation for range queries leads to a wrong result. It would be better
to calculate the result cardinality as in
X X
fˆ(x) − fˆ(x)
c1 ≤x≤c2 c1 ≤x≤c2 ,x∈W

For this to work, we have to know where the holes in [l, u] are. If there are only
a few of them, we can memorize them. If they are to many to be stored, we
can approximate them as follows. Let W = {w1 , . . . , wm }. Then, we can use
approximation techniques to approximate the set of points (i, wi ), 1 ≤ i ≤ m.
Depending on the size of the interval [l, u] either l∞ or lq is the appropriate
norm. Similarily, the peaks, i.e. the distinct values occurring in the attribute A
of R, can be approximated if there are only a few of them in the domain of A.

Number of distinct values

24.5.3 Linear Models Under l2

Now that we know that the solution to our problem exists and is unique, we
continue by characterizing it. Let S be a linear space (say R2 ) and s ∈ S some
point. Further denote by G some linear subspace of S (say a straight line). For
any g ∈ G, we can define the residual vector g − f . Using residuals, we can
characterize the unique solution quite easily and intuitively. Exactly the vector
g ∗ ∈ G is closest to f whose residual f − g is orthogonal to G. Remember that
two vectors are orthogonal if and only if their scalar product is zero. Now we
can characterize the solution to our approximation problem under l2 .
406 CHAPTER 24. CARDINALITY AND COST ESTIMATES

Theorem 24.5.9 (Characterization) Let S be a linear space and G a sub-

space. An element g ∗ is the best approximation of a point s ∈ S if and only
if
hg ∗ − f, gi = 0
holds. That is, if the error is orthogonal to all elements in G.

Since we are used to solve equations for x, we rewrite our problem to A~x = b.
That is, the vector ~x replaces the coefficient vector c. Using Theorem 24.5.9, we
must have that A~x∗ − b is orthogonal to the range of A. The range of a matrix
A ∈ Rm×n is defined as R(A) = {Ax|x ∈ Rn }. Let ai be i-th column vector
of A and ~x = (x1 , . . . , xn )T . Then, the best approximation can be found by
solving the following system of linear equations, which is called (Gauß) normal
equations:

ha1 , a1 ix1 + ha2 , a1 ix2 + . . . + han , a1 ixn = hb, a1 i

ha1 , a2 ix1 + ha2 , a2 ix2 + . . . + han , a2 ixn = hb, a2 i
.. .. .. .. ..
. . . . .
ha1 , an ix1 + ha2 , an ix2 + . . . + han , an ixn = hb, an i

or, using matrix notation, we get

AT A~x = AT~b (24.10)

This system of linear equations can be solved by many different approaches.

Some fast and numerically stable approaches are QR decomposition and sin-
gular value decomposition (SVD). Both leave the conditioning of the problem
unchanged. QR decomposition can only be applied if the the matrix has full
rank (see below). Otherwise, one has to keep up with variants of QR decom-
position or SVD. Hence, we will briefly discuss SVD. We will not give any
algorithms. The interested reader is referred to [?].
Before we proceed with SVD, let us repeat some basics on matrices. A
special matrix is the identity matrix I ∈ Rn×n with I = (δi,j )i,j , 1 ≤ i ≤ n.
Matrices can have plenty of properties. Here are some of them.

Definition 24.5.10 (rank) The rank of a matrix A, denoted by rank(A), is

the rank of the subspace R(A).

Definition 24.5.11 (full rank) A matrix A ∈ Rm×n , m > n has full rank if
its rank is n.

Definition 24.5.12 (symmetric) A matrix A ∈ Rn is symmetric if and only

if AT = A.

Note that for all matrices A ∈ Rm×n , we always have that AAT and AT A are
symmetric.

Definition 24.5.13 (idempotent) A matrix A ∈ Rn×n is idempotent if and

only if AA = A.
24.5. APPROXIMATION WITH LINEAR MODELS 407

Definition 24.5.14 (inverse) A Matrix A−1 ∈ Rn×n is the inverse of a ma-

trix A ∈ Rn×n if and only if A−1 A = AA−1 = I.

A matrix for which the uniquely determined inverse exists is called regular.

Definition 24.5.15 (orthogonal) A matrix A ∈ Rn×n is orthogonal if and

only if AAT = AT A = I.

Let us use a simple, operational, recursive definition of the determinant.

Definition 24.5.16 (determinant) Let A ∈ Rn×n be a matrix. We define

the determinant of A as det(A) = a1,1 if n = 1. Otherwise, we define
n
X
det(A) = (−1)i+j ai,j det(Ai,j )
j=1

where Ai,j ∈ R(n−1)×(n−1) results from A by eliminating the i-th row and the
j-th column.

Definition 24.5.17 (characteristic polynomial) Let A ∈ Rn×n be a ma-

trix. The characteristic polynomial is defined as
 
(a1,1 − z) a1,2 ... a1,n 

 a2,1 (a2,2 − z) · · · a2,n 
Pn (z; A) := det(A − zI) = 

.. .. . .. .. 

 . . . 

 an,1 an,2 · · · (an,n − z)

Definition 24.5.18 (Eigenvalue) Let A ∈ Rn×n be a matrix and Pn (z; A) its

characteristic polynomial. Any root λi of Pn (z; A), i.e. P( z; A)(λi ) = 0 is called
Eigenvalue. The set of Eigenvalues is denoted by

λ(A) := {λ1 , . . . , λk }

and is called spectrum of A.

Definition 24.5.19 (similar) Two matrices A, B ∈ Rn×n are similar if and

only if there exists a regular matrix X ∈ Rn×n such that B = X −1 AX.

Two similar matrices have the same Eigenvalues, as can be seen from the fol-
lowing theorem.

Theorem 24.5.20 Let A, B ∈ Rn×n be two similar matrices. Then they have
the same characteristic polynomial.

Definition 24.5.21 (generalized inverse) A matrix A− ∈ Rn×m is the gen-

eralized inverse, or g-inverse, of a matrix A ∈ Rm×n , if AA− A = A holds.

Every matrix and, hence, every vector has a g-inverse. For regular matrices,
the g-inverse and the inverse coincide. In general, the g-inverse is not uniquely
determined. Adding some additional properties makes it unique.
408 CHAPTER 24. CARDINALITY AND COST ESTIMATES

Definition 24.5.22 (Moore-Penrose inverse) A matrix A+ ∈ Rn×m is the

Moore-Penrose inverse of a matrix A ∈ Rmn if the following conditions hold:

1. AA+ A = A

2. A+ AA+ = A+

3. (A+ A)T = A+ A

4. (AA+ )T = AA+

For every matrix and, hence, every vector there exists a uniquely determined
Moore-Penrose inverse. In case A is regular, A+ = A−1 holds. If A is symmetric,
then A+ A = AA+ . If A is symmetric and idempotent, then A+ = A. Further,
all of A+ A, AA+ , I − A+ A, and I − AA+ are idempotent. Here are some
equalities holding for the Moore-Penrose inverse:

(A+ )+ = A (24.11)
T + + T
(A ) = (A ) (24.12)
T + + T +
(A A) = A (A ) (24.13)
T + T + +
(AA ) = (A ) A (24.14)
T + T
A AA = A (24.15)
+ T T
A AA = A (24.16)

The following theorem states the existence of a decomposition of any matrix

into regular/orthogonal submatrices.

Theorem 24.5.23 (singular value decomposition) Let A ∈ Rm×n be a

matrix. Then there exist an orthogonal matrix U ∈ Rm×m and an orthogo-
nal matrix V ∈ Rn×n such that

U T AV = S

such that S ∈ Rm×n is of the form

S = diag(s1 , . . . , sk )

with k = min(m, n) and, further

s1 ≥ s2 ≥ . . . ≥ sr > sr+1 = . . . = sk = 0

holds where r = rank(A).

For a proof and algorithms to calculate the SVD of an arbitrary matrix see
the book by Golub and Loan [?]. Another proof can be found in the book by
Harville [?]. The diagonal elements si of S, which is orthogonal equivalent to
A, are called singular values. From

S T S = (U T AV )T (U T AV ) = V T AT U U T AV = V −1 AT AV
24.5. APPROXIMATION WITH LINEAR MODELS 409

it follows that S T S and AT A are similar. Since S T S = diag(s21 , . . . , s2r , 0, . . . , 0)

and similar matrices have the same spectrum, it follows that
p
si = λi

for λi ∈ λ(AT A), 1 ≤ i ≤ n.

Define S −1 = diag(1/s1 , . . . , 1/sr , 0, . . . , 0) and A+ = V S −1 U T . From

AA+ A = (U SV T )(V S −1 U T )(U SV T )

= U SS −1 SV T
= U SV T
= A

and

A+ AA+ = (V S −1 U T )(U SV T )(V S −1 U T )

= V S −1 SS −1 U T
= V S −1 U T
= A+

we see that A+ = V S −1 U T is a g-inverse of A. The reader is advised to check

the remaining conditions of the Moore-Penrose inverse.
Remember that we have to solve AT A~x = AT~b for ~x in order to find the
best approximation for our set of data points. Set ~x = A+~b. Then

AT A~x = AT AA+~b
= AT~b

where we used Eqn. 24.15. Hence, the Moore-Penrose inverse2 solves our prob-
lem. Moreover, the solution can be obtained easily from the singular value
decomposition.

Approximation by a linear function

Assume we are given m points (xi , yi ), 1 ≤ i ≤ m and wish to approximate
them by a linar function f (x) = α + βx. The design matrix, b and ~x then are
 
1 x1  
1 x2    y1
α  .. 
A = . ..  x = β , b =  . 
 
 .. . 
ym
1 xm

The resulting system of normal equations

 Pm     Pm 
m i=1 x i α i=1 y i
Pm Pm 2 = Pm
i=1 xi i=1 (xi ) β i=1 xi yi
2
The Greville algorithm to calculate the Moore-Penrose inverse directly is described in [?].
410 CHAPTER 24. CARDINALITY AND COST ESTIMATES

has the solution

Pm Pm Pm Pm
2 m m x i yi − m xi m
P P P
i=1 (xi )P i=1 yi − P
i=1 xi yi i=1 xi i=1 i=1 y
Pm i=12 i
α= m 2 m 2
,β = Pm 2
m i=1 (xi ) − ( i=1 xi ) m i=1 (xi ) − ( i=1 xi )

Note that this is a very nice formula as new points arrive or are deleted, only
the sums have to be updated and the quotients to be calculated. There is no
need to look at the other points again.

24.5.4 Linear Models Under l∞

Let A ∈ Rm×n be a matrix, where m > n, and b ∈ Rm a vector. The problem
we solve in this section is to

find ~a ∈ Rn to minimize ||r(a)||∞ (24.17)

where
r(~a) = ~b − A~a (24.18)
The components of the vector r(~a) are denoted by ri (~a).
As pointed out earlier, l∞ is a convex norm. Hence, a solution exists. Since
l∞ is not strictly convex, the uniqueness of the solution is not guaranteed. To
solve problem 24.17 by following the approach proposed by Watson [?]. We
start by characterizing the solution, continue with the conditions under which
uniqueness holds, make some more observations, and finally derive an algorithm
for the case n = 2, i.e. we find a best approximation by a linear function.
Although only few applications in databases exist for l∞ , it is very useful to
find a best approximation under lq if we want to approximate by a function
eβ+αx (see Sec. 24.5.6).
Assume we have a best solution ~a. Then, for some indices i, ri (~a) attains the
maximum, i.e. ri (~a) = ||r(~a)||∞ . Otherwise, a better solution would exist. We
denote the set of indices where the maximum is attained by I(~ ¯ a). We further
¯ The
denote by θi (~a) the sign of ri (~a). Thus ri (~a) = θi (~a)||r(~a)||∞ for all i ∈ I.
following theorem gives a characterization of the solution.

Theorem 24.5.24 A vector ~a ∈ Rn solves problem 24.17 if and only if there

exists a subset I of I¯ with |I| ≤ n + 1 and a vector ~λ ∈ Rm such that

1. λi = 0 for all i 6∈ I,

2. λi θi ≥ 0 for all i ∈ I, and

3. AT~λ = ~0.

The set I in the theorem is called an extremal subset of a solution ~a.

There are two important corollaries to this theorem.

Corollary 24.5.25 Let ~a solve problem 24.17. Then ~a solves an l∞ approxi-

mation problem in Rn+1 obtained by restricting the components of r(~a) to some
particular n + 1 components. If A has rank t, then the components of r(~a may
be restricted to a particular t + 1 components.
24.5. APPROXIMATION WITH LINEAR MODELS 411

Corollary 24.5.26 Let ~a solve problem 24.17 and let I be chosen according
to Theorem 24.5.24 such that λi 6= 0 for all i ∈ I. Further let d~ be another
solution to 24.17. Then
~ = ri (~a).
ri (d)

Hence, not surprisingly, any two solutions have the same residuals for compo-
nents where the maximum is attained. The theorem and its first corollary state
that we need at most t + 1 solutions for a matrix A of rank t. The next theorem
shows that at least t + 1 indices exist where the maximum is attained.

Theorem 24.5.27 If A has rank t, a solution to problem 24.17 exists for which
¯ ≥ t + 1.
|I|

Thus, any submatrix of A consisting of a subset of the rows of A, which core-

¯ a), must have rank t for some solution ~a to
spond to the indices contained in I(~
problem 24.17.
The above theorems and corollaries indicate that the clue to uniqueness is
the rank of subsets of rows of A. The following definition captures this intuition.

Definition 24.5.28 (Haar condition) A matrix R ∈ Rmn, where m ≥ n

satisfies the Haar condition if and only if every submatrix consisting of n rows
of A is nonsingular.

Finally, we can derive uniqueness for those A which satisfy the Haar condition:

Theorem 24.5.29 If A satisfies the Haar condition, the solution to prob-

lem 24.17 is unique.

Obviously, we need to know, whether the Haar condition holds for a matrix
A. Remember that we want to approximate a set of points by a linear combi-
nation of functions Φj , 1 ≤ j ≤ n. From the points (xi , yi ), 1 ≤ i ≤ m, and the
Φj , the design matrix A is derived as shown in Equation 24.5. If the Φj form a
Chebyshev set, the design matrix will fulfill the Haar condition.

Definition 24.5.30 (Chebyshev set) Let X be a closed interval of R. A set

of continous function Φ1 (x), . . . , Φn (x), Φi : X → R, is called a Chebyshev
set, if every non-trivial linear combination of these functions has at most n − 1
zeros in X.

Assume the xi are ordered, that is xi < xi+1 for 1 ≤ i < m. Further, it is well-
known that the set of polynomials Φj = xj−1 , 1 ≤ j ≤ n, forms a Chebyshev
set on any interval X. From now on, we assume that our xi are ordered, that
is x1 < . . . < xm . Further, we define X = [x1 , xm ]. We also assume that the
matrix A of Problem 24.17 is defined as given in Equation 24.5, where the Φj
are continous functions from X to R.
We still need some more knowledge in order to build an algorithm. The
next definition will help to derive a solution for subsets I of {1, . . . , m} with
|I| = n + 1.
412 CHAPTER 24. CARDINALITY AND COST ESTIMATES

Definition 24.5.31 (alternating set) Let ~a be a vector in Rn . We say that

r(~a) alternates s times, if there exists points xi1 , . . . , xis ∈ {x1 , . . . , xm } such
that
rik (~a) = −rik+1 (~a)
for 1 ≤ k < s. The set {xi1 , . . . , xis } is called an alternating set for ~a.

Theorem 24.5.32 Let (xi , yi ), 1 ≤ i ≤ m, be an ordered set of points with

xi ≤ xi+1 for 1 ≤ i < m. Define X = [x1 , xm ]. Further let Φj , 1 ≤ j ≤ n be
a Chebyshev set on X. Define A = (ai,j ), where 1 ≤ i ≤ m, 1 ≤ j ≤ n, and
ai,j = Φj (xi ). Then, a vector ~a ∈ Rn solves Problem 24.17 if and only if there
exists an alternating set with n + 1 points for a.

Consider again the example where we want to approximate the three points
(1, 20), (2, 10), and (3, 60) by a linar function. We saw that the solution to our
problem is fˆl∞ (x) = −15 + 20x. The following table gives the points, the value
of fˆl∞ , the residuals, including their signs.

x y fˆl∞ ri
1 20 5 +15
2 10 25 -15
3 60 45 +15

As Theorem 24.5.32 predicts, the signs of the residual alternate.

The proof of Lemma 24.5.32 uses the following lemma (see [?]).

Lemma 24.5.33 Let (xi , yi ), 1 ≤ i ≤ m, be an ordered set of points with

xi ≤ xi+1 for 1 ≤ i < m. Define X = [x1 , xm ]. Further let Φj , 1 ≤ j ≤ n be a
Chebyshev set on X. Define the n × n determinant

∆i = ∆(x1 , . . . , xi−1 , xi+1 , . . . , xn+1 )

where  
 Φ1 (x1 ) . . . Φn (x1 ) 
 
∆(x1 , . . . , xn ) = det  ... .. ..  (24.19)

 . . 
Φ1 (xn ) . . . Φn (xn )

Then
sign(∆i ) = sign(∆i+1 ), ∀ 1 ≤ i ≤ n.

Let us take a closer look at Theorem 24.5.32 in the special case where m = 3,
i.e. we have exactly three points (xi1 , yi1 ), (xi2 , yi2 ), and (xi3 , yi3 ). We find the
best linear approximation fˆ(x) = α + βx under l∞ by solving the following
equations:

yi1 − (α + βxi1 ) = −1 ∗ λ
yi2 − (α + βxi2 ) = +1 ∗ λ
yi3 − (α + βxi3 ) = −1 ∗ λ
24.5. APPROXIMATION WITH LINEAR MODELS 413

where λ represents the value of ||r(~a)||∞ for the solution ~a to be found. Solving
these equations results in
yi2 − yi1 (yi − yi1 )(xi2 − xi1 )
λ = − 3
2 2(xi3 − xi1 )
yi2 − yi1 2λ
β = −
xi2 − yi1 x i2 − x i1
α = yi1 + λ − xi1 β

The algorithm starts with three arbitrary points with indices i1 , i2 , and i3
with xi1 < xi2 < xi3 . Next, it derives α, β, and λ using the solutions to our
equations 24.20-24.20. Then, the algorithm tries find new indices j1 , j2 , j3 by
exchanging one of the ij with some k such that λ will be increased. Obviously,
we use a k that maximizes the deviation from the best approximation fˆ of
i1 , i2 , i3 , i.e.
||yk − fˆ(xk )||∞ = max ||yi − f (xi )||∞ .
i=1,...,m

Depending on the position of xk in the sequence i1 , i2 , i3 and the sign of the

residual we determine the ij to be exchanged with k.
• xk < xi1
if (sign(yk − fˆk ) == sign(yi1 − fˆi1 ))
then j1 = k, j2 = i2 , j3 = i3
else j1 = k, j2 = i1 , j3 = i2
• xi1 < xk < xi2
if (sign(yk − fˆk ) == sign(yi1 − fˆi1 ))
then j1 = k, j2 = i2 , j3 = i3
else j1 = i1 , j2 = k, j3 = i2
• xi2 < xk < xi3
if (sign(yk − fˆk ) == sign(yi2 − fˆi2 ))
then j1 = i1 , j2 = k, j3 = i2
else j1 = i1 , j2 = i2 , j3 = k
• xk > xi3
if (sign(yk − fˆk ) == sign(yi3 − fˆi3 ))
then j1 = i1 , j2 = i2 , j3 = k
else j1 = i2 , j2 = i3 , j3 = k
The above rules are called exchange rules. In general, they state that if k falls
between two indices, the one with the same sign as rk is replaced by k. If k is
smaller than the smallest index (larger than the largest index), we consider two
cases. If the smaller (largest) index has the same sign of its residue as k, we
exchange it with k; otherwise we exchange it with the largest (smallest) index.
Stated this way, we can use the exchange rules for cases where n > 2.
Algorithm 24.5 summarizes the above considerations.
In case n > 2, the above algorithm remains applicable. We just have to use
the general exchange rule and provide a routine solving the following system of
equations for xi and λ: EXC
414 CHAPTER 24. CARDINALITY AND COST ESTIMATES

BestLinearApproximationUnderChebyshevNorm

1. Choose arbitrary i1 , i2 , i3 with xi1 < xi2 < xi3 .

(e.g. equi-distant ij .)

2. Calculate the solution for the system of equations.

This gives us an approximation function fˆ(x) = α + βx and λ.

3. Find an xk for which the deviation of fˆ from the given data is maximized.
Call this maximal deviation λmax .

4. If λmax − λ >  for some small 

then apply the exchange rule using xk and go to step 2.
(The  is mainly needed for rounding problems with floating point num-
bers.)

5. Return α, β, λ.

Figure 24.5: Algorithm for best linear approximation under l∞

a1,1 x1 + a1,2 x2 + a1,n xn = −λ

a2,1 x2 + a2,2 x2 + a2,n xn = +λ
... ...
an+1,1 x2 + an+1,2 x2 + an+1,n xn = (−1)n+1 λ

24.5.5 Linear Models Under lq

Let (xi , yi ) for 1 ≤ i ≤ m be a set of points with yi > 0, which we again want to
approximate by a linear combination of a given set of functions Φj , 1 ≤ j ≤ n.
This time, we measure the deviation by applying lq . That is, we want to find a
coefficients aj such that the function
n
X
fˆ(x) = aj Φj (x)
j=1

minimizes ( )
yi fˆ(xi )
max max , .
i=1,...,m fˆ(xi ) yi

Let ~a and ~b be two vectors in Rn with bi > 0. Then, we define ~a/~b = ~~a =
b
(a1 /b1 , . . . , an /bn )t T .
Let A ∈ Rm×n be a matrix, where m > n and ~b = (b1 , . . . , bm )t T be a vector
in Rm with bi > 0. Then we can state the problem as

find ~a ∈ Rn that minimizes ||A~a/~b||Q (24.20)

under the constraint that αit T > 0, 1 ≤ i ≤ m, for all row vectors αi of A.
24.5. APPROXIMATION WITH LINEAR MODELS 415

Alternatively, we can modify A by “dividing’ it by ~b. We need some nota-

tions to do so. Let ~b = (b1 , . . . , bm )t T be a vector in Rm . Define diag(~b) to be the
m × m diagonal matrix which contains the bi in its diagonal and is zero outside
the diagonal. For vectors ~b with bi > 0, we can define ~b−1 = (1/b1 , . . . , 1/bm )t T .
Using these notations, we can define
A0 = diag(~b−1 )A
In the special case of univariate polynomial approximation with fˆ(x) = a1 +
a2 x + . . . + an xn−1 the matrix A0 has the form
1/y1 x1 /y1 . . . x1n−1 /y1
 
 1/y2 x2 /y2 . . . xn−1 /y2 
0 2
A = . . (24.21)
 
. .. ..
 . . ... . 
n−1 /y
1/ym xm /ym . . . xm m

Keeping the trick with A0 in mind, it is easy to see that Problem 24.20 can
be solved, if we can solve the general problem
find~a ∈ Rn that minimizes||A~a||Q . (24.22)
The following proposition ensures that a solution to this general problem exists.
Further, since ||A~a||Q is convex, the minimum is a global one.
Proposition 24.5.1 Let A ∈ Rm,n such that R(A) ∩ Rm
>0 6= ∅. Then ||A · ||Q
attains its minimum.
Recall that lq is subadditive and convex. Further it is lower semi-continuous
(see also [?, p. 52]). However, it is not strictly convex. Hence, as with l∞ , we
expect uniqueness to hold only under certain conditions.
We need some more notation. Let A ∈ Rm,n . We denote by R(A) =
{A~a | ~a ∈ Rn } the range of A and by N (A) = {~a ∈ Rn | A~a = 0} the nullspace
of A.
Problem (24.22) can be rewritten as the following constrained minimization
problem:
1
min q subject to ≤ A~a ≤ q and q ≥ 1. (24.23)
(~a,q)∈Rn ×R q
The Lagrangian of (24.23) is given by
1
L(~a, q, λ+ , λ− , µ) := q − (λ+ )T (q − A~a) − (λ− )T (A~a − ) − µ(q − 1).
q
Assume that R(A) ∩ Rm >0 6= ∅. Then the set {(~ a, q) : 1q ≤ A~a ≤ q and q ≥
1} is non-empty and closed and there exists (~a, q) for which we have strong
inequality in all conditions. Then the following Karush-Kuhn-Tucker conditions
are necessary and sufficient for (~aˆ, q̂) to be a minimizer of (24.23), see, e.g., [?,
+ − m
p. 62]: there exist λ̂ , λ̂ ∈ R≥0 and µ̂ ≥ 0 such that
ˆ, q̂, λ̂+ , λ̂− , µ̂) = AT λ+ − AT λ− = 0
∇~a L(~a (24.24)
m m
∂ ˆ + −
X
+ 1 X −
L(~a, q̂, λ̂ , λ̂ , µ̂) = 1 − λ̂i − 2 λ̂i − µ = 0 (24.25)
∂q q
i=1 i=1
416 CHAPTER 24. CARDINALITY AND COST ESTIMATES

and for i = 1, . . . , m,
 
λ̂+ â − (A ˆ i
~a) = 0, (24.26)
i
 
λ̂− (A~a)ˆ i−1 = 0, (24.27)
i
q̂
µ̂(q̂ − 1) = 0.

Assume that 1m 6∈ R(A), where 1m is the vector with all components 1. Then
q̂ > 1 and consequently µ̂ = 0. Furthermore, it is clear that not both λ̂+i and
− ˆ 1 ˆ
λ̂i can be positive because the conditions q̂ = (A~a)i and q̂ = (A~a)i cannot be
fulfilled at the same time, since q̂ > 1.
Setting λ̂ := λ̂+ − λ̂− , we can summarize our findings (24.24) - (24.27) in
the following theorem.

Theorem 24.5.34 Let A ∈ Rm,n such that R(A) ∩ Rm >0 6= ∅ and 1m 6∈ R(A).
ˆ
Then (~a, q̂) solves (24.23) if and only if there exists λ̂ ∈ Rm such that
i) AT λ̂ = 0.
P 1 P
ii) q = q λ̂i + q λ̂i .
λ̂i >0 λ̂i <0

iii) λ̂i = 0 if 1 ˆ i < q.

< (A~a)
q̂

iv) if λ̂i > 0 then (A~a) ˆ i = q̂ and if λ̂i < 0 then (A~a)
ˆ i = 1/q̂.
 
Remark. We see that 1 < q̂ = (A~a ˆ)i implies sign (A~a
ˆ)i − 1 = 1 and that
   
1 > 1/q̂ = (A~a ˆ)i implies sign (A~a ˆ)i − 1 = −1; whence λ̂i (A~a ˆ)i − 1 ≥ 0.
For our approximation problem (24.20) this means that the residuum fˆ(xi ) − bi
fulfills λ̂i (fˆ(xi ) − bi ) ≥ 0.
Under certain conditions, problem (24.22) has a unique solution which can
be simply characterized. Let us start with some straightforward considerations
ˆ of ||A·||Q that
in this direction. If N (A) 6= {~0}, then we have for any minimizer ~a
ˆ + β, β ∈ N (A) is also a minimizer. In particular, we have that N (A) 6= {~0} if
~a
• m < n,

• m ≥ n and A is not of full range, i.e., rank(A) < n.

In these cases, we cannot have a unique minimizer. Note further, that if 1m ∈
R(A), then the minimum of ||A · ||Q is 1 and the set of minimizers is given by

A+ 1m + N (A),

where A+ denotes the Moore-Penrose inverse of A. Of course, this can easily

be checked using the methods of Sec. 24.5.3.
In the following, we restrict our attention to the case m > n and rank(A) =
n.
The following proposition considers (n + 1, n)–matrices.
24.5. APPROXIMATION WITH LINEAR MODELS 417

Proposition 24.5.2 Let A ∈ Rn+1,n such that R(A) ∩ Rn+1 >0 6= ∅, 1m 6∈ R(A)
and rank(A) = n. Then ||A · ||Q has a unique minimizer if and only if the
Lagrange multipliers λ̂i , i = 1, . . . , n + 1 are not zero.

By spark(A) we denote the smallest number of rows of A which are linearly

dependent. In other words, any spark(A)−1 rows of A are linearly independent.
For the ’spark’ notation we also refer to [?].
Examples. 1. We obtain for the matrix
 
1 0 0
 0 1 0 
A :=  0 0 1 ,
 rg(A) = 3, spark(A) = 3.
1 0 1

2. The matrix (m, n)–matrix A in (24.21) is the product of the diagonal ma-
trix diag (1/bi )m
i=1 with positive diagonal entries and a Vandermonde matrix.
Hence, it can easily be seen that spark(A) = n + 1. If an (m, n)–matrix A has
spark(A) = n + 1, then A fulfills the Haar condition.
Proposition 24.5.2 can be reformulated as follows:

Corollary 24.5.35 Let A ∈ Rn+1,n such that R(A)∩Rn+1 >0 6= ∅ and 1m 6∈ R(A)
. Then ||A · ||Q has a unique minimizer if and only if spark(A) = n + 1.

The result can be generalized by the following theorem.

Theorem 24.5.36 Let A ∈ Rm,n such that R(A) ∩ Rm >0 6= ∅. Suppose that
spark(A) = n + 1. Then ||A · ||Q has a unique minimizer which is determined
by n + 1 rows of A, i.e., there exists an index set J ⊂ {1, . . . , m} of cardinality
|J| = n + 1 such that ||A · ||Q and ||A|J · ||Q have the same minimum and the
same minimizer. Here A|J denotes the restriction of A to the rows which are
contained in the index set J. We call such index set J an extremal set.

Of course the condition spark(A) = n + 1 is not necessary for ||A · ||Q to

have a unique minimizer as the following example shows.
Example. The matrices
   
1 0 1 0
 0 1   0 1 
A := 
 −1 1  ,
 and A := 
 −4 4 

2
−4 2 −1 1

have both spark(A) = 2. By some following considerations, we obtain for

both problems that the minimum of ||A · ||Q is q̂ = 2. However, in the first
problem the minimizer is uniquely determined by ~a ˆ = ( 1 , 2)T while the whole
2
1 3
line c( 2 , 1) + (1 − c)( 2 , 2) , c ∈ [0, 1] minimizes the functional in the second
T T

case. For ( 21 , 1)T we have sign(λ̂1 , λ̂2 , λ̂3 , λ̂3 ) = (−1, 0, 1, −1) while the pattern is
(0, 1, 1, −1) for ( 23 , 2)T and (0, 0, 1, −1) within the line bounded by these points.
By Theorem 24.5.36, a method for finding the
minimizer of ||A · ||Q would
m
be to compute the unique minimizers of the n+1 subproblems ||A|J · ||Q for
418 CHAPTER 24. CARDINALITY AND COST ESTIMATES

all index sets J of cardinality n + 1 and to take the largest minimum â and
the corresponding ˆ
m

~a as minimizer of the original problem. For our line problem
there exist 3 = O(m3 ) of these subproblems. In the following section, we
give another algorithm which is also based on Theorem 24.5.36, but ensures
that the value a enlarges for each new choice of the subset J. Since there is
only a finite number of such subsets we must reach a stage where no further
increase is possible and J is an extremal set. In normed spaces such methods
are known as ascent methods, see [?].
In this section, we suggest a detailed algorithm for minimizing ||A·||Q , where
we restrict our attention to the line problem
 
bi β + αxi
max max , . (24.28)
i=1,...,m β + αxi bi

i.e., to the matrix A in (24.21) with n = 2.

Corollary 24.5.37 Let (xi , bi ), i = 1, 2, 3 be given points with pairwise distinct

xi ∈ R and positive bi , i = 1, 2, 3. Then the minimum q̂ and the minimizer
ˆ ∈ R2 of (24.28) are given by q̂ = ||q̂1 ||Q and
~a
    
β̂ 1 x2 −x1 b1 q̂1
= ,
α̂ x2 − x1 −1 1 b2 q̂2

where  q
r2


 1−r1 if r1 < 0 and r2 > 0,
 q
1−r2
q̂1 := r1 if r1 > 0 and r2 < 0, (24.29)

 q
1
if r1 > 0 and r2 > 0,


r1 +r2
(
r1
1/q̂1 if r2 < 0,
q̂2 := r1
x̂1 if r2 >0

and
b1 (x2 − x3 ) b2 (x3 − x1 )
r1 := , r2 := .
b3 (x2 − x1 ) b3 (x2 − x1 )

Remark. If the points are ordered, i.e., x1 < x2 < x3 (or alternatively in
descending order), then either A~a ˆ = (q̂, 1/q̂, q̂)T or A~a
ˆ = (1/q̂, q̂, 1/q̂)T . This
means that λ̂ in Theorem 24.5.34 has alternating signs. In other words, the
points f (x1 ), f (x3 ) lie above b1 , b3 and f (x2 ) lies below b2 or conversely.
Later we will show that the alternating sign condition is true for general
best polynomial approximation with respect to the Q-paranorm.
Corollary 24.5.37 is the basis of the Algorithm 24.6, which finds the optimal
line with respect to three points in each step and chooses the next three points
if the minimum corresponding to their line becomes larger.

Proposition 24.5.3 The algorithm computes the line f (x) = β̂ + α̂x which
minimizes (24.28).
24.5. APPROXIMATION WITH LINEAR MODELS 419

Algorithm. (Best line approximation with respect to lq )

Input: (xi , bi ), i = 1, . . . , m of pairwise distinct points xi ∈ R and bi > 0
Set i1 := 1, i2 := 2 and stopsignal := −1.
While stopsignal = −1 do

1. For i = 1, . . . , m; i 6= i1 , i2 compute

bi1 (xi2 − xi ) bi2 (xi − xi1 )

r1,i := , r2,i := .
bi (xi2 − xi1 ) bi (xi2 − xi1 )

2. Compute âj = max{||x̂1 (r1,i , r2,i )||Q } by (24.29). Let j 6= i1 , i2 be an

i
index where the maximum is attained and x̂1 = x̂1 (r1,j , r2,j ).

3. Compute a := max {||r1,i x̂1 + r2,i x̂2 ||Q }.

i
Let k be an index, where the maximum is attained.

4. If a ≤ âj then stopsignal = 1 and â = âj ,

    
β̂ 1 xi2 −xi1 bi1 q̂1
= ,
α̂ x i2 − x i1 −1 1 bi2 /q̂1

otherwise set i1 := j and i2 := k and return to 1.

Figure 24.6: Algorithm finding best linear approximation under lq .

Remark. Alternatively, one can deal with ordered points b1 < b2 < b3
r2
which restricts the effort in (24.29) to q̂1 = 1−r 1
but requires an ascending
ordering of the points xi1 , xi2 , xj in each step of the algorithm.
Finally, we want to generalize the remark on the signs of the Lagrange
multipliers given after Corollary 24.5.37. Remember that the set of polynomials
Φi (x) = xi−1 , i = 1, . . . , n forms a Chebyshev set (see Def. 24.5.30). Applying
again Lemma 24.5.33, one can easily prove the following result.
Theorem 24.5.38 Let Φi : I → R, i = 1, . . . , n be a Chebyshev set and let
x1 < . . . < xn+1 be points in I. Then, for
Φ := (Φj (xi ))n+1,n
i,j=1 ,

the Lagrange multipliers λ̂i , i = 1, . . . , n + 1 corresponding to the minimizer of

||Φ · ||Q have alternating signs.
For our polynomial approximation problem argmin~a∈Rn ||A~a||Q with A ∈
Rn+1,n defined by (24.21) and ordered points x1 < . . . < xn+1 we see that
A = diag(1/bi )n+1
i=1 Φ, where Φ is the matrix belonging to the Chebyshev set
Φi (x) = xi−1 . Since the bi are positive, we obtain immediately that the La-
grange multipliers λ̂i have alternating signs. Again, this means that fˆ(xi ) − bi
has alternating signs.
Using Theorem 24.5.38, we not only simplify Algorithm 24.6 but also use
Algorithm 24.5 even for approximation by arbitrary Chebyshev sets of size
 420 CHAPTER 24. CARDINALITY AND COST ESTIMATES

n > 2. We only have to provide a routine which solves the following system of
EXC equations:

a1,1 x1 + a1,2 x2 + a1,n xn = λ+1

a2,1 x2 + a2,2 x2 + a2,n xn = λ−1
... ...
n
an+1,1 x2 + an+1,2 x2 + an+1,n xn = λ(−1)

Let us illustrate this for n = 2. In this case, we can write

1
(α + βx1 ) = y1
λ
λ(α + βx2 ) = y2
1
(α + βx3 ) = y3
λ
If we number the above equations from 1 to 3, then we may conclude that

3 =⇒ α = λy3 − βx3 (∗)

1, (∗) =⇒ λy3 − βx3 + βx1 = λy1
=⇒ (y3 − y1 )λ = (x3 − x1 )β
x3 −x1
=⇒ λ = y3 −y1 β (∗∗)
=⇒ λ = q13 β (∗∗)
2, (∗), (∗∗) =⇒ q13 β(q13 y3 β − βx3 + βx2 ) = y2
−1
=⇒ β 2 (q13 y3 − x3 + x2 ) = yq2 q13
−1
=⇒ β = g −1 y2 q13

where
x3 − x1
q13 :=
y3 − y1
g := q13 y3 − x3 + x2

Caution is necessary, if β = 0. Then:

β = 0
α = λy1
p
λ = y2 /y1

24.5.6 Non-Linear Models

In general there is a lot to say about this subject and we refer the reader to
the literature [?]. However, let us consider two simple problems, which we can
solve using algorithms we already know:

1. Find the best approximation using ep(x) under lq , and

2. find the best approximation using ln(p(x)) under l∞ ,

24.5. APPROXIMATION WITH LINEAR MODELS 421

where p(x) is a linear combination of a set of Chebyshev functions.

Let us start with the first problem. That is, we ask for an exponential
function Pn
fˆ = e j=1 αj Φj
which best approximates under lq a given set of points (xi , yi ), i = 1, . . . , m
with pairwise distinct xi ∈ Rd and yi > 0, 1 ≤ i ≤ m. Note that fˆ > 0 by
definition. Since the ln function increases strictly monotone this is equivalent
to minimizing
( )!
yi fˆ(xi )
ln max max , = max max{ln yi − ln fˆ(xi ), ln fˆ(xi ) − ln yi }
i=1,...,m fˆ(xi ) yi i=1,...,m
n
X
= max | ln yi − αj Φj (xi )|
i=1,...,m
j=1
= k(ln yi )m
i=1 − Φ αk∞ .

Thus, it remains to find the best function nj=1 αj Φj (xi ) with respect to the
P
l∞ norm.
It is now easy to see that we can solve the second problem as follows.
Let (xi , yi ) be the data we want to approximate by a function of the form EXC
ln(p(x)) while minimizing the Chebyshev norm. We can do so by finding the
best approximation of (xi , eyi ) under lq .
422 CHAPTER 24. CARDINALITY AND COST ESTIMATES
 Part V

Implementation

423
Chapter 25

Architecture of a Query
Compiler

25.1 Compilation process

25.2 Architecture
Figure 25.1 a path of a query through the optimizer. For every step, a single
component is responsible. Providing a facade for the components results in the
overall architecture (Fig. 25.2). Every component is reentrant and stateless.
The information necessary for a component to process a query is passed via
references to control blocks. Control blocks are discussed next, then we discuss
memory management. Subsequent sections describe the components in some
detail.

25.3 Control Blocks

It is very convenient to have a hierarchy of control blocks within the optimizer.
Figure 25.3 shows some of the control blocks. For simplification, those blocks
concerned with session handling and transaction handling are omitted. Every
routine call within the optimizer has a control block pointer as a parameter.
The routines belonging to a specific phase have a pointer to the phase’ specific
control block as a parameter. For example, the routines in NFST have a NFST CB
pointer as a parameter. We now discuss the purpose of the different control
blocks.
The global control block governs the behavior of the query compiler. It
contains boolean variables indicating which phases to perform and which phases
of the compilation process are to be traced. It also contains indicators for the
individual phases. For example, for the first rewrite phase it contains indicators
which rules to apply, which rules to trace and so on. These control indicators
are manipulated by the driver which also allows to step through the different
phases. This is very important for debugging purposes. Besides this overall
control of the query compilers behavior, the global control block also contains

425
426 CHAPTER 25. ARCHITECTURE OF A QUERY COMPILER

query

parsing CTS
abstract syntax tree

nfst
internal representation

rewrite I query
internal representationoptimizer

plan generation
internal representation

rewrite II
internal representation

code generation
execution plan

Figure 25.1: The compilation process

a pointer to the schema cache. The schema cache itself allows to look up type
names, relations, extensions, indexes, and so on.
The query control block contains all the information gathered for the current
query so far. It contains the abstract syntax tree, after its construction, the
analyzed and translated query after NFST has been applied, the rewritten plan
25.4. MEMORY MANAGEMENT 427

after the Rewrite I phase, and so on. It also contains a link to the memory
manager that manages memory for this specific query. After the control block
for a query is created, the memory manager is initialized. During the destructor
call, the memory manager is destroyed and memory released.
Some components need helpers. These are also associated with the control
blocks. We discuss them together with the components.

25.4 Memory Management

There are three approaches to memory management in query optimizers. The
first approach is to use an automatic garbage collector if the language provides
one. This is not necessarily the most efficient approach but by far the most
convenient one. This approach can be imitated by an implementation based on
smart pointers. I would not recommend doing so since the treatment of cycles
can be quite tricky and it is inefficient. Another approach would be to collect all
references to newly created objects and release these after the query has been
processed. This approach is easy to implement, very convenient (transparent to
the implementor), but inefficient. A better approach is to allocate bigger areas
of memory by a memory manager. Factories1 then use these memory chunks to
generate objects as necessary. After the query has been processed, the chunks
are freed.
Here, we consider only memory whose duration lasts for the processing of a
single query. In general, we have more kinds of memory whose validity conforms
to sessions and transactions.

25.5 Tracing and Plan Visualization

25.6 Driver

25.7 Bibliography

1
Design pattern.
428 CHAPTER 25. ARCHITECTURE OF A QUERY COMPILER

Parser 1 QueryCompiler Singleton,

1..* Facade
parse(Query_CB*)

NFST
CodeGenerator
run(NFST_CB*)
Scanner run(CodeGenerator_CB*)

Rewrite_I PlanGenerator Rewrite_II

run(Rewrite_I_CB*) run(PlanGenerator_CB*) run(Rewrite_II_CB*)

Figure 25.2: Class Architecture of the Query Compiler

25.7. BIBLIOGRAPHY 429

SchemaCache Factorizer
NFST_CB

BlockHandler
Global_CB Rewrite_I_CB

Query_CB PlanGenerator_CB BitMapHandler

Rewrite_II_CB OpCodeMapper

MemoryManager

CodeGenerator_CB OperatorFactory

RegisterManager

Figure 25.3: Control Block Structure

430 CHAPTER 25. ARCHITECTURE OF A QUERY COMPILER
Chapter 26

Internal Representations

26.1 Requirements
easy access to information
query representation: overall design goal: methods/functions with semantic
meaning, not only syntactic meaning.
relationships: consumer/producer (occurrance) precedence order informa-
tion equivalence of expressions (transitivity of equality) see also expr.h fuer
andere funktionen/beziehungen die gebraucht werden
2-ebenen repraesentation. 2. ebene materialisiert einige beziehungen und
funktionen, die haeufig gebraucht werden und kompliziert zu berechnen sind an-
derer grund fuer materialisierung: vermeide zuviele geschachtelte forschleifen.
bsp: keycheck: gegeben eine menge von attributen und eine menge von schlues-
seln, ist die menge ein schluessel? teste jeden schluessel, kommt jedes element
in schluessel in menge von attributen vor? (schon drei schleifen!!!)
modellierungsdetail: ein grosser struct mit dicken case oder feine klassen-
hierarchie. wann splitten: nur wenn innerhalb des optimierers verschiedene
abarbeitung erfordert.
Representation: info captured: 1) 1st class information (information ob-
vious in original query+(standard)semantic analysis) 2) 2nd class information
(derived information) 3) historic information (during query optimization itself)
- modified (original expression, modifier) - copied (original expression, copi-
er) 4) information about the expression itselt: (e.g.: is function call, is select)
5) specific representations for specific purposes (optimization algorithms, code
generation, semantic analysis) beziehungen zwischen diesen repraesentationen
info captured for 1) different parts of the optimizer
syntactic/semantic information
garbage collection: 1) manually 2) automatic 3) semi-automatic (collect
references, free at end of query)

26.2 Algebraic Representations

relational algebra in: [167].

431
432 CHAPTER 26. INTERNAL REPRESENTATIONS

26.2.1 Graph Representations

26.2.2 Query Graph
also called object graph: [70, 840]

26.2.3 Operator Graph

used in: [714], [836]
enhanced to represent physical properties: [629]
with outerjoins: [626], [264]
graph representation and equivalence to calculus: [561]

26.3 Query Graph Model (QGM)

26.4 Classification of Predicates

klassifikation von praedikaten

• nach stelligkeit,wertigkeit (selektion, join, nasty)

• nach funktor(=,¡,..., between, oder boolsche funktion)

• nach funktion: fuer keys in index: start/stop/range/exact/enum range(in-

predicate)

• nach sel-wert: simple (col = const), komplex (col = expr) cheap/expensive

• nach join wert: fuer hj, smj, hbnlj,...

• korrelationspraedikate

26.5 Treatment of Distinct

26.6 Query Analysis and Materialization of Analysis

Results
Questions:

1. was materialisieren wir

2. was packen wir in die 1. repraesentation?

• bsp: properties: zeiger auf property oder besser inline properties

• bsp: unique number: entweder in expr oder getrennter dictionary
struktur
26.7. QUERY AND PLAN PROPERTIES 433

query analysis (purpose, determine optimization algorithm)

#input relations, #predicates, #ex-quantifiers, #all-quantifiers,
#conjunctions, #disjunctions, #joingraphkind(star,chain,tree,cyclic)
#strongly-connected-components (for crossproduct indication)
#false aggregates in projection list clause (implies grouping required)
/* remark: typical query optimizes should at least have two algorithms:
- exhaustive (for large queries)
- heuristic (for small queries)
*/

for blocks: indicator whether they should produce a null-tuple, in case they
do not produce any tuple. this is nice for some rewrite rules. other possibility:
if-statement in algebra.

26.7 Query and Plan Properties

Logical and Physical Properties of Plans
Ausführungsplänen können eine Reihe von Eigenschaften zugeordnet wer-
den. Diese Eigenschaften fallen in drei Klassen
1. logische Eigenschaften, also beispielsweise

(a) beinhaltete Relationen

(b) beinhaltete Attribute
(c) angewendete Prädikate

2. physische Eigenschaften, also beispielsweise

(a) Ordnung der Tupel

(b) Strom oder Materialisierung des Ergebnisses
(c) Materialisierung im Hauptspeicher oder Hintergrundspeicher
(d) Zugriffspfade auf das Ergebnis
(e) Rechnerknoten des Ergebnis (im verteilten Fall)
(f) Kompression

3. quantitative Eigenschaften, also beispielsweise

(a) Anzahl der Elemente im Ergebnis

(b) Größe des Ergebnisses oder eines Ergebniselementes
(c) Auswertungskosten aufgeschlüsselt nach I/O, CPU und Kommunika-
tionskosten

kosten: diese sind zu berechnen und dienen als grundlage fuer die planbe-
wertung ges-kosten /* gesamt kosten (ressourcenverbrauch) */ ges-kosten +=
cpu-instr / inst/sek ges-kosten += seek-kosten * overhead (waiting/cpu) ges-
kosten += i/o-kosten * io-weight cpu-kosten /* reine cpu-kosten */ i/o-kosten
/* hintergrundspeicherzugriff ( warten auf platte + cpu fuer seitenzugriffe) */
434 CHAPTER 26. INTERNAL REPRESENTATIONS

com-kosten /* kommunikation */ com-init /* initialisierungskosten fuer kom-

munikationsvorgang */ com-exit /* exitkosten fuer kommunikationsvorgang */
com-cptu /* kosten fuer jede transfereinheit (z.b. byte) waehrend eines kom-
munikationsvorgangs */
kostenstruktur koennte etwas sein, dass ges/cpu/io kosten enthaelt. ausser-
dem waeren kosten fuer rescanning interessant, falls dies notwendig ist (puffer-
probleme, indexscan und dann faellt seite raus) weiteres interessantes kosten-
mass sind die kosten, bis das erste tupel berechnet wird.
dies sind die konstanten, die system-abhaengig sind. am besten sind, sie wer-
den gemessen. Hardware: #cpu-instruktionen pro sekunde #cpu-instruktionen
fuer block zugriff/transfer lesen/schreiben #cpu-instruktionen pro transfer init/send/exit
init/receive/exit ms fuer seek/latency/transfer pro nK block
RTS-kosten #cpu-instruktionen fuer open/next/close fuer scan operatoren
unter verschiedenen voraussetzungen:mit/ohne praedikat, mit/ohne projektion
(entsprechend den avm programmen) #cpu-instruktionen fuer open/next/close
fuer jeden alg operator, #cpu-instruktionen fuer funktionen/operationen/praedikate/avm-
befehle
statistics: first/large physical page of a relation number of pages of a relation
-¿ to estimate scan cost measured sequential scan cost (no interference/plenty
interference)
–properties:

• menge der quns

• menge der attribute

• menge der praedikate

• ordnung

• boolean properties

• globale menge der gepipelineten quns

• kostenvektor

• cardinalitaeten bewiesen/geschaetzt

• gewuenschter puffer

• schluessel, fds

• #seiten, die durch ein fetch gelesen werden sollen

• menge der objekte, von denen der plan (der ja teilplan sein kann) abhaengt

• eigenschaften fuer parallele plaene

• eigenschaften fuer smp plaene

26.8. CONVERSION TO THE INTERNAL REPRESENTATION 435

das folgende ist alles blabla. aber es weisst auf den punkt hin,
das in dieser beziehung etwas getan werden muss.
--index: determine degree of clustering
- lese_rate = #gelesene_seiten / seiten_fuer_relation
ein praedikate erniedrigt die lesen_rate, ein erneutes lesen aufgrund einer verdr
falls TIDs sortiert werden, muss fetch_ration erneut berechnet werden
- seiten koennen in gruppen z.b. auf einem zylinder zusammengefasst werden
und mit einem prefetch befehl geholt werden. anzahl seeks abschaetzen
- cluster_ration(CR)
CR = P(read(t) ohne page read) = (card - anzahl pagefetch)/card
= (card - (#pagefetch - #page))/card
das ist besonderer quark
- cluster_factor(CF)
CF = P(avoid unnecessary pagefetch) = (pagefetch/maxpagefetch)
= card -#fetch / card - #pageinrel
das ist besonderer quark
index retrieval on full key => beide faktoren auf 100% setzen, da
innerhalb eines index die TIDs pro key-eintrag sortiert werden.

Speicherung von Properties unter dynamischem Programmieren und Mem-

oization: Kosten und andere Eigenschaften, die nicht vom Plan abhängen,
können pro Planklasse gespeichert werden und brauchen nicht pro Plan gespe-
ichert zu werden.

26.8 Conversion to the Internal Representation

26.8.1 Preprocessing
26.8.2 Translation into the Internal Representation

26.9 Bibliography
436 CHAPTER 26. INTERNAL REPRESENTATIONS
Chapter 27

Details on the Phases of

Query Compilation

27.1 Parsing
Lexical analysis is pretty much the same as for traditional compilers. However,
it is convenient to treat keywords as soft. This allows for example for relation
names like order which is a keyword in SQL. This might be very convenient for
users since SQL has plenty (several hundreds) of keywords. For some keywords
like select there is less danger of it being a relation name. A solution for group
and order would be to lex them as a single token together with the following
by.
Parsing again is very similar to parsing in compiler construction. For both,
lexing and parsing, generators can be used to generate these components. The
parser specification of SQL is quite lengthy while the one for OQL is pretty
compact. In both cases, a LALR(2) grammar suffices. The outcome of the
parser should be an abstract syntax tree. Again the data structure for abstract
syntax trees (ast) as well as operations to deal with them (allocation, deletion,
traversal) can be generated from an according ast specification.
During parsing already some of the basic rewriting techniques can be ap-
plied. For example, between can be eliminated.
In BD II, there are currently four parsers (for SQL, OQL, NQL (a clean
version of XQuery), XQuery). The driver allows to step through the query
compiler and allows to influence its overall behavior. For example, several trace
levels can be switched on and off while within the driver. Single rewrites can
be enabled and disabled. Further, the driver allows to switch to a different
query language. This is quite convenient for debugging purposes. We used the
Cocktail tools to generate the lexer, parser, ast, and NFST component.

27.2 Semantic Analysis, Normalization, Factoriza-

tion, Constant Folding, and Translation
The NFST component performs (at least) four different tasks:

437
438CHAPTER 27. DETAILS ON THE PHASES OF QUERY COMPILATION

*
/

IU:salary IU:budget 100

Figure 27.1: Expression

1. normalization of expressions,

2. factorization of common subexpressions,

3. semantic analysis, and

4. translation into the internal algebra-based query representation.

Although these are different tasks, a single pass over the abstract syntax tree
suffices to perform all these tasks in one step.
Consider the following example query:

select e.name, (d.salary / d.budget) * 100

from Employee e, Department d
where e.salary > 100000 and e.dno = d.dno

The internal representation of the expression (d.salary / d.budget) * 100 in the

query is shown in Fig. 27.1. It contains two operator nodes for the operations
“∗” and “/”. At the bottom, we find IU nodes. IU stands for Information
Unit. A single IU corresponds to a variable that can be bound to a value.
Sample IUs are attributes of a relation or, as we will see, intermediate results.
In the query representation, there are three IUs. The first two IUs are bound
to attribute values for the attributes salary and budget. The third IU is bound
to the constant 100.
NFST routines can be implemented using a typical compiler generator tool.
It is implemented in a rule-based language. Every rule matches a specific kind
of AST nodes and performs an action. The ast tree is processed in post order.
The hierarchy for organizing different kinds of expressions is shown in Fig 27.2.
Here is a list of useful functions:

• occurrance of expressions in another expression

27.3. NORMALIZATION 439

Expression

Constant IU DB I term Function Call Bolean Aggregat

Relation Extent Variable Attribute Access AND OR NOT

Figure 27.2: Expression hierarchy

• for a given expression: compute the set of occurring (consumed, free) IUs

• for a given expression: compute the set of produced IUs

• for a given IU, retrieve the block producing the IU

• determine whether some block returns a single value only

• computation of the transivitity of predicates, especially equality to derive

its equivalence classes.

• determine whether some expression produces a subset of another expres-

sion

• constant folding

• merge and/or (from e.g. binary to n-ary) and push not operations

• replace a certain expression by another one

• deep and shallow copy

These functions can be implemented either as member functions of expressions

or according to visitor/collector/mutator patterns. For more complex functions
(consumer/producer) we recommend the latter.
Some of these functions will be called quite frequently, e.g. the consumer/producer,
precedence ordering, equivalence (transivitity of equality) functions. So it might
be convenient to compute these relationships only once and then materialize
them. Since some transformation in the rewrite phases are quite complex, a
recomputation of these materialized functions should be possible since their
direct maintenance might be too complex.

27.3 Normalization
Fig. 27.3 shows the result after normalization. The idea of normalization is to
introduce intermediate IUs such that all operators take only IUs as arguments.
This representation is quite useful.

27.4 Factorization
Common subexpressions are factorized by replacing them with references to
some IU. For the expressions in TPCD query 1, the result is shown in Fig. 27.4.
440CHAPTER 27. DETAILS ON THE PHASES OF QUERY COMPILATION

IU:-

*
IU:- IU:-

IU:salary IU:budget 100

Figure 27.3: Expression

Factorization is enabled by a factorization component that takes care of all

expressions seen so far and the IUs representing these expressions. Every ex-
pression encountered by some NFST routine is passed to the factorization. The
result is a reference to an IU. This IU can be a new IU in case of a new expres-
sion, or an existing IU in case of a common subexpression. The factorization
component is available to the NFST routines via the NFST control block which
is associated with a factorization component (Fig.25.3).

27.5 Constant Folding

27.6 Semantic analysis

The main purpose of semantic analysis is to attach a type to every expres-
sion. For simple expressions it is very similar to traditional semantic analysis
in compiler construction. The only difference occurs for references to schema
constructs. The schema is persistence and references to e.g. relations or named
objects have to be looked up there. For performance reasons it is convenient
to have a schema cache in order to cache frequently used references. Another
aspect complicating semantic analysis a little is that collection types are fre-
quently used in the database context. Their incorporation is rather straight
forward but the different collection types should be handled with care.
As programming languages, query languages provide a block structure. Con-
sider for example the SQL query

...
select a, b, c
from A, B
where d > e and f = g
...
27.6. SEMANTIC ANALYSIS 441

IU: IU: IU:

SUM SUM SUM

IU:

*
IU: IU:

*
IU:

- +

IU:Extended Price IU: IU:Discount IU:Tax

Figure 27.4: Query 1

Consider the semantic analysis of d . Since SQL provides implicit name look up,
we have to check (formerly analyzed) relations A and B whether they provide
an attribute called d . If none of them provides an attribute d , then we must
check the next upper SFW-block. If at least one of the relations A or B provides
an attribute d, we just check that only one of them provides such an attribute.
Otherwise, there would be an unallowed ambiguity. The blockwise look up is
handled by block handler. For every newly encounterd block (e.g. SFW block),
a new block is opened. All identifiers analyzed within that block are pushed
into the list of identifiers for that block. In case the query language allows for
implicit name resolution, it might also be convenient to push all the attributes
of an analyzed relation into the blocks list. The lookup is then performed
blockwise. Within every block, we have to check for ambiguities. If the lookup
fails, we have to proceed looking up the identifier in the schema. The handling
of blocks and lookups is performed by the BlockHandler component attached
to the control block of the NFST component (Fig. 25.3).
442CHAPTER 27. DETAILS ON THE PHASES OF QUERY COMPILATION

Another departure from standard semantic analysis are false aggregates as

provided by SQL.
select avg(age)
from Students

I call count(age) a false aggregate since a true aggregate function operators on

a collection of values and returns a single value. Here, the situation is different.
The attribute age is of type integer. Hence, for the average function whith
signature avg : {int} −−→ int the semantic analysis would detect a typing
error. The result is that we have to treat these false aggregates as special cases.
This is (mostly) not necessary for query languages like OQL.

27.7 Translation
The translation step translates the original AST representation into an internal
representation. There are as many internal query representations as there are
query compiler. They all build on calculus expressions, operator graphs build
over some algebra, or tableaux representations [766, 767]. A very powerful
representation that also captures the subtleties of duplicate handling is the
query graph model (QGM) [586].
The representation we use here is a mixture of a typed algebra and calcu-
lus. Algebraic expressions are simple operator trees with algebraic operators
like selection, join, etc. as nodes. These operator trees must be correctly typed.
For example, we are very picky about whether a selection operator returns a
set or a bag. The expression that more resemble a calculus representation than
an algebraic expression is the SFWD block used in the internal representation.
We first clarify our notion of block within the query representation described
here and then give an example of an SFWD block. A block is everything that
produces variable bindings. For example a SFWD-block that pretty directly
corresponds to a SFW-block in SQL or OQL. Other examples of blocks are
quantifier expressions and grouping operators. A block has the following ingre-
dients:
• a list of inputs of type collection of tuples1 (labeled from)
• a set of expressions whose top is an IU (labeled define)
• a selection predicate of type bool (labeled where)
For quantifier blocks and group blocks, the list of inputs is restricted to length
one. The SFWD-block and the grouping block additionally have a projection
list (labeled select) that indicates which IUs are to be projected (i.e. passed to
subsequent operators). Blocks are typed (algebraic) expressions and can thus
be mixed with other expressions and algebraic operator trees.
An example of a SFWD-block is shown in Fig. 27.5 where dashed lines
indicate the produced-by relationship. The graph corresponds to the internal
1
We use a quite general notion of tuple: a tuple is a set of variable (IU) bindings.
27.7. TRANSLATION 443

select

where
>
define
IU: IU: IU: IU:

/ 100 100.000
*
from

IU: name IU: salary IU: budget

Attr. Acces Attr. Acces Attr. Acces

"name" "salary" "budget"

key IU key IU
scan IU:e scan IU:d

Relation/Extent Relation/Extent
"Employee" "Department"

Figure 27.5: Internal representation

representation of our example query. The semantics of a SFWD-block can be

described as follows. First, take the cross product of the collections of tuples
found in the list of inputs. (If this is not possible, due to dependencies, d-joins
have to be used.) Then, for every resulting tuple, compute the bindings for all
the IUs mentioned in the define clause, apply the selection predicate and return
all the bindings for the IUs mentioned in the select clause.
Although the SFWD-block looks neat, it lacks certain information that must
be represented. This information concerns the role of the entries in the from
clause and duplicate elimination. Let us start with the latter. There are three
views relevant to duplicate processing:

1. the user view: did the user specify distinct?

2. the context view: does the occurrence or elimination of duplicates make

444CHAPTER 27. DETAILS ON THE PHASES OF QUERY COMPILATION

a difference for the query result?

3. the processing view: does the block produce duplicates?

All this information is attached to a block. This information can then be

summarized to one of three values representing

• eliminate duplicates

• preserve duplicates

• don’t care about duplicates

(The optimizer can feel free to do whatever is more efficient.)

This summary is also attached to every block. Let us illustrate this by a simple
example:

select distinct ssno

from Employee
where . . . and
exists( select . . . from . . . where )

For the inner block, the user specifies that duplicates are to be preserved. How-
ever, duplicates or not does not modify the outcome of exists. Hence, the
contextual information indicates that the outcome for the inner block is a don’t
care. The processing view can determine whether the block produces dupli-
cates. If for all the entries in the from clause, a key is projected in the select
clause, then the query does not produce duplicates. Hence, no special care has
to be taken to remove duplicates produced by the outer block if we assume that
ssno is the key of Employee.
No let us consider the annotations for the arguments in the from clause.
The query

select distinct e.name

from Employee e, Department d
where e.dno = d.dno

retrieves only Employee attributes. Such a query is most efficiently evaluated by

a semi-join. Hence, we can add a semi-join (SJ) annotation to the Department
d clause.
For queries without a distinct, the result may be wrong (e.g. in case an
employee works in several departments) since a typical semi-join just checks for
existence. A special semi-join that preserves duplicates should be used. The
according annotation is (SJ,PD). Another annotation occurs whenever an outer-
join is used. Outer joins can (in SQL) be part of the from clause. Typically
they have to be fully parenthesized since outer joins and regular joins not always
commute. But under special circumstances, they commute and hence a list of
entries in the from clause suffices [263]. Then, the entry to be preserved (the
27.7. TRANSLATION 445

outer part) should be annotated by (OJ). We use (AJ) as the anti-join annota-
tion, and (DJ) for a d-join. To complete annotation, the case of a regular join
can be annotated by (J). If the query language also supports all-quantifications,
that translate to divisions, then the annotation (D) should be supported.
Since the graphical representation of a query is quite complex, we also use
text representations of the result of the NFST phase. Consider the following
OQL query:

select distinct s.name, s.age, s.supervisor.name, s.supervisor.age

from s in Student
where s.gpa > 8 and s.supervisor.age < 30

The annotated result (without duplicate annotations) of the normalization and

factorization steps is

select distinct sn, sa, ssn, ssa

from s in Student (J)
where sg > 8 and ssa< 30
define sn = s.name
sg = s.gpa
sa = s.age
ss = s.supervisor
ssn= ss.name
ssa= ss.age

Semantic analysis just adds type information (which we never show).

In standard relational query processing multiple entries in the from clause
are translated into a cross product. This is not always possible in object-
oriented query processing. Consider the following query

select distinct s
from s in Student, c in s.courses
where c.name = “Database”

which after normalization yields

select distinct s
from s in Student, c in s.courses
where cn = “Database”
define cn = c.name

The evaluation of c in s.courses is dependend on s and cannot be evaluated if

no s is given. Hence, a cross product would not make much sense. To deal with
this situation, the d-join has been introduced [161]. It is a binary operator that
evaluates for every input tuple from its left input its right input and flattens the
result. Consider the algebraic expression given in Fig. 27.6. For every student
446CHAPTER 27. DETAILS ON THE PHASES OF QUERY COMPILATION

PROJECT [s]

SELECT [cn=”Database”]

EXPAND [cn:c.name]

SCAN [s:student] D-JOIN [c:s.courses]

Figure 27.6: An algebraic operator tree with a d-join

s from its left input, the d-join computes the set s.courses. For every course
c in s.courses an output tuple containing the original student s and a single
course c is produced. If the evaluation of the right argument of the d-join is not
dependend on the left argument, the d-join is equivalent with a cross product.
The first optimization is to replace d-joins by cross products whenever possible.
Queries with a group by clause must be translated using the unary grouping
operator GROUP which we denote by Γ. It is defined as
Γg;θA;f (e) = {y.A ◦ [g : G]|y ∈ e,
G = f ({x|x ∈ e, x.Aθy.A})}
where the subscripts have the following semantics: (i) g is a new attribute
that will hold the elements of the group (ii) θA is the grouping criterion for a
sequence of comparison operators θ and a sequence of attribute names A, and
(iii) the function f will be applied to each group after it has been formed. We
often use some abbreviations. If the comparison operator θ is equal to “=”, we
don’t write it. If the function f is identity, we omit it. Hence, Γg;A abbreviates
Γg;=A;id .
Let us complete the discussion on internal query representation. We already
mentioned algebraic operators like selection and join. These are called logical
algebraic operators. There implementations are called physical algebraic opera-
tors. Typically, there exist several possible implementations for a single logical
algebraic operator. The most prominent example being the join operator with
implementations like Grace join, sort-merge join, nested-loop join etc. All the
operators can be modelled as objects. To do so, we extend the expression hi-
erarchy by an algebra hierarchy. Although not shown in Fig 27.7, the algebra
class should be a subclass of the expression class. This is not necessary for SQL
but is a requirement for more orthogonal query languages like OQL.
27.8. REWRITE I 447

Expression

Algebraic Operator

AlgUnary AlgBinary AlgNary AlgScan Group SFWD

block

Join
Dup SortUnnestSelectChiProjection AlgIfDivision AlgSetop
Elim

Union Intersection Difference

Figure 27.7: Algebra

27.8 Rewrite I

27.9 Plan Generation

27.10 Rewrite II

27.11 Code generation

In order to discuss the tasks of code generation, it is necessary to have a little
understanding of the interface to the runtime system that interpretes the exe-
cution plan. I have chosen AODB as an example runtime system since this is
one I know. The interface to AODB is defined by the AODB Virtual Machine
(AVM). For simple operations, like arithmetic operations, comparisons and so
on, AVM provides assembler-like operations that are interpreted at runtime.
Simple AVM operations work on registers. A single register is able to hold the
contents of exactly one IU. Additionally, AVM provides physical algebraic oper-
ators. These operators take AVM programs (possibly with algebraic operators)
as arguments. There is one specialty about AVM programs though. In order to
efficiently support factorization of common subexpressions involving arithmetic
operations (as needed in aggregations like avg, sum), arithmetic operators in
AVM can have two side effects. They are able to store the result of the opera-
tion into a register and they are able to add the result of the operation to the
contents of another register. This is denoted by the result mode. If the result
mode is A, they just add the result to some register, if it is C, they copy (store)
the result to some register, if it is B, they do both. This is explored in the code
for Query 1 of the TPC-D benchmark (Fig. 1.6).
Code generation has the following tasks. First it must map the physical op-
erators in a plan to the operators of the AVM code. This mapping is a straight
forward 1:1 mapping. Then, the code for the subscripts of the operators has
to be generated. Subscripts are for example the predicate expressions for the
selection and join operators. For grouping, several AVM programs have to be
448CHAPTER 27. DETAILS ON THE PHASES OF QUERY COMPILATION

generated. First program is the init program. It initializes the registers that
will hold the results for the aggregate functions. For example, for an average
operation, the register is initalized with 0. The advance program is executed
once for every tuple to advance the aggregate computation. For example, for
an average operations, the value of some register of the input tuple is added
to the result register holding the average. The finalize program performs post-
processing for aggregate functions. For example for the average, it devides the
sum by the number of tuples. For hash-based grouping, the last two programs
(see Fig.1.6) compute the hash value of the input register set and compare the
group-by attributes of the input registers with those of every group in the hash
bucket.
During the code generation for the subscripts factorization of common subex-
pression has to take place. Another task is register allocation and deallocation.
This task is performed by the register manager. It uses subroutines to de-
termine whether some registers are no longer needed. The register manager
must also keep track in which register some IU is stored (if at all). Another
component used during code generation is a factory that generates new AVM
operations. This factory is associated with a table driven component that maps
the operations used in the internal query representation to AVM opcodes.

27.12 Bibliography
Chapter 28

Hard-Wired Algorithms

28.1 Hard-wired Dynamic Programming

28.1.1 Introduction

Plan generation is performed block-wise. The goal is to generate a plan for

every block. Typically, not all possible plans are generated. For example, the
group operator (if necessary for the query) is mostly performed last (see also
Sec. ??). This mainly leaves ordering joins and selections as the task of plan
generation. A plan is an operator tree whose node consist of physical algebraic
operators, e.g. selection, sort-operator, sort-merge and other joins, relation and
index scans. The process of plan generation has received a lot of attention.
Often, the term query optimization is used synonymous for the plan generation
phase.
Figure 28.1 shows a plan for the block

select e.name
from Employee e, Department d
where e.dno = d.dno and d.name = “shoe”

The bottom level contains two table scans that scan the base tables Employee
and Department. Then, a selection operator is applied to restrict the depart-
ments to those named “shoe”. A nested-loop join is used to select those employ-
ees that work in the selected departments. The projection restricts the output
to the name of the employees, as required by the query block. For such a plan,
a cost function is used to estimate its cost. The goal of plan generation is to
generate the cheapest possible plan. Costing is briefly sketched in Section ??.
The foundation of plan generation are algebraic equivalences. For e, e1 , e2 , . . .
being algebraic expressions and p, q predicates, here are some example equiva-

449
450 CHAPTER 28. HARD-WIRED ALGORITHMS

Project (e.name)

NL-Join (e.dno = d.dno)

Select (d.name = ”shoe”)

Table Scan (Employee[e]) Table Scan (Department[d])

Figure 28.1: A sample execution plan

lences:

σp (σq (e)) ≡ σq (σp (e))

σp (e1 1q e2 ) ≡ (σp (e1 )) 1q e2 if p is applicable to e1
e1 1p e2 ≡ e2 1p e1
(e1 1p e2 ) 1q e3 ≡ e1 1p (e2 1q e3 )
e1 ∪ e2 ≡ e2 ∪ e1
(e1 ∪ e2 ) ∪ e3 ≡ e1 ∪ (e2 ∪ e3 )
e1 ∩ e2 ≡ e2 ∩ e1
(e1 ∩ e2 ) ∩ e3 ≡ e1 ∩ (e2 ∩ e3 )
σp (e1 ∩ e2 ) ≡ σp (e1 ) ∩ e2

For more equivalences and conditions that ought to be attached to the equiva-
lences see the appendix 7.2. Note that commutativity and associativity of the
join operator allow an arbitrary ordering. Since the join operator is the most
expensive operation, ordering joins is the most prominent problem in plan gen-
eration.
These equivalences are of course independent of the actual implementation
of the algebraic operators. The total number of plans equivalent to the original
query block is called the potential search space. However, not always is the
total search space considered. The set of plans equivalent to the original query
considered by the plan generator is the actual search space. Since the System R
plan generator [672], certain restrictions are applied. The most prominent are:

• Generate only plans where selections are pushed down as far as possible.

• Do not consider cross products if not absolutely necessary.

• Generate only left-deep trees.

28.1. HARD-WIRED DYNAMIC PROGRAMMING 451

R4

R3

R1 R2 R1 R2 R3 R4

left-deep tree bushy tree

Figure 28.2: Different join operator trees

• If the query block contains a grouping operation, the group operator is

performed last.

Some comments are in order. Cross products are only necessary, if the query
graph is unconnected where a query graph is defined as follows: the nodes
are the relations and the edges correspond to the predicates (boolean factors 1 )
found in the where clause. More precisely, the query graph is a hypergraph,
since a boolean factor may involve more than two relations. A left-deep tree is
an operator tree where the right argument of a join operator always is a base
relation. A plan with join operators whose both arguments are derived by other
join operators is called bushy tree. Figure 28.2 gives an example of a left-deep
tree and a bushy tree.
If we take all the above restrictions together, the problem boils down to
ordering the join operators or relations. This problem has been studied exten-
sively. The complexity of finding the best (according to some cost function)
ordering (operator tree) was first studied by Ibaraki and Kameda [377]. They
proved that the problem of generating optimal left-deep trees with no cross
products is NP-hard for a special block-wise nested loop join cost function.
This cost function applied in the proof is quite complex. Later is was shown
that even if the cost function is very simple, the problem remains NP-hard
[165]. The cost function (Cout ) used there just adds up intermediate results
sizes. This cost function is interesting in that it is the kernel of many other cost
functions and it fulfills the ASI property of which we now the following: If the
cost function fulfills the ASI property and the query graph is acyclic, then the
problem can be solved in polynomial time [377, 443]. Ono and Lohman gave ex-
amples that considering cross products can substantially improve performance
[553]. However, generating optimal left-deep trees with cross products even
for Cout makes the problem NP-hard [165]. Generating optimal bushy trees is
1
A boolean factor is a disjunction of basic predicates in a conjunctive normal form.
452 CHAPTER 28. HARD-WIRED ALGORITHMS

even harder. Even if there is no predicate, that is only cross products have
to be used, the problem is NP-hard [657]. This is surprising since generating
left-deep trees with cross products as the only operation is very simple: just
sort the relations by increasing sizes.
Given the complexity of the problem, there are only two alternatives to
generate plans: either explore the total search space or use heuristics. The
former can be quite expensive. This is the reason why the above mentioned
restrictions to the search space have traditionally been applied. The latter
approach risks missing good plans. The best-known heuristics is to join the
relation next, that results in the smallest next intermediate result. Estimating
the cardinality of such results is discussed in Section ??.
Traditionally, selections where pushed as far down as possible. However,
for expensive selection predicates (e.g. user defined predicates, those involving
user-defined functions, predicates with subqueries) this does not suffice. For
example, if a computer vision application has to compute the percentage of
snow coverage for a given set of satellite images, this is not going to be cheap. In
fact, it can be more expensive than a join operation. In these cases, pushing the
expensive selection down misses good plans. That is why lately research started
to take expensive predicates into account. However, some of the proposed
solutions do not guarantee to find the optimal plans. Some approaches and their
bugs are discussed in [132, 356, 354, 656, 658]. Although we will subsequently
give an algorithm that incorporates correct predicate placement, not all plan
generators do so. An alternative approach (though less good) is to pull-up
expensive predicates in the Rewrite-II-phase.
There are several approaches to explore the search space. The original ap-
proach is to use dynamic programming [672]. The dynamic programming algo-
rithm is typically hard-coded. Figure 28.3 illustrates the principle of bottom-up
plan generation as applied in dynamic programming. The bottom level consists
of the original relations to be joined. The next level consists of all plans that
join a subset of cardiniality two of the original relations. The next level con-
tains all plans for subsets of cardinality three, and so on. With the advent
of new query optimization techniques, new data models, extensible database
systems, researchers where no longer satisfied with the hard-wired approach.
Instead, they aimed for rule-based plan generation. There exist two differ-
ent approaches for rule-based query optimizers. In the first approach, the al-
gebraic equivalences that span the search space are used to transform some
initial query plan derived from the query block into alternatives. As search
strategies either exhaustive search is used or some stochastic approach such as
simulated annealing, iterative improvement, genetic algorrithms and the like
[66, 382, 385, 386, 723, 747, 746, 749]. This is the transformation-based ap-
proach. This approach is quite inefficient. Another approach is to generate
plans by rules in a bottom-up fashion. This is the generation-based approach.
In this approach, either a dynamic programming algorithm [487] is used or
memoization [306]. It is convenient to classify the rules used into logical and
physical rules. The logical rules directly reflect the algebraic equivalences. The
physical rules or implementation rules transform a logical algebraic operator
into a physical algebraic operator. For example, a join-node becomes a nested-
28.1. HARD-WIRED DYNAMIC PROGRAMMING 453

R123 R123 R123 <== 2 alternatives pruned

R13 R12 R23 <== first set of partial plans generated

R1 R2 R3 <== input relations

Figure 28.3: Bottom up plan generation

loop join node.

28.1.2 A plan generator for bushy trees

Within the brief discussion in the last subsection, we enumerated plans such
that first all 1-relation plans are generated, then all 2-relation plans and so on.
This enumeration order is not the most efficient one. Let us consider the simple
problem where we have to generate exactly one best plan for the subsets of the
n element set of relations to be joined. The empty subset is not meaningful,
leaving the number of subsets to be investigated at 2n − 1. Enumerating these
subsets can be done most efficient by enumerating them in counting order . That
is, we initialize a n bit counter with 1 and count until have reached 2n − 1. The
n bits represent the subsets. Note that with this enumeration order, plans are
still generated bottom up. For a given subset R of the relations (encoded as the
bit pattern a), we have to generate a plan from subsets of this subset (encoded
as the bit pattern s). For example, if we only want to generate left-deep trees,
then we must consider 1 element subsets and their complements. If we want
to generate bushy trees, all subsets must be considered. We can generate these
subsets by a very fast algorithm developed by Vance and Maier [778]:

s = a & -a;
while(s) {
s = a & (s - a);
process(s);
}

The meaning of process(s) depends on the kinds of plans we generate. If we

concentrate on join ordering neglecting selection operations (i.e. pushing them)
This step essentially looks up the plans for s and its complement s and then
joins the plans found there. Lookup is best implemented via an array with s as
an index.

28.1.3 A plan generator for bushy trees and expensive selec-

tions
Figure 28.4 shows the pseudocode of a dynamic programming algorithm that
generates plans with cross products, selections, and joins. It generates optimal
454 CHAPTER 28. HARD-WIRED ALGORITHMS

proc Optimal-Bushy-Tree(R, P )
1 for k = 1 to n do
2 for all k-subsets Mk of R do
3 for l = 0 to min(k, m) do
4 for all l-subsets Pl of Mk ∩ RS do
5 best cost so far = ∞;
6 for all subsets L of Mk with 0 < |L| < k do
7 L0 =VMk \ L, V = Pl ∩ L, V 0 = Pl ∩ L0 ;
8 p = {pi,j | pi,j ∈ P, Ri ∈ V, Rj ∈ V 0 }; // p=true might hold
9 T = (T [L, V ] 1p T [L0 , V 0 ]);
10 if Cost(T) < best cost so far then
11 best cost so far = Cost(T);
12 T [Mk , Pl ] = T ;
13 fi;
14 od;
15 for all R ∈ Pl do
16 T = σR (T [Mk , Pl \ {R}]);
17 if Cost(T) < best cost so far then
18 best cost so far = Cost(T);
19 T [Mk , Pl ] = T ;
20 fi;
21 od;
22 od;
23 od;
24 od;
25 od;
26 return T [R, S];

Figure 28.4: A Dynamic Programming Optimization Algorithm

bushy trees. Efficient implementation technique for the algorithm can be found
in [778, 658]. As input parameters, the algorithm takes a set of relations R and
a set of predicates P . The set of relations for which a selection predicate exists
is denoted by RS . We identify relations and predicates that apply to these
relations. For all subsets Mk of the relations and subsets Pl of the predicates,
an optimal plan is constructed and entered into the table T . The loops range
over all Mk and Pl . Thereby, the set Mk is split into two disjoint subsets L
and L0 , and the set Pl is split into three parts (line 7). The first part (V )
contains those predicates that apply to relations in L only. The second part
(V 0 ) contains those predicates that apply to relations in L0 only. The third part
(p) is a conjunction of all the join predicates connecting relations in L and L0
(line 8). Line 9 constructs a plan by joining the two plans found for the pairs
[L, V ] and [L0 , V 0 ] in the table T . If this plan has so far the best costs, it is
memoized in the table (lines 10-12). Last, different possibilities of not pushing
predicates in Pl are investigated (lines 15-19).
Another issue that complicates the application of dynamic programming are
certain properties of plans. The most prominent such properties are interesting
orders [672, 709, 710]. Take a look at the following query:
28.2. BIBLIOGRAPHY 455

select d.no, e.name

from Employee e, Department d
where e.dno = d.dno
order by d.dno

Here, the user requests the result to be order on d.dno. Incidentally, this is also a
join attribute. During bottom up plan generation, we might think that a Grace
hash join is more efficient than a sort-merge join since the cost of sorting the
relations is too high. However, the result has to be sorted anyway so that this
sort may pay off. Hence, we have have to keep both plans. The approach is the
following. In the example, an ordering on d.dno is called an interesting order.
In general, any order that is helpful for ordering the output as requested by the
user, for a join operator, for a grouping operator, or for duplicate elimination
is called an interesting order . The dymamic programming algorithm is then
modified such that plans are not pruned, if they produce different interesting
orders.

28.1.4 A plan generator for bushy trees, expensive selections

and functions

28.2 Bibliography
456 CHAPTER 28. HARD-WIRED ALGORITHMS
Chapter 29

Rule-Based Algorithms

29.1 Rule-based Dynamic Programming

The section is beyond the scope of the paper and the reader is refered to the
starburst papers, especially [333, 462, 461, 487, 488].

29.2 Rule-based Memoization

This section is beyond the scope of the paper and the reader is refered to
the Volcano and Cascade papers [292, 297, 302, 305, 306]. Both optimizer
frameworks derived from the earlier Exodus query optimizer generator [290,
303].

29.3 Bibliography

457
458 CHAPTER 29. RULE-BASED ALGORITHMS
Chapter 30

Example Query Compiler

30.1 Research Prototypes

30.1.1 AQUA and COLA
30.1.2 Black Dahlia II
30.1.3 Epoq
Für das objektorientierte Datenmodell Encore [844] wurde die Anfragesprache
Equal [693, 692, 694], eine objektorientierte Algebra, die die Erzeugung von Ob-
jekten erlaubt, entwickelt. Zur Optimierung von Equal-Algebra-Ausdrücken
soll der Optimierer Epoq dienen. Eine Realisierung von Epoq steht noch
aus. Konkretisiert wurden jedoch bereits der Architekturansatz [525] und die
Kontrolle der Alternativenerzeugung [523] innerhalb dieser Architektur. Einen
Gesamtüberblick gibt die Dissertation von Mitchell [522].
Der Architekturvorschlag besteht aus einer generischen Architektur, die
an einem Beispieloptimierer konkretisiert wurde [522, 523]. Die elementaren
Bausteine der Architektur sind Regionen. Sie bestehen aus einer Kontrol-
lkomponente und wiederum Regionen beziehungsweise Transformationen. Die
einfachste Region ist dabei eine Transformation/Regel, die einen Algebraaus-
druck in einen äquivalenten Algebraausdruck umformt. Jede Region selbst wird
wiederum als eine Transformation aufgefaßt. Innerhalb der Architektur werden
nun diese Regionen in einer Hierarchie oder auch einem gerichteten azyklis-
chen Graphen, organisiert. Abbildung 30.1 zeigt eine solche Beispielorganisa-
tion. Regionen selbst können bis auf die Kontrolle als Module im Sinne von
Sciore und Sieg [668] aufgefaßt werden. Sie weisen sehr ähnliche Parameter und
Schnittstellen auf. Während jedoch bei Sciore und Sieg die Kontrollstrategie
eines Moduls aus einer festen Menge von gegebenen Kontrollstrategien aus-
gewählt werden muß, kann sie hier freier spezifiziert werden.
Unabhängig davon, ob die Transformationen einer Region wiederum Regio-
nen sind oder elementare Transformationen, wird ihre Anwendung einheitlich
von der Kontrolle der Region bestimmt. Die Aufgabe dieser Kontrolle besteht
darin, eine Folge von Transformationen zu finden, die die gegebene Anfrage
in eine äquivalente überführen. Sinngebend ist hierbei ein gewisses Ziel, das
es zu erreichen gilt. Beispielsweise kann dieses Ziel lauten: Optimiere eine

459
460 CHAPTER 30. EXAMPLE QUERY COMPILER

Globale Kontrolle

Regionen

? ? ?
Kontrolle Kontrolle Kontrolle

Transformation Transformation Transformation

? ?
Kontrolle Kontrolle

Transformation Transformation

Figure 30.1: Beispiel einer Epoq-Architektur

geschachtelte Anfrage. Um dieses Ziel zu erreichen, sind zwei grobe Schritte

notwendig. Zunächst muß die Anfrage entschachtelt werden und als nächstes
die entschachtelte Anfrage optimiert werden. Man sieht sofort, daß die Folge der
Transformationen, die die Kontrolle auszuwählen hat, sowohl von den Eigen-
schaften der Anfrage selbst wie auch vom zu erfüllenden Ziel abhängt. Basierend
auf dieser Beobachtung wird die Kontrolle nicht als Suchfunktion implemen-
tiert, sondern es wird das Planungsparadigma zur Realisierung gewählt. Die
Kontrolle selbst wird mit Hilfe eines Satzes von Regeln spezifiziert, die aus
Vorbedingung und Aktion bestehen.
Da es nicht möglich ist, im Vorfeld einen Plan, also eine Sequenz von Trans-
formationen/Regionen, zu erstellen, der in garantierter Weise das Ziel erreicht,
wird erlaubt, daß die Ausführung einer Transformation/Region fehlschlägt. In
diesem Fall kann dann ein alternativer Plan erzeugt werden, der aber auf dem
bisher Erreichten aufsetzt. Hierzu werden die Regeln, die die Kontrolle spezi-
fizieren in Gruppen eingeteilt, wobei jeder Gruppe eine einheitliche Vorbedin-
gung zugeordnet ist. Zu jeder Gruppe gehört dann eine Sequenz von Aktionen,
die der Reihe nach ausprobiert werden. Schlägt eine vorangehende Aktion fehl,
so wird die nächste in der Reihe der Aktionen angewendet. Schlagen alle Ak-
30.1. RESEARCH PROTOTYPES 461

tionen fehl, so schlägt auch die Anwendung der Region fehl.

Jede Aktion selbst ist wiederum eine Sequenz von elementaren Aktionen.
Jede dieser elementaren Aktionen ist entweder die Anwendung einer elementaren
Transformation, der Aufruf einer Region oder der rekursive Aufruf des Planers
mit einem neuformulierten Ziel, dessen Teilplan dann an entsprechender Stelle
in die Aktion eingebaut wird.
Die Erweiterbarkeit dieses Ansatzes um neue Regionen scheint einfach möglich,
da die Schnittstelle der Regionen genormt ist. Probleme könnte es lediglich bei
den Kontrollstrategien geben, da nicht klar ist, ob die benutzte Regelsprache
mächtig genug ist, um alle wünschenswerten Kontrollstrategien zu verwirk-
lichen.
Die Frage, ob die einzelnen Komponenten des Optimierers, also die Re-
gionen, evaluiert werden können, ist schwierig zu beantworten. Dafür spricht
jedoch, daß jede Region in einem gewissen Kontext aufgerufen wird, also zur Er-
reichung eines bestimmten Zieles bei der Optimierung einer Anfrage mit ebenso
bestimmten Eigenschaften. Beurteilen kann man daher die Erfolgsquote einer
Region innerhalb ihrer verschiedenen Anwendungen. Da jede Region lediglich
eine Alternative erzeugen darf, aufgrund des eine Region ist eine Transforma-
tion-Paradigmas, ist schwer zu sagen, in wieweit sich die durch die beschriebene
Bewertung gewonnene Information zur Verbesserung der Regionen oder des
Gesamtoptimierers einsetzen läßt.
Da auch hier der transformierende Ansatz zugrunde liegt, treffen die bereits
diskutierten Probleme auch für den Optimierer für Straube zu.
Einen stetigen Leistungsabfall könnte man durch die Realisierung von al-
ternativen Regionen erreichen, indem man ein Ziel OptimiereSchnell einführt,
das dann entsprechend weniger sorgfältige, aber schnellere Regionen aufruft.
Vorhersagen über der Güte (bei gegebener Optimierungszeit) scheinen aber
schwerlich möglich.

30.1.4 Ereq
A primary goal of the EREQ project is to define a common architecture for the
next generation of database managers. This architecture now includes
* the query language OQL (a la ODMG), * the logical algebra AQUA (a la
Brown), and * the physical algebra OPA (a la OGI/PSU).
It also includes
* software to parse OQL into AQUA (a la Bolo)
and query optimizers:
* OPT++ (Wisconsin), * EPOQ (Brown), * Cascades (PSU/OGI), and *
Reflective Optimizer (OGI).
In order to test this architecture, we hope to conduct a ”bakeoff” in which
the four query optimizers will participate. The primary goal of this bakeoff is
to determine whether optimizers written in different contexts can accommodate
the architecture we have defined. Secondarily, we hope to collect enough per-
formance statistics to draw some conclusions about the four optimizers, which
have been written using significantly different paradigms.
462 CHAPTER 30. EXAMPLE QUERY COMPILER

Modellbeschreibung

?
Optimierergenerator

?
C-Compiler

?
Anfrage - Synt. Analyse - Optimierer - Interpreter - Antwort

Anfrage Graph Auswertungsplan

Figure 30.2: Exodus Optimierer Generator

At present, OGI and PSU are testing their optimizers on the bakeoff queries.
Here is the prototype bakeoff optimizer developed at OGI. This set of Web
pages is meant to report on the current progress of their effort, and to define
the bakeoff rules. Please email your suggestions for improvement to Leo Fegaras
[email protected]. Leo will route comments to the appropriate author.
http://www.cse.ogi.edu/DISC/projects/ereq/bakeoff/bakeoff.html

30.1.5 Exodus/Volcano/Cascade
Im Rahmen des Exodus-Projektes wurde ein Optimierergenerator entwickelt
[303]. Einen Überblick über den Exodus-Optimierergenerator gibt Abbildung 30.2.
Ein Model description file enthält alle Angaben, die für einen Optimierer nötig
sind. Da der Exodus-Optimierergenerator verschiedene Datenmodelle unter-
stützen soll, enthält dieses File zunächst einmal die Definition der verfügbaren
Operatoren und Methoden. Dabei werden mit Operatoren die Operatoren der
logischen Algebra bezeichnet und mit Methoden diejenigen der physischen Al-
gebra, also die Implementierungen der Operatoren. Das Model description file
enthält weiterhin zwei Klassen von Regeln. Transformationen basieren auf alge-
braischen Gleichungen und führen einen Operatorbaum in einen anderen über.
Implementierungsregeln wählen für einen gegebenen Operator eine Methode
aus. Beide Klassen von Regeln haben einen linken Teil, der mit einem Teil des
aktuellen Operatorgraphen übereinstimmen muß, einen rechten Teil, der den
Operatorgraphen nach Anwendung der Regel beschreibt, und eine Bedingung,
die erfüllt sein muß, damit die Regel angewendet werden kann. Während die
linke und rechte Seite der Regel als Muster angegeben werden, wird die Be-
dingung durch C-Code beschrieben. Auch für die Tranformation lassen sich
C-Routinen verwenden. In einer abschließenden Sektion des Model description
files finden sich dann die benötigten C-Routinen.
30.1. RESEARCH PROTOTYPES 463

Aus dem Model description file wird durch den Optimierergenerator ein
C-Programm erzeugt, das anschließend übersetzt und gebunden wird. Das
Ergebnis ist dann der Anfrageoptimierer, der in der herkömmlichen Art und
Weise verwendet werden kann. Es wurde ein übersetzender Ansatz für die
Regeln gewählt und kein interpretierender, da in einem von den Autoren vorher
durchgeführten Experiment sich die Regelinterpretation als zu langsam erwiesen
hat.
Die Regelabarbeitung im generierten Optimierer verwaltet eine Liste OPEN,
in der alle anwendbaren Regeln gehalten werden. Ein Auswahlmechanismus
bestimmt dann die nächste anzuwendende Regel und entfernt sie aus OPEN.
Nach deren Anwendung werden die hierdurch ermöglichten Regelanwendungen
detektiert und in OPEN vermerkt. Zur Implementierung des Auswahlmecha-
nismus werden sowohl die Kosten eines aktuellen Ausdrucks als auch eine Ab-
schätzung des Potentials einer Regel in Betracht gezogen. Diese Abschätzung
des Potentials berechnet sich aus dem Quotienten der Kosten für einen Opera-
torbaum vor und nach Regelanwendung für eine Reihe von vorher durchgeführten
Regelanwendungen. Mit Hilfe dieser beiden Angaben, den Kosten des aktuellen
Operatorgraphen, auf den die Regel angewendet werden soll, und ihres Poten-
tials können dann Abschätzungen über die Kosten des erzeugten Operator-
graphen berechnet werden. Die Suchstrategie ist Hill climbing.
Der von den Autoren vermerkte Hauptnachteil ihres Optimierergenerators,
den sie jedoch für alle transformierenden regelbasierten Optimerer geltend machen,
ist die Unmöglichkeit der Abschätzung der absoluten Güte eines Operator-
baumes und des Potentials eines Operatorbaumes im Hinblick auf zukünftige
Optimierungen. Dadurch kann niemals abgeschätzt werden, ob der optimale
Operatorbaum bereits erreicht wurde. Erst nach Generierung aller Alternativ-
en ist die Auswahl des optimalen Operatorbaumes möglich. Weiter bedauern es
die Autoren, daß es nicht möglich ist, den A∗-Algorithmus als Suchfunktion zu
verwenden, da die Abschätzung des Potentials oder der Distanz zum optimalen
Operatorgraphen nicht möglich ist.
Zumindest kritisch gegenüberstehen sollte man auch der Bewertung einzel-
ner Regeln, da diese, basierend auf algebraischen Gleichungen, von zu feiner
Granularität sind, als daß eine allgemeine Bewertung möglich wäre. Die erfol-
greiche Verwendung des Vertauschens zweier Verbundoperationen in einer An-
frage bedeutet noch lange nicht, daß diese Vertauschung auch in der nächsten
Anfrage die Kosten verringert. Die Hauptursache für die kritische Einstel-
lung gegenüber dieser recht ansprechenden Idee ist, daß eine Regelanwendung
zu wenig Information/Kontext berücksichtigt. Würde dieses Manko beseitigt,
wären Regeln also von entschieden gröberer Granularität, so erschiene dieser
Ansatz vielversprechend. Ein Beispiel wäre eine Regel, die alle Verbundoper-
ationen gemäß einer gegebenen Heuristik ordnet, also ein komplexer Algorith-
mus, der mehr Wissen in seine Entscheidungen einbezieht.
Graefe selbst führt einige weitere Nachteile des Exodus-Optimierergenerators
an, die dann zur Entwicklung des Volcano-Optimierergenerators führten [305,
306]. Unzureichend unterstützt werden

• nicht-triviale Kostenmodelle,
464 CHAPTER 30. EXAMPLE QUERY COMPILER

• Eigenschaften,

• Heuristiken und

• Transformationen von Subskripten von algebraischen Operatoren in alge-

braische Operatoren.

Der letzte Punkt ist insbesondere im Bereich der Objektbanken wesentlich, um

beispielsweise Pfadausdrücke in eine Folge von Verbundoperationen umwandeln
zu können.
Im Volcano-Optimierergenerator werden algebraische Ausdrücke wieder in
einen Operatorbaum umgewandelt. Wie im Exodus-Optimierergenerator wird
der Optimierer wieder mit einer Menge von transformierenden und implemen-
tierenden Regeln beschrieben. Die Nachteile des transformierenden Ansatz
werden somit geerbt. Eine Trennung in zwei Phasen, wie bei vielen Opti-
mierern anzutreffen, ist für den Volcano-Optimierergenerator nicht notwendig.
Der Entwickler des Optimierers hat die Freiheit, die Phasen selbst festzulegen.
Die Probleme, die sonst bei der Kopplung der algebraischen mit der nicht-
algebraischen Optimierung auftreten, können also vermieden werden. Die Be-
handlung der Eigenschaften erfolgt zielorientiert. Die in der Anfrage geforderten
Eigenschaften (bspw. Sortierung), werden der Suchfunktion als Parameter übergeben,
damit gezielt Pläne erstellt werden, die diese erfüllen. Wenn ein Operator oder
eine Methode eingebaut wird, so wird darauf geachtet, daß diese noch nicht
erfüllten Eigenschaften durch den Operator oder die Methode erzielt werden.
Die geforderten Eigenschaften dienen wieder als Zielbeschreibung für die nach-
folgenden Aufrufe der Suchfunktion. Zu diesen Eigenschaften gehören auch
Kostengrenzen, mit denen die Suchfunktion dann einen Branch-and-bound-
Algorithmus implementiert. Bevor ein Plan für einen algebraischen Ausdruck
generiert wird, wird in einer Hash-Tabelle nachgeschaut, ob ein entsprechen-
der Ausdruck mit den geforderten Eigenschaften bereits existiert. Dadurch
wird Doppeltarbeit vermieden. Bei beiden Optimierergeneratoren werden die
Forderungen nach stetigem Leistungsabfall, früher Bewertung von Alternativen
und Evaluierbarkeit einzelner Komponenten nicht erfüllt.

30.1.6 Freytags regelbasierte System R-Emulation

[251] zeigt, wie man mit Hilfe eines regelbasierten Ansatzes den Optimierer von
System R [672] emulieren kann. Die Eingabe besteht aus einem Lisp-ähnlichen
Ausdruck:

(select <proj-list>
<sel-pred-list>
<join-pred-list>
<table-list>)

Die Projektionsliste besteht aus Attributspezifikationen der Form

<rel-name>.<attr-name>
30.1. RESEARCH PROTOTYPES 465

Anfrage

?
Generierung des
allg. Ausdrucks

?
Zugriffsplan-
generierung

?
Join-
Reihenfolge und
-Methoden

?
Auswertungsplan

Figure 30.3: Organisation der Optimierung

Diese werden auch für die Selektionsprädikate und Joinprädikate verwendet.

Die Algebra beinhaltet sowohl Operatoren der logischen als auch der physischen
Algebra. Im einzelnen gibt es Scan-, Sort-, Projektions, Verbundoperatoren in
einer logischen und verschiedenen physischen Ausprägungen. Die Erzeugung
der Auswertungspläne wird in verschiedene Schritte unterteilt, die wiederum in
Teilschritte zerlegt sind (siehe Abb. 30.3). Zunächst erfolgt die Übersetztung in
die logische Algebra. Hier werden Scan-Operatoren um die Relationen gebaut
und Selektionen, die nur eine Relation betreffen, in die Scan-Opertoren einge-
baut. Der zweite Schritt generiert Zugriffspläne, indem der Scan-Operator
durch einen einfachen File-Scan (FSCAN) ersetzt wird, oder falls möglich, durch
einen Index-Scan (ISCAN). Der dritte Schritt generiert zunächst verschiedene
Verbund-Reihenfolgen und bestimmt anschließend die Verbund-Methoden. Sie
in System R wird zwischen Sort-merge- und Nested-loop-join unterschieden.
Es werden keinerlei Aussagen über die Auswahl einer Suchstrategie gemacht.
Ziel ist es vielmehr, durch die Modellierung des System R Optimierers mit Hilfe
eines Regelsystems die prinzipielle Brauchbarkeit des regelbasierten Ansatzes
nachzuweisen.

30.1.7 Genesis
Das globale Ziel des Genesisprojektes [52, 53, 54, 57] war es, die gesamte Daten-
banksoftware zu modularisieren und eine erhöhte Wiederverwendbarkeit von
Datenbankmodulen zu erreichen. Zwei Teilziele wurden hierbei angestrebt:
466 CHAPTER 30. EXAMPLE QUERY COMPILER

1. Standardisierung der Schnittstellen und

2. Formulierung der Algorithmen unabhängig von der DBMS-Implementierung.

Wir interessieren uns hier lediglich für die Erreichung der Ziele beim Bau von
Optimierern [50, 55].
Die Standardisierung der Schnittstellen wird durch eine Verallgemeinerung
von Anfragegraphen erreicht. Die Algorithmen selbst werden durch Transfor-
mationen auf Anfragegraphen beschrieben. Man beachte, daß dies nicht be-
deutet, daß die Algorithmen auch durch Transformationregeln implementiert
werden. Regeln werden lediglich als Beschreibungsmittel benutzt, um die Natur
der Wiederverwendbarkeit von Optimierungsalgorithmen zu verstehen.
Die Optimierung wird in zwei Phasen eingeteilt, die Reduktionsphase und
die Verbundphase. Die Reduktionsphase bildet Anfragegraphen, die auf nicht
reduzierten Datenmengen arbeiten, auf solche ab, die auf reduzierten Daten-
mengen arbeiten. Die Reduktionsphase orientiert sich also deutlich an den
Heuristiken zum Durchschieben von Selektionen und Projektionen. Die zweite
Phase bestimmt Verbundordnungen. Damit ist die in den Papieren beschriebene
Ausprägung des Ansatzes sehr konservativ in dem Sinne, daß nur klassische
Datenmodelle betrachtet werden. Eine Anwendung der Methodik auf objekto-
rientierte oder deduktive Datenmodelle steht noch aus.
Folglich lassen sich nur die existierenden klassischen Optimierungsansätze
mit diesen Mitteln hinreichend gut beschreiben. Ebenso lassen sich die ex-
istierenden klassischen Optimierer mit den vorgestellten Mitteln als Zusam-
mensetzung der ebenfalls im Formalismus erfaßten Algorithmen beschreiben.
Die Zusammensetzung selbst wird mit algebraischen Termersetzungen beschrieben.
Durch neue Kompositionsregeln lassen sich dann auch neue Optimierer beschreiben,
die andere Kombinationen von Algorithmen verwenden.
Durch die formale, implementierungsunabhängige Beschreibung sowohl der
einzelnen Optimierungsalgorithmen als auch der Zusammensetzung eines Opti-
mierers wird die Wiederverwendbarkeit von bestehenden Algorithmen optimal
unterstützt. Wichtig dabei ist auch die Verwendung der standardisierten An-
fragegraphen. Dieser Punkt wird allerdings aufgeweicht, da auch vorgesehen ist,
verschiedene Darstellungen von Anfragegraphen zu verwenden [53]. Hierdurch
wird die Wiederverwendung von Implementierungen von Optimierungsalgorith-
men natürlich in Frage gestellt, da diese üblicherweise nur auf einer bestimmten
Darstellung der Anfragegraphen arbeiten.
Wenn neue Optimierungsansätze entwickelt werden, so lassen sie sich eben-
falls im vorgestellten Formalismus beschreiben. Gleiches gilt auch für neue In-
dexstrukturen, da auch diese formal beschrieben werden [51, 56]. Nicht abzuse-
hen ist, in wieweit der standardisierte Anfragegraph Erweiterungen standhält.
Dies ist jedoch kein spezifisches Problem des Genesisansatzes, sondern gilt für
alle Optimierer. Es ist noch offen, ob es gelingt, die Optimierungsalgorithmen
so zu spezifizieren und zu implementieren, daß sie unabhängig von der konkreten
Darstellung oder Implementierung der Anfragegraphen arbeiten. Der objekto-
rientierte Ansatz kann hier nützlich sein. Es erhebt sich jedoch die Frage, ob bei
Einführung eines neuen Operators die bestehenden Algorithmen so implemen-
30.1. RESEARCH PROTOTYPES 467

tierbar sind, daß sie diesen ignorieren können und trotzdem sinnvolle Arbeit
leisten.
Die Beschränkung auf zwei Optimierungsphasen, die Reduktions- und die
Verbundphase, ist keine Einschränkung, da auch sie mittels Termersetzungsregeln
festgelegt wurde, und somit leicht geändert werden kann.
Da die Beschreibungen des Optimierers und der einzelnen Algorithmen un-
abhängig von der tatsächlichen Implementierung sind, sind auch die globale
Kontrolle des Optimierers und die lokalen Kontrollen der einzelnen Algorithmen
voneinander losgelöst. Dieses ist eine wichtige Forderung, um Erweiterbarkeit
zu erreichen. Sie wird oft bei regelbasierten Optimierern verletzt und schränkt
somit deren Erweiterbarkeit ein.
Die Evaluierbarkeit, die Vorhersagbarkeit und die frühe Bewertung von Al-
ternativen sind mit dem vorgestellten Ansatz nicht möglich, da die einzelnen
Algorithmen als Transformationen auf dem Anfragegraphen aufgefaßt werden.
Dieser Nachteil gilt jedoch nicht allein für den hier vorgestellten Genesisansatz,
sondern generell für alle bis auf einen Optimierer. Es ist allerdings nicht ab-
sehbar, ob dieser Nachteil aus dem verwendeten Formalismus resultiert oder
lediglich aus deren Konkretisierung bei der Modellierung bestehender Optimier-
er. Es ist durchaus möglich, daß der Formalismus mit leichten Erweiterungen
auch andere Ansätze, insbesondere den generierenden, beschreiben kann.
Insgesamt handelt es sich beim Genesisansatz um einen sehr brauchbaren
Ansatz. Leider hat er, im Gegensatz zur Regelbasierung, nicht genug Wider-
hall gefunden hat. Er hat höchst wahrscheinlich mehr Möglichkeiten, die An-
forderungen zu erfüllen, als bisher ausgelotet wurde.

30.1.8 GOMbgo
468 CHAPTER 30. EXAMPLE QUERY COMPILER

GOMql-Anfrage

Übersetzung und Vorverarbeitung

Termrepräsentation

? Heuristik


ASR-Schema - Regelanwendung
Y

Regelbasis
Liste der optimierten Terme

Selektion und Polierung  Kostenmodell

optimierter Term

Code Generator

Auswertungsplan
(QEP)
?

Figure 30.4: Ablauf der Optimierung

30.1. RESEARCH PROTOTYPES 469

heuristics transformation rules

heuristic
evaluator

tool-
box cond rule
mgr application
query optimized
transf query alternatives
pattern mgr
matcher

environment manager

Schema Manager
- types
- access support relations

Figure 30.5: Architektur von GOMrbo

470 CHAPTER 30. EXAMPLE QUERY COMPILER

X
?

Normalisierung

?
Algebraische-
optimierung
1
?
Konstante u.
gemeinsame π χ
Teilausdrücke

?
sort
Übersetzung in
Ausdrucksalgebra

σ head
?
nicht-algebr.
Optimierung
REL
?

Figure 30.6: a) Architektur des Gral-Optimierers; b) Operatorhierarchie nach

Kosten

30.1.9 Gral
Gral ist ein erweiterbares geometrisches Datenbanksystem. Der für dieses Sys-
tem entwickelte Optimierer, ein regelbasierter Optimierer in Reinkultur, erzeugt
aus einer gegebenen Anfrage in fünf Schritten einen Ausführungsplan (s. Abb. 30.6
a) [60]. Die Anfragesprache ist gleich der verwendeten deskriptiven Algebra
(descriptive algebra). Diese ist eine um geometrische Operatoren erweiterte
relationale Algebra. Als zusätzliche Erweiterung enthält sie die Möglichkeit,
Ausdrücke an Variablen zu binden. Ein Auswertungsplan wird durch einen Aus-
druck der Ausführungsalgebra (executable algebra) dargestellt. Die Ausführungsalgebra
beinhaltet im wesentlichen verschiedene Implementierungen der deskriptiven
Algebra und Scan-Operationen. Die Trennung zwischen deskriptiver Algebra
und Ausführungsalgebra ist strikt, das heißt, es kommen keine gemischten Aus-
drücke vor (außer während der expliziten Konvertierung (Schritt 4)).
Die Schritte 1 und 3 sind durch feste Algorithmen implementiert. Während
30.1. RESEARCH PROTOTYPES 471

der Normalisierung (Schritt 1) werden Variablenvorkommen durch die an sie

gebundenen Ausdrücke ersetzt. Dies ist notwendig, um das Optimierungspo-
tential vollständig erschließen zu können. Schritt 3 führt für konstante Aus-
drücke Variablen ein. Die entspricht der Entschachtelung von Anfragen vom
Typ N und A (s. Kapitel ?? und [424]). Die Behandlung von gemeinsamen
Teilausdrücken ist noch nicht implementiert, aber für Schritt 3 vorgesehen.
Die Schritte 2, 4 und 5 sind regelbasiert. Zur Formulierung der Regeln wird
eine Regelbeschreibungssprache (rule description language) verwendet. Die
Beschreibungen der Regeln werden in einer Datei abgelegt. Innerhalb der Datei
werden Regeln zu Gruppen (sections) zusammengefaßt. Diese Gruppen werden
nacheinander angewandt. Daraus ergeben sich auch für einen Schritt mehrere
kleinere Schritte. Beispielsweise ist der Schritt 2 im OPTEX-Optimierer für
Gral in vier Teilschritte unterteilt:
1. Dekomposition von Selektionen mit komplexen Selektionsprädikaten in
eine Folge von Selektionen mit einfachen Selektionsprädikaten und Zer-
legung von Verbundoperationen in eine Folge von Selektionen und Kreuzpro-
dukten.
2. Eigentlicher IMPROVING Schritt (siehe unten).
3. Teilausdrücke bestehend aus einer Selektion und einem unmittelbar fol-
genden Kreuzprodukt werden in Verbundoperationen umgewandelt.
4. Bestimmung einer Ordnung zwischen den Verbundoperationen und Kreuzpro-
dukten. Dabei werden Kreuzprodukte zum Schluß ausgeführt und kleine
Relationen zuerst verbunden.
Jeder Gruppe wird eine von drei in Gral implementierten Suchstrategien zuge-
ordnet.
STANDARD Führt solange alle Regeln einer Gruppe aus, bis keine Regel
mehr anwendbar ist. Es werden keine Vorkehrungen getroffen, um End-
losschleifen zu verhindern. Die Regeln müssen also dementsprechend for-
muliert werden. Diese Strategie kann für Schritte 2 und 5 verwendet
werden.
IMPROVING Diese Strategie unterstützt algebraische Optimierung in der
deskriptiven Algebra (Schritt 2). Das Ziel ist hierbei eine gute Ord-
nung der algebraischen Operatoren zu erlangen. Hierzu wird eine partielle
Ordnung der algebraischen Operatoren gemäß ihrer Kosten definiert (s.
Abb. 30.6 b) für ein Beispiel). Die IMPROVING-Strategie versucht dann
die hierdurch definierte Ordnung in einem gegebenen Ausdruck zu erre-
ichen. Hierzu wird sie zunächst rekursiv auf alle Teilausdrücke eines Aus-
drucks angewendet. Regeln zur Umformung werden dann angewendet,
wenn dadurch eine höhere Kohärenz der Operatorfolge im Ausdruck mit
der der Operatorkostenhierarchie erreicht werden kann. Dies entspricht
einem Bubble-sort auf dem Ausdruck. Ausdrücke mit der kleinsten An-
zahl von runs werden bevorzugt. Dabei ist ein run eine Folge von Op-
eratoren innerhalb des zu optimierenden Ausdrucks, dessen Operatoren
gemäß der Operatorkostenhierarchie geordnet sind.
472 CHAPTER 30. EXAMPLE QUERY COMPILER

TRANSLATION Regelgruppen mit dieser Strategie werden während der

Übersetzung von der deskriptiven Algebra in die Ausführungsalgebra angewen-
det (Schritt 4). Jede Regel beschreibt dabei die Übersetzung eines einzel-
nen deskriptiven Operators in einen Ausdruck der Ausführungsalgebra, al-
so einen, der keine deskriptiven Operatoren enthalten darf. Die Übersetzung
erfolgt lokal. Für Parameter, also beispielsweise Selektions- und Ver-
bundprädikate, können Regeln angegeben werden, die einen Suchraum für
die Reorganisation des Parameters erlauben. Hiermit kann man beispiel-
sweise alle Permutationen einer Konjunktion erzeugen. Die Suchstrate-
gie für die Parameterbestimmung ist erschöpfend und trägt Vorsorge, daß
keine Zyklen auftreten. Eine Auswahl kann mittels des valuation-Eintrags
in den Regeln getroffen werden. Dieser kann beispielsweise Kosten repräsentieren.
Dementsprechend werden dann Regeln mit der kleinsten valuation bevorzugt.
Jede für einen Parameter generierte Darstellung wird übersetzt.
Die Syntax für eine Regel ist
specification
definition
RULE
pattern
→ result1 valuation1 if condition1
···
→ resultn valuationn if conditionn

wobei
specification von der Form
SPEC spec1 ,. . . ,specn
ist. Dabei sind die speci Range-Spezifikationen wie beispielsweise opi in <
OpSet >.
definition Variablen definiert (bspw. für Attributsequenzen). In Gral ex-
istieren verschiedene Sorten von Variablen für Attribute, Operationen,
Relationen etc.
pattern ein Muster in Form eines Ausdrucks ist, der Variablen und Konstan-
ten enthalten kann. Der Ausdruck kann ein Ausdruck der deskriptiven
Algebra oder der Ausführungsalgebra sein.
conditioni eine Bedingung ist. Diese Bedingung ist ein allgemeiner boolescher
Ausdruck. Spezielle Prädikate wie ExistsIndex (existiert ein Index für eine
Relation?) werden von Gral zur Verfügung gestellt.
resulti wiederum ein Ausdruck ist, der das Ergebnis der Regel beschreibt.
valuationi ist ein arithmetischer Ausdruck, der einen numerischen Wert zurückliefert.
Dieser kann in einer (Gral unterstützt mehrere) Auswahlstrategie herange-
zogen werden: Es wird die Regel mit der kleinsten valuation bevorzugt.
30.1. RESEARCH PROTOTYPES 473

Die Auswertung einer Regel erfolgt standardmäßig. Sei E der Ausdruck auf
den die Regel angewendet werden soll.

if ∃ Substitution σ, Unterausdruck E 0 von E mit E 0 σ = pattern

and ∀1 ≤ i ≤ j: ¬ conditioni
and conditionj
then ersetzte E 0 in E durch resultj σ

Der Gral-Optimierer ist ein reiner regelbasierter Optimierer, der den Trans-
formationsansatz verfolgt. Dementsprechend treffen alle vorher identifizierten
Nachteile derselben zu.
Zu bemängeln sind im einzelnen folgende Punkte:

• Es erfolgt keine frühzeitige Bewertung der Alternativen.

• Die Suchstrategien sind fest eingebaut und nicht sonderlich ausgefeilt.

• Der Einbau von hochspezialisierten Algorithmen, die besondere Opti-

mierungstechniken repräsentieren, ist schwierig, wenn nicht unmöglich.

• Eine Bestimmung der Verbundreihenfolge gemäß eines komplexeren Al-

gorithmus ist nicht möglich.

• Da die Übersetzung in die Ausführungsalgebra lokal ist und keine An-

notationen zugelassen sind, können vorhandene Sortierreihenfolgen nur
schwer ausgenutzt werden.

Es wird nur eine Alternative der algebraischen Optimierung zur physischen

Optimierung übergeben. Das kann zu Fällen führen, in denen der Optimierer
niemals das Optimum finden kann. Wenngleich dies auch im allgemeinen nicht
immer möglich ist, so sollte jedoch diese Eigenschaft nicht inhärent sein.
Positiv zu vermerken ist, daß für IMPROVING und TRANSLATION der
Aufwand für das Pattern-matching vermutlich gering gehalten werden kann.

30.1.10 Lambda-DB
http://lambda.uta.edu/lambda-DB/manual/overview.html

30.1.11 Lanzelotte in short

Query Language Der Lanzelotte-Optimierer verwendet keine spezielle An-
fragesprache. Ausgangspunkt der Betrachtungen sind sog. Anfragegraphen
(request graphs, query graphs). Einzelheiten stehen in meiner Ausar-
beitung. In einem Papier ([451]) wird gezeigt wie man von einer Regel-
sprache (RDL) zu Anfragegraphen kommt.

Internal Representation Die interne Repraesentation einer Anfrage ist der

Class Connection Graph. Dort enthalten sind die Datenbankobjekte (Ex-
tensionen), die in der Anfrage referenziert werden aus der Sicht des physikalis-
chen Schemas und die in der Anfrage bedeutsamen Beziehungen zwischen
diesen Extensionen (Joins, Attributpfade, Selektionen).
474 CHAPTER 30. EXAMPLE QUERY COMPILER

Query Execution Plans QEPs werden als (deep) processing trees repraesen-
tiert.

Architecture Der Lanzelotte-Optimierer ist regelbasiert.

Transformation versus generation Lanzelotte bietet Regeln fuer beide Spielarten.

Sie unterscheidet enumerative search (Generierung), randomized search
(Transformation) und genetic search (Transformation).

Control/Search-Strategy Lanzelotte versucht von den Einzelheiten der ver-

wendeten Stategien zu abstrahieren und stellt eine erweiterbare Opti-
mierung vor, die die Einzelheiten ueberdeckt. Die tatsaechlich zu einem
bestimmten Zeitpunkt verwendete Strategie wird durch “assertions” bes-
timmt. (Dazu steht nicht viel in den Papieren, vielleicht meint sie auch
die Bedingungsteile der Regeln)

Cost Model Ziemlich aehnlich dem, das wir verwenden. Sie benutzt auch
solche Sachen wie card(C), size(C), ndist(Ai ), f an(Ai ), share(Ai ). Einzel-
heiten stehen in meiner Ausarbeitung.

30.1.12 Opt++
wisconsin

30.1.13 Postgres
Postgres ist kein Objektbanksystem sondern fällt in die Klasse der erweiterten
relationalen Systeme [733]. Die wesentlichen Erweiterungen sind
• berechenbare Attribute, die als Quel-Anfragen formuliert werden [731],

• Operationen [729],

• abstrakte Datentypen [728] und

• Regeln [732].
Diese beiden Punkte sollen uns jedoch an dieser Stelle nicht interessieren. Die
dort entwickelten Optimierungstechniken, insbesondere die Materialisierung der
berechenbaren Attribute, sind in der Literatur beschrieben [400, 344, 342, 343].
Unser Interesse richtet sich vielmehr auf eine neuere Publikation, in der eine
Vorschlag für die Reihenfolgebestimmung von Selektionen und Verbundopera-
tionen unterbreitet wird [356]. Diese soll im folgenden kurz vorgestellt werden.
Zunächst jedoch einige Vorbemerkungen.
Wenn man eine Selektion verzögert, also nach einem Verbund ausführt,
obwohl dies nicht notwendig wäre, so kann es passieren, daß das Selektion-
sprädikat auf mehr Tupeln ausgewertet werden muß. Es kann jedoch nicht
passieren, daß es auf mehr verschiedenen Werten ausgeführt werden muß. Im
Gegenteil, die Anzahl der Argumentewerte wird durch einen Verbund im allge-
meinen verkleinert. Cached man also die bereits errechneten Werte des Selek-
tionsprädikates, so wird die Anzahl der Auswertungen des Selektionsprädikates
30.1. RESEARCH PROTOTYPES 475

nach einem Verbund zumindest nicht größer. Die Auswertung wird dann durch
ein Nachschlagen ersetzt. Da wir hier nur teure Selektionsprädikate betrachten,
ist ein Nachschlagen sehr billig gegenüber der Auswertung. Die Kosten für das
Nachschlagen können sogar vernachläßigt werden. Es bleibt das Problem der
größe des Caches. Liegt Eingabe sortiert nach den Argumenten des Selektion-
sprädikates vor, so kann der die größe des Caches unter Umständen auf 1 re-
duziert werden. Er erübrigt sich ganz, wenn man eine indirekte Repräsentation
des Verbundergebnisses verwendet. Eine mögliche indirekte Repräsentation ist
in Abbildung ?? dargestellt, wobei die linke der abgebildeten Relationen die
Argumente für das betrachtete Selektionsprädikat enthalte.
Für jedes Selektionsprädikat p(a1 , . . . , an ) mit Argumenten ai bezeichne cp
die Kosten der Auswertung auf einem Tupel. Diese setzen sich aus CPU-
und I/O-Kosten zusammen (s. [356]). Ein Plan ist ein Baum, dessen Blätter
scan-Knoten enthalten und dessen innere Knoten mit Selektions- und Verbund-
prädikaten markiert sind. Ein Strom in einem Plan ist ein Pfad von einem Blatt
zur Wurzel. Die zentrale Ide ist nun die Selektions- und Verbundprädikate nicht
zu unterscheiden, sondern gleich zu behandeln. Dabei wird angenommen, daß
alle diese Prädikate auf dem Kreuzprodukt aller Relationen der betrachteten
Anfrage arbeiten. Dies erfordert eine Anpassung der Kosten. Seien a1 , . . . , an
die Relationen der betrachteten Anfrage und p ein Prädikat über den Relationen
a1 , . . . , ak . Dann sind die globalen Kosten von p wie folgt definiert:

C(p) = Qn c p
i=k+1 |ai |

Die globalen Kosten berechnen die Kosten der Auswertung des Prädikates über
der gesamten Anfrage. Hierbei müssen natürlich diejenigen Relationen her-
ausgenommen werden, die das Prädikat nicht beeinflussen. Zur Illustration
nehme man an, p sei ein Selektionsprädikat auf nur einer Relation a1 . Wendet
man p direkt auf a1 an, so entstehen die Kosten cp ∗ |a1 |. Im vereinheitlicht-
en Modell wird angenommen, daß jedes Prädikat auf dem Kreuzprodukt aller
in der Anfrage beteiligten Relationen ausgewertet wird. Es entstehen also die
Kosten C(p)∗|a1 |∗|a2 |∗. . .∗|an |. Diese sind aber gleich cp ∗|a1 |. Dies ist natürlich
nur unter der Verwendung eines Caches für die Werte der Selektionsprädikate
korrekt. Man beachte weiter, daß die Selektivität s(p) eines Prädikates p un-
abhängig von der Lage innerhalb eines Stroms ist.
Der globale Rang eines Prädikates p ist definiert als
s(p)
rank (p) = C(p)

Man beachte, daß die Prädikate innerhalb eines Stroms nicht beliebig umord-
bar sind, da wir gewährleisten müssen, daß die von einem Prädikat benutzten
Argumente auch vorhanden sein müssen. In [356] wir noch eine weitere Ein-
schränkung vorgenommen: Die Verbundreihenfolge darf nicht angetastet wer-
den. Es wird also vorausgesetzt, daß eine optimale Verbundreihenfolge bereits
bestimmt wurde und nur noch die reinen Selektionsprädikate verschoben wer-
den dürfen.
Betrachtet man zunächst einmal nur die Umordnung der Prädikate auf
einem Strom, so erhält man bedingt durch die Umordbarkeitseinschränkungen
476 CHAPTER 30. EXAMPLE QUERY COMPILER

das Sequentialisierungsproblem mit Vorrangbedingungen für das Algorithmus

mit Laufzeit O(nlogn) (n ist die Stromlänge) eine optimale Lösung bekannt ist
[533].
Das in [356] vorgeschlagene Verfahren wendet diesen Algorithmus solange
auf jeden Strom an, bis keine Verbesserung mehr erzielt werden kann. Das
Ergebnis ist ein polynomialer Algorithmus, der die optimale Lösung garantiert.
Dies jedoch nur unter der Einschränkung, daß die Kosten des Joins linear sind.
Damit sind wir bereits bei einem der Nachteile des Verfahrens: Die Kosten
der Verbundoperation nicht mitunter nicht linear sondern sogar quadratisch.
Ein weiterer Nachteil liegt in der Voraussetzung, daß die optimale Verbun-
dreihenfolge schon bestimmt wurde, denn diese hängt wesentlich davon ab, an
welcher Stelle die Selektionen eingebaut werden. Üblicherweise wird bei der Bes-
timmung der optimalen Verbundreihenfolge vorausgesetzt, daß alle Selektion-
sprädikate soweit wie möglich nach unten verschoben werden. Dies ist jedoch
jetzt nicht mehr der Fall. Es ist also notwendig die Selektionsprädikatmigration
in die Joinreihenfolgebestimmung zu integrieren. Nur dann kann man auf gute
Ergebnisse hoffen. Die Integration mit einem Ansatz des dynamischen Pro-
grammierens ist problematisch, da dort Lösungen verworfen werden, die unter
Umständen zur Optimalen Lösung führen, wenn ein Selektionsprädikat nicht
ganz nach unten durchgeschoben wird [356].
Eine Teillösung wird dort auch angedeutet. Ist der Rang eines Selektion-
sprädikates größer als jeder Rang jedes Plans einer Menge von Verbunden, so
ist das Selektionsprädikat in einem optimalen Baum oberhalb all dieser Ver-
bundoperationen plaziert. Ein entsprechender Algorithmus hat aber, wenn
er beispielsweise nur Left-deep-trees erzeugt, eine Worst-case-Komplexität von
O(n4 n!).

30.1.14 Sciore & Sieg

Die Hauptidee von Sciore und Sieg ist es, die Regelmenge in Module zu or-
ganisieren und jedem Modul eine eigene Suchstrategie, Kostenberechnung und
Regelmenge zuzuordnen. Module können andere Module explizit aufrufen, oder
implizit ihre Ausgabemenge an das nächste Modul weiterleiten.

30.1.15 Secondo
Gueting

30.1.16 Squiral
Der erste Ansatz eines regelbasierten Optimierers, Squiral, kann auf das Jahr
1975 zurückgeführt werden [714]. Man beachte, daß dieses Papier vier Jahre
älter ist als das vielleicht am häufigsten zitierte Papier über den System R
Optimierer [672], der jedoch nicht regelbasiert, sondern fest verdrahtet ist.
Abbildung 30.7 gibt einen Überblick über den Aufbau von Squiral. Nach
der syntaktischen Analyse liegt ein Operatorgraph vor. Dieser ist in Squiral
zunächst auf einen Operatorbaum beschränkt. Zur Behandlung von gemein-
samen Teilausdrücken wird das Anlegen von temporären Relationen, die den
30.1. RESEARCH PROTOTYPES 477

query

parsing

operator graph

transformation graph
transformations transformations
rules
optimized
operator graph
operator base
construction procedures
cooperative
concurrent
programs
database
machine

result

Figure 30.7: Die Squiralarchitektur

gemeinsamen Teilausdrücken entsprechen, vorgeschlagen. Diese temporären

Relationen ersetzen dann die gemeinsamen Teilausdrücke. Dadurch ist es möglich,
sich auf Operatorbäume zu beschränken.
Der Operatorbaum wird dann in einen optimierten Operatorbaum trans-
formiert. Hierzu werden Regeln, die den algebraischen Gleichungen entsprechen,
verwendet. Die Anwendung dieser Transformationsregeln ist rein heuristisch
gesteuert. Die Heuristik selber ist in den Transformationsanwendungsregeln
abgelegt. Eine dieser Regeln sagt beispielsweise, daß Projektionen nur dann
nach unten geschoben werden, wenn die Operation, über die die Projektion
als nächstes geschoben werden soll, keine Verbundoperation ist. Neben den
Standardregeln, die das Vertauschen von relationalen Operatoren ermöglichen,
gibt es Regeln, die es erlauben, relationale Ausdrücke in komplexe boolesche
Ausdrücke, die dann als Selektionsprädikate Verwendung finden, zu überführen.
Dies ist der erste Vorschlag, nicht nur primitive Selektionsprädikate in Form von
Literalen, sondern auch komplexere Ausdrücke mit booleschen Verknüpfungen
zu verwenden. Auf die Optimierung dieser Ausdrücke wird jedoch nicht weiter
478 CHAPTER 30. EXAMPLE QUERY COMPILER

eingegangen.
Die wesentliche Aufgabe der Operatorkonstruktion ist die Auswahl der tatsächlichen
Implementierungen der Operatoren im Operatorgraph unter optimaler Aus-
nutzung gegebener Sortierreihenfolgen. Auch diese Phase der Optimierung ist
in Squiral nicht kostenbasiert. Sie wird durch zwei Durchläufe durch den Op-
eratorgraphen realisiert. Der erste Durchlauf berechnet von unten nach oben
die möglichen Sortierungen, die ohne zusätzlichen Aufwand möglich sind, da
beispielsweise Relationen schon sortiert sind, und vorhandene Sortierungen
durch Operatoren nicht zerstört werden. Im zweiten Durchlauf, von oben nach
unten, werden Umsortierungen nur dann vorgenommen, wenn keine der im er-
sten Durchlauf berechneten Sortierungen eine effiziente Implementierung des
zu konvertierenden Operators erlaubt. Beide Durchläufe sind mit Regelsätzen
spezifiziert. Es ist bemerkenswert, daß die Anzahl der Regeln, 32 für den
Aufwärtspaß und 34 für den Abwärtspaß, die Anzahl der Regeln für die Trans-
formationsphase (insgesamt 7 Regeln), bei weitem übertrifft. Auch die Kom-
plexität der Regeln ist erheblich höher.
Beide für uns interessante Phasen, die Operatorgraphtransformation und
Operatorkonstruktion, sind mit Regeln spezifiziert. Es ist jedoch in beiden
Phasen kein Suchprozeß nötig, da die Regeln alle Fälle sehr gezielt auflisten
und somit einen eindeutigen Entscheidungsbaum beschreiben. Eine noch minu-
tiösere Unterscheidung für die Erzeugung von Ausführungsplänen in der Oper-
atorkonstruktionsphase gibt es nur noch bei Yao [836]. Diese haben auch den
Vorteil, durch Kostenrechnungen belegt zu sein.
Da die Regeln in ihren Prämissen die Heuristik ihrer Anwendung mit kodieren
und keine eigene Suchfunktion zur Anwendung der Regeln existiert, ist die Er-
weiterbarkeit sehr schwierig. Das Fehlen jeglicher Kostenbewertung macht eine
Evaluation der Alternativen unmöglich. Daher ist es auch schwer, die einzel-
nen Komponenten des Optimierers, nämlich die Regeln, zu bewerten, zumal der
transformierende Ansatz gewählt wurde. Der Forderung nach Vorhersagbarkeit
und stetiger Leistungsabfall wird in diesem Ansatz ebenfalls nicht nachgegan-
gen.

30.1.17 System R and System R∗

30.1.18 Starburst and DB2
Starburst [229, 332] liegt ein erweiterbares relationales Datenmodell zugrunde.
Die Anfragebearbeitung ist wie in System R und System R* in die zwei Schritte
Anfrageübersetzung und -ausführung zergliedert [333]. Wir interessieren uns
für den ersten Schritt, die Anfrageübersetzung. Einen Überblick gibt Abbil-
dung 30.8. Nach der standardmäßigen Zerteilung liegt die Anfrage in der
internen Darstellung QGM (Query Graph Model) vor. QGM ist an die An-
fragesprache Hydrogen (ähnlich SQL) von Starburst angelehnt. Der wichtigste
Grundbaustein von QGM ist der select-Operator. Dieser enthält eine Projek-
tionsliste und das Anfrageprädikat in Graphform. Die Knoten sind markiert
und referenzieren (gespeicherte) Relationen oder weitere QGM-Operatoren. Die
Markierung ist entweder ein Quantor (∀, ∃) oder die Mengenerzeugermarkierung
30.1. RESEARCH PROTOTYPES 479
Anfrage

Zerteilung

?
Anfrage-
transformation

Planoptimierung

Planverfeinerung

?
Auswertungsplan

Figure 30.8: Starburst Optimierer

(F). Knoten, die mit F markiert sind, tragen zur Erzeugung des Ergebnisses
eines Operators bei, die Quantorenmarkierungen zu dessen Einschränkung. Die
Kanten sind mit den Prädikaten markiert. Es ergeben sich also Schleifen für nur
eine Relation betreffende Prädikate. Weitere Operatoren sind insert, update,
intersection, union und group-by. Daneben wird die QGM-Repräsentation ein-
er Anfrage mit Schemainformation und statistischen Daten angereichert. Sie
dient also auch als Sammelbecken für alle die Anfrage betreffende Information.
Die QGM-Repräsentation dient der Anfragetransformation (Abb. 30.8) als
Ausgangspunkt. Die Anfragetransformation generiert zu einer QGM-Repräsentation
verschiedene äquivalente QGM-Repräsentationen. Die Anfragetransformation
läßt sich, abgesehen von den Darstellungsunterschieden von QGM und Hydro-
gen, als eine Variante der Source-level-Transformationen ansehen. Sie wird
regelbasiert implementiert, wobei C die Regelsprache ist. Eine Regel besteht
aus 2 Teilen, einer Bedingung und einer Aktion. Jeder Teil wird durch eine
C-Prozedur beschrieben. Dadurch erübrigt sich die Implementierung eines all-
gemeinen Regelinterpreters mit Pattern-matching. Regeln können in Gruppen
zusammengefaßt werden. Der aktuelle Optimierer umfaßt drei Klassen von
Regeln:

1. Migration von Prädikaten

480 CHAPTER 30. EXAMPLE QUERY COMPILER

2. Migration von Projektionen

3. Verschmelzung von Operationen

Für die Ausführung der Regeln stehen drei verschiedene Suchstrategien zur
Verfügung:

1. sequentiell,

2. prioritätsgesteuert und

3. zufällig, gemäß einer gegebenen Verteilung.

Die Teilgraphen der QGM-Repräsentation, auf die Regeln anwendbar sind,

können entweder durch eine depth-first oder eine breadth-first Suche bestimmt
werden. Falls mehrere alternative QGM-Repräsentationen existieren (was meis-
tens der Fall ist), wird ein Choose-Operator [307] verwendet, der die verschiede-
nen QGMs in einen QGM zusammenbaut. Die nachfolgende Phase wählt dann
kostenbasiert einen dieser alternativen QGMs aus. Dies ist nicht zwingend,
die Auswahl kann auch erst zur Auswertungszeit stattfinden. Begründet wird
dieses Vorgehen damit, daß keine Kosten für QGMs berechnet werden können,
und somit keine Bewertung eines QGMs stattfinden kann. Wie die Autoren
selbst anmerken, ist dieser Umstand sehr mißlich, da keine Alternativen ver-
worfen werden können. Sie kündigen daher Untersuchungen an, die Transfor-
mation (Schritt 2) mit der Planoptimierung (Schritt 3) zu verschmelzen. Um
eine gewisse Kontrolle über das Verhalten der Transformation zu haben, kann
diesem Schritt ein “budget” mitgegeben werden, nach dessen Ablauf der Schritt
beendet wird. Die genaue Funktionsweise des “budget” ist leider nicht erläutert.
Der Schritt der Planoptimierung (s. Abb. 30.8) kann mit der bisherigen Op-
timierung verglichen werden. Sie arbeitet regelbasiert, benutzt aber nicht den
transformierenden, sondern den generierenden Ansatz [488]. Aus Basisopera-
tionen – LOLEPOPs (LOw-LEvel Plan OPerator) genannt – werden mit (gram-
matischen) Regeln – STARs (strategy alternative rules) genannt – (alternative)
Auswertungspläne erzeugt. LOLEPOPs entstammen der um SCAN, SORT
und ähnliche physische Operatoren angereicherten relationalen Algebra. Ein
Auswertungsplan ist dann ein Ausdruck von geschachtelten Funktionsaufrufen,
wobei die Funktionen den LOLEPOPs entsprechen.
Ein STAR definiert ein benanntes parametrisiertes Objekt, das einem Nicht-
terminalsymbol entspricht. Er besteht aus einer Menge von alternativen Defi-
nitionen, die jede aus einer Bedingung für die Anwendbarkeit und der Defini-
tion eines Plans bestehen. Der generierte Plan kann LOLEPOPs (entsprechen
Terminalsymbolen) und STARs referenzieren. Ein rootSTAR entspricht dem
Startsymbol der Grammatik. STARs ähneln den Regeln, die in Genesis nicht
nur für den Optimierer, sondern für das ganze DBMS eingesetzt werden, um
alternative Implementierungen zu erhalten [52, 50, 54, 53, 55]. Um erzeugte
Alternativen für einen Plan zusammenzusetzen und zu verhindern, daß diese
Alternativen die Anzahl der Pläne in denen diese vorkommen, vervielfachen,
wird ein Glue-Mechanismus eingesetzt. Dieser hat den Choose-Operator als
Wurzel. Darunter hängen dann Alternativen, die beispielsweise einen Strom
30.1. RESEARCH PROTOTYPES 481

Alternative
deklarative normalisierter Objektalgebra- typkonsistenter optimierter Ausf”uhrungs-
Anfrage Kalk”ulausdruck ausdruck Ausdruck Algebraausdruck pl”ane

Übers. von Generierung

?
- Übers. in ?
- Kalk”ul in ?
- Typ- - Algebra-
? -Ausf”uhrungs- ?
? -
Kalk”ul Algebra ”uberpr”ufung optimierung plan

Figure 30.9: Der Optimierer von Straube

mit gewissen Eigenschaften (Sortierung, Lokation) erzeugen. Von diesen Alter-

nativen werden nur diejenigen betrachten, die die geringsten Kosten bei gleichen
Eigenschaften haben [463]. Die Kosten beziehen sich dabei immer nur auf den
bisher erreichten Teilplan.
Der Aufbau eines Auswertungsplanes erfolgt Bottom-up. Die Menge der
anwendbaren STARs wird in einer ToDo-Liste gehalten. Diese ist eine sortierte
Liste. Hiermit können dann verschiedene Suchstrategien implementiert werden,
indem verschiedene Sortierungen für die ToDo-Liste Verwendung finden [463].
Ein Vorteil des STAR-Ansatzes ist die Vermeidung von Pattern-matching. Dies
erlaubt es, die STARs zu interpretieren [463].
Die Beurteilung der Erweiterbarkeit ist sehr schwierig. Zum einen handelt es
sich um einen erweiterbaren Optimierer, da sowohl LOLEPOPs als auch STARs
hinzugefügt werden können. Der Glue-Mechanismus kann ebenfalls spezifiziert
werden, ohne in die Implementierung einzugreifen. Das Problem ist lediglich
die Komplexität dieser Änderungen. Man kann diesen Ansatz daher vielleicht
als bedingt erweiterbar kennzeichnen.
Eine Trennung der Optimierung in verschiedene Phasen wirft die damit
verbundenen Probleme auf. Wie oben bereits angeführt, kündigen die Autoren
weitere Untersuchungen an, um eine Verschmelzung der Phasen zu ermöglichen.
Da keine Alternativen verworfen werden, ist es potentiell möglich, den opti-
malen Auswertungsplan zu errechnen. Schwer zu sehen ist jedoch, wie ein
stetiger Leistungsabfall zu realisieren ist. Gleiches gilt für die Evaluierbarkeit
der einzelnen Komponenten (STARs).
More on Starburst can be found in [586, 587].

30.1.19 Der Optimierer von Straube

In seiner Dissertation stellt Straube den von ihm entwickelten Optimierer dar
[739]. Die Ergebnisse dieser Arbeit flossen in eine Reihe von Veröffentlichungen
ein [769, 736, 737, 735, 738]. Der Aufbau des Optimierers ist in Abbildung 30.9
skizziert. Eine Anfrage wird zunächst in den Objektkalkül übersetzt und von
dort in die Objektalgebra. Hier findet dann zunächst eine Typüberprüfung
statt. Danach beginnt die eigentliche Optimierung. Diese besteht aus zwei
Phasen, der algebraischen Optimierung und der Generierung des Ausführungsplans.
Die erste Phase, die algebraische Optimierung, folgt dem Tranformation-
sparadigma. Die algebraischen Ausdrücke werden mit Hilfe von Regeln in
482 CHAPTER 30. EXAMPLE QUERY COMPILER

äquivalente algebraische Ausdrücke transformiert. Straube beschränkt sich

dabei im wesentlichen auf die Formulierung der Regeln. Für die Abarbeitung
der Regeln schlägt er lediglich die Verwendung des Exodus-Optimierergenerators
[303] oder des Anfrageumformers von Starburst [352] vor.
Die zweite Phase, die Generierung der Ausführungspläne, ist nicht regel-
basiert. Ihr liegt eine sogenannte Ausführungsplanschablone zu Grunde. Sie ist
vergleichbar mit einem Und/Oder-Baum, der alle möglichen Ausführungspläne
implizit beinhaltet. Zur Generierung eines konkreten Ausführungsplans wird
der durch die Ausführungsschablone aufgespannte Suchraum vollständig durch-
sucht. Der billigste Ausführungsplan kommt dann zur Abarbeitung.
Da ein regelbasierten Ansatz für die erste Phase gewählt wurde und die Ver-
wendung des Exodus-Optimierergenerators oder des Starburst-Anfrageumformers
vorgeschlagen wird, verweisen wir für die Bewertung dieser Phase auf die entsprechen-
den Abschnitte.
Die zweite Phase ist voll auskodiert und damit schlecht erweiterbar. Eine
frühe Bewertung der Alternativen ist nicht ausgeschlossen, wird aber nicht
vorgenommen. Ein vollständiges Durchsuchen verhindert natürlich auch den
stetigen Leistungsabfall des Optimierers.
Erschwerend für den gewählten Ansatz kommt die Zweiphasigkeit hinzu.
Es ist schwierig zu sehen, wie eine phasenübergreifende Kontrolle auszusehen
hat, die zumindest potentiell Optimalität gewährleistet. Die Evaluierbarkeit
einzelner Komponenten des Optimierers ist nicht möglich.

30.1.20 Other Query Optimizer

Neben den in den vorangehenden Abschnitten erwähnten Optimierern gibt es
noch eine ganze Reihe anderer, die aber nicht im einzelnen vorgestellt werden
sollen. Erwähnt werden sollen noch die Systeme Probe [191, 190, 555] und
Prima [348, 346]. Der Schwerpunkt bei der Optimierung liegt im Primasys-
tem auf dem dynamischen Zusammenbau von Molekülen. Es wäre zu unter-
suchen, ob ein Assembly-Operator (s. [412]) hier von Nutzen wäre. Beson-
ders erwähnenswert ist noch eine Arbeit, die Optimierungsmöglichkeiten für
die Datenbankprogrammiersprache FAD vorstellt [774]. Diese Arbeit stellt
einen ersten Schritt in Richtung eines Optimierers für eine General-purpose-
Programmiersprache dar. Ein wesentlicher Punkt ist dabei, daß auch ändernde
Operationen optimiert werden. Der Optimierer ist in zwei Module (RWR and
OPT) eingeteilt. RWR ist ein Sprachmodul, das die Übersetzung von FAD in
ein internes FAD vornimmt. Immer wenn RWR einen Ausdruck erkennt, der
in der vom Optimierer OPT bearbeitbaren Sprache ausgedrückt werden kann,
so wird dieser an den Optimierer weitergegeben und dort optimiert. Es wird
Exhaustive search als Suchstrategie für den Optimierer vorgeschlagen.
Im erweiterten O2 -Kontext wurde das Zerteilen von Pfadausdrücken weit-
er untersucht [159]. Es werden die Vorteile einer typisierten Algebra für diese
Zwecke herausgearbeitet. Eine graphische Notation sorgt für eine anschauliche
Darstellung. Ihr besonderes Augenmerk richten die Autoren auf die Faktorisierung
gemeinsamer Teilausdrücke. Einige der Ersetzungsregeln sind aus [693] und
[692] entnommen und werden gewinnbringend eingesetzt, so beispielsweise die
30.1. RESEARCH PROTOTYPES 483

Ersetzung von Selektionen durch Verbundoperatoren.

Ebenfalls erwähnt wurden bereits die Arbeiten im Orion-Kontext [45, 46,
423], die sich auf die Behandlung von Pfadausdrücken konzentrieren. Auch hier
wurde ein funktionsfähiger Optimierer entwickelt.
Wie bereits erwähnt, stammt der erste regelbasierte Optimierer von Smith
und Chang [714]. Doch erst die neueren Arbeiten führten zu einer Blüte
des regelbasierten Ansatzes. Hier ist insbesondere die Arbeit von Freytag zu
erwähnen, die diese Blüte mit initiierte [251]. Dort wird gezeigt, wie man mit
Hilfe eines regelbasierten Ansatzes den Optimierer von System R [672] emulieren
kann. Die Eingabe besteht aus einem Lisp-ähnlichen Ausdruck:
(select <proj-list>
<sel-pred-list>
<join-pred-list>
<table-list>)
Die Projektionsliste besteht aus Attributspezifikationen der Form
<rel-name>.<attr-name>
Diese werden auch für die Selektionsprädikate und Joinprädikate verwendet.
Die Algebra beinhaltet sowohl Operatoren der logischen als auch der physischen
Algebra. Im einzelnen gibt es Scan-, Sort-, Projektions, Verbundoperatoren in
einer logischen und verschiedenen physischen Ausprägungen. Die Erzeugung
der Auswertungspläne wird in verschiedene Schritte unterteilt, die wiederum in
Teilschritte zerlegt sind (siehe Abb. 30.3).
Zunächst erfolgt die Übersetztung in die logische Algebra. Hier werden
Scan-Operatoren um die Relationen gebaut und Selektionen, die nur eine Re-
lation betreffen, in die Scan-Operatoren eingebaut. Der zweite Schritt gener-
iert Zugriffspläne, indem der Scan-Operator durch einen einfachen File-Scan
(FSCAN) ersetzt wird oder falls möglich, durch einen Index-Scan (ISCAN).
Der dritte Schritt generiert zunächst verschiedene Verbundreihenfolgen und
bestimmt anschließend die Verbundmethoden. Wie in System R wird zwis-
chen dem Sortiere-und-Mische-Verbund und dem Verbund durch geschachtelte
Schleifen unterschieden. Es werden keinerlei Aussagen über die Auswahl einer
Suchstrategie gemacht. Ziel ist es vielmehr, durch die Modellierung des System
R Optimierers mit Hilfe eines Regelsystems die prinzipielle Brauchbarkeit des
regelbasierten Ansatzes nachzuweisen.
Man beachte auch die erwähnte Arbeit von Sciore und Sieg zur Modular-
isierung von regelbasierten Optimierern [668]. Die Hauptidee von Sciore und
Sieg ist es, die Regelmenge in Module zu organisieren und jedem Modul eine
eigene Suchstrategie, Kostenberechnung und Regelmenge zuzuordnen. Mod-
ule können andere Module explizit aufrufen oder implizit ihre Ausgabemenge
an das nächste Modul weiterleiten. Der erste Optimierer des GOM-Systems
ist ebenfalls regelbasiert [415, 414]. Die gesamte Regelmenge wurde hier in
Teilmengen ähnlich zu den Modulen organisiert. Die Steuerung zwischen den
Teilmengen erfolgt durch ein heuristisches Netz, das angibt in welchen Fällen zu
welcher weiteren Teilmenge von Regeln zu verzweigen ist. Die Strukturierung
des Optimiererwissens steht auch in [498] im Vordergrund.
484 CHAPTER 30. EXAMPLE QUERY COMPILER

In diesem Zusammenhang, der Strukturierung von Optimierern und der

Wiederverwendbarkeit einzelner Teile, sei noch einmal ausdrücklich auf die
Arbeiten von Batory [53] aus dem Genesiskontext hingewiesen (s. auch Ab-
schnitt 30.1.7). Der dort leider ein wenig zu kurz kommende Aspekt der
Wiederverwendbarkeit von Suchfunktionen wird in einer Arbeit von Lanzelotte
und Valduriez [452] ausführlicher behandelt. Hier wurde eine Typhierarchie ex-
istierender Suchfunktionen entworfen und deren Schnittstellen vereinheitlicht.
Die Suchfunktionen selbst wurden modularisiert. Weitere Arbeiten aus der-
selben Gruppe beschäftigen sich mit der Optimierung von objektorientierten
Anfragen [451, 455], wobei hier die Behandlung von Pfaden im Vordergrund
steht. Eine neuere Arbeit beschäftigt sich mit der Optimierung von rekursiven
Anfragen im objektorientierten Kontext [453].
Viele kommerzielle Systeme besitzen eine Anfragesprache und einen Opti-
mierer. Einer der wenigen Optimierer, die auch in der Literatur beschrieben
werden, ist der von ObjectStore [554]. Durch die einfache Anfragesprache,
die nur Teilmengenbestimmung erlaubt, und die strikte Verwendung von C-
Semantik für boolesche Ausdrücke sind die meisten Optimierungsmöglichkeiten
jedoch ausgeschlossen, und der “Optimierer” ist daher sehr einfach.

30.2 Commercial Query Compiler

30.2.1 The DB 2 Query Compiler
30.2.2 The Oracle Query Compiler
Oracle still provides two modes for its optimizer. Dependent on the user spec-
ified optimizer mode, a query is optimized either by the rule-based optimizer
(RBO) or by the cost-based optimizer (CBO). The RBO is a heuristic optimizer
that resembles the simple optimizer of chapter 2. Here we concentrate on the
more powerful CBO. The user can also determine whether the optimizer should
optimize for throughput or response time.

• nested loop join, nested loop outer join, index nested loop joins, sort merge
join, sort merge outer join, hash joins, hash outer join, cartesian join, full
outer join, cluster join, anti-joins, semi-joins, uses bitmap indexes for star
queries

• sort group-by,

• bitmap indexes, bitmap join indexes

• index skip scans

• partitioned tables and indexes

• index-organized tables

• reverse key indexes

• function-based indexes
30.2. COMMERCIAL QUERY COMPILER 485

• SAMPLE clause in SELECT statement

• parallel query and parallel DML

• star transformations and star joins

• query rewrite with materialized views

• cost: considers CPU, I/O, memory

• access path: table scan, fast full index scan, index scan, ROWID scans
(access ROW by ROWID), cluster scans, hash scans. [former two with
prefetching] index scans:

– index unique scan (UNIQUE or PRIMARY KEY constraints)

– index range scan (one or more leading columns or key)
– index range scan descending
– index skip scan (> 1 leading key values not given)
– index full scan, index fast full scan
– index joins (joins indexes with hash join, resembles index anding)
– bitmap joins (index anding/oring)
– cluster scan: for indexed cluster to retrieve rows with the same clus-
ter id
– hash scan: to locate rows in a hash cluster

CBO: parsed quer –¿ [query transformer] –¿ [estimator] –¿ [plan generator]

1-16.
after parser: nested query blocks
simple rewrites:

• eliminate between

• elminate x in (c1 . . . cn) (also uses IN-LIST iterator as outer table con-
structor in a d-join or nested-loop join like operation.

query transformer:

• view merging

• predicate pushing

• subquery unnesting

• query rewrite using materialized views (cost based)

remaining subplans for nested query blocks are ordered in an efficient manner
plan generator:

• choose access path, join order (upper limit on number of permutations

considered), join method.
486 CHAPTER 30. EXAMPLE QUERY COMPILER

• generate subplan for every block in a bottom-up fashion

• (> 1 for still nested queries and unmerged views)

• stop generating more plans if there already exists a cheap plan

• starting plan: order by their effective cardinality

• considers normally only left-deep (zig-zag) trees.

• single row joins are placed first (based on unique and key constraints.

• join statement with outer join: table with outer join operator must come
after the other table in the condition in the join order. optimizer does
not consider join orders that violate this rule.

• NOT IN (SELECT . . . ) becomes a anti-join that is executed as a nested-

loop join by default unless hints are given and various conditions are met
which allow the transformation of the NOT IN uncorrelated subquery into
a sort-merge or hash anti-join.

• EXISTS (SELECT . . . ) becomes a semi-join. execution as index nested

loops, if there is an index. otherwise a nested-loop join is used by default
for EXISTS and IN subqueries that cannot be merged with the containing
query unless a hint specifies otherwise and conditions are met to allos the
transformation of the subquery into a sort-merge or hash semi-join.

• star query detection

cost:
• takes unique/key constraints into consideration

• low/high values and uniform distribution

• host variables: guess small selectivity value to favor index access

• histograms

• common subexpression optimization

• complex view merging

• push-join predicate

• bitmap access paths for tables with only B-tree indexes

• subquery unnesting

• index joins
rest:

• Oracle allows user hints in SQL statements to influence the Optimizer.

for example join methods can be given explicitly
30.2. COMMERCIAL QUERY COMPILER 487

parameters:

• HASH AREA SIZE

• SORT AREA SIZE

• DB FILE MULTIBLOCK READ COUNT (number of prefetched pages)

statistics:

• table statistics
number of rows, number of blocks, average row length

• column statistics
number of distinct values, number of nulls, data distribution

• index statistics
number of keys, (from column statistics?) number of leaf blocks, levels,
clustering factor (collocation amount of the index block/data blocks, 3-17)

• system statistics
I/O performance and utilization, cpu performance and utilization

generating statistics:

• estimation based on random data sampling

(row sampling, block sampling)

• exact computation

• user-defined statistics collection methods

histograms:

• height-based histograms (approx. equal number of values per bucket)

• value-based histograms
used for number of distinct values ≤ number of buckets

• support of index-only queries

• index-organized tables

• bitmap indexes (auch fuer null-werte x <> const)

• convert b-tree result RID lists to bitmaps for further bitmap anding

• bitmaps and count

• bitmap join index

• cluster tables (cluster rows of different tables on the same block)

• hash clusters
488 CHAPTER 30. EXAMPLE QUERY COMPILER

• hint: USE CONCAT: OR ::= UNION ALL

• hint: STAR TRANSFORMATION: see Oracle9i Database Concepts

• NOT IN ::= anti-join

• EXISTS ::= special join preserving duplicates and adding no phantom

duplicates (semi-join) (5-27)

• continue 5-35

30.2.3 The SQL Server Query Compiler

 Part VI

Selected Topics

489
Chapter 31

Generating Plans for

Top-N-Queries?

31.1 Motivation and Introduction

motivation:

• first by user (ordered)

• optimize for n rows (user/cursor)

• exist(subquery) optimize for 1 row

• having count(*) <= n

31.2 Optimizing for the First Tuple

31.3 Optimizing for the First N Tuples

• nl-join instead of sm/hash join

• index access over table scan

• disable prefetching

[104, 105, 106] [124, 211] [230, 231, 372] [477]

[324] (also contains inverted list algorithms under frequent updates)
[477]

491
492 CHAPTER 31. GENERATING PLANS FOR TOP-N-QUERIES?
Chapter 32

Recursive Queries

493
494 CHAPTER 32. RECURSIVE QUERIES
Chapter 33

Issues Introduced by OQL

33.1 Type-Based Rewriting and Pointer Chasing Elim-

ination
The first rewrite technique especially tailored for the object-oriented context is
type-based rewriting. Consider the query

select distinct sn, ssn, ssa

from s in Student

PROJECT [sn, sa, ssn, ssa]

SELECT [sg >8 and ssa <30]

EXPAND [sn:s.name, sg:s.gpa, ss:s.supervisor]

EXPAND [ssn:ss.name, ssa:ss.age]

SCAN [s:student]

Figure 33.1: Algebraic representation of a query

495
496 CHAPTER 33. ISSUES INTRODUCED BY OQL

where sg > 8 and ssa < 30

define sn = s.name
sg = s.gpa
ss = s.supervisor
ssn= ss.name
ssa= ss.age

The algebraic expression in Fig. 33.1 implies a scan of all students and a sub-
sequent dereferentiation of the supervisor attribute in order to access the su-
pervisors. If not all supervisors fit into main memory, this may result in many
page accesses. Further, if there exists an index on the supervisor’s age, and
the selection condition ssa < 30 is highly selective, the index should be applied
in order to retrieve only those supervisors required for answering the query.
Type-based rewriting enables this kind of optimization. For any expression of
certain type with an associated extent, the extent is introduced in the from
clause. For our query this results in

select distinct sn, pn, pa

from s in Student, p in Professor
where sg > 8 and pa < 30 and ss = p
define sn = s.name
sg = s.gpa
ss = s.supervisor
pn = ss.name
pa = ss.age

As a side-effect, the attribute traversal from students via supervisor to professor

is replaced by a join. Now, join-ordering allows for several new plans that could
not be investigated otherwise. For example, we could exploit the above men-
tioned index to retrieve the young professors and join them with the students
having a gpa greater than 8. The according plan is given in Fig. 33.2. Turning
implicit joins or pointer chasing into explicit joins which can be freely reordered
is an original query optimization technique for object-oriented queries. Note
that the plan generation component is still allowed to turn the explicit join into
an implicit join again.
Consider the query

select distinct p
from p in Professor
where p.room.number = 209

Straight forward evaluation of this query would scan all professors. For every
professor, the room relationship would be traversed to find the room where the
professor resides. Last, the room’s number would be retrieved and tested to be
209. Using the inverse relationship, the query could as well be rewritten to
33.2. CLASS HIERARCHIES 497

PROJECT [sn, pn, pa]

JOIN [ss=p]

SELECT [sg>8] SELECT [pa<30]

EXPAND [sg:s.gpa EXPAND [pa:p.age, pn:p.name]

ss:s.supervisor
sn:s.name]

Student [s] Professor [p]

Figure 33.2: A join replacing pointer chasing

select distinct r.occupiedBy

from r in Room
where r.number = 209

The evaluation of this query can be much more efficient, especially if there
exists an index on the room number. Rewriting queries by exploiting inverse
relationships is another rewrite technique to be applied during Rewrite Phase
I.

33.2 Class Hierarchies

Another set of equivalences known from the relational context involves the
UNION operator (∪) and plays a vital role in dealing with class/extent hier-
archies. Consider the simple class hierarchy given in Figure 33.3. Obviously,
for the user, it must appear that the extent of Employee contains all Manag-
er s. However, the system has different alternatives to implement extents. Most
OBMSs organize an object base into areas or volumes. Each area or volume is
then further organized into several files. A file is a logical grouping of objects
not necessarily consisting of subsequent physical pages on disk. Files don’t
share pages.
The simplest possible implementation to scan all objects belonging to a cer-
tain extent is to perform an area scan and select those objects belonging to the
extent in question. Obviously, this is far to expensive. Therefore, some more so-
498 CHAPTER 33. ISSUES INTRODUCED BY OQL

Employee name: string

salary: int
6 boss: Manager

Manager
boss: CEO
6

CEO

Figure 33.3: A Sample Class Hierarchy

phisticated possibilities to realize extents and scans over them are needed. The
different possible implementations can be classified along two dimensions. The
first dimension distinguishes between logical and physical extents, the second
distinguishes between strict and (non-strict) extents.

Logical vs. Physical Extents

An extent can be realized as a collection of object identifiers. A scan over
the extent is then implemented by a scan over all the object identifiers
contained in the collection. Subsequently, the object identifiers are deref-
erenced to yield the objects themselves. This approach leads to logical
extents. Another possibility is to implement extent membership by phys-
ical containment. The best alternative is to store all objects of an extent
in a file. This results in physical extents. A scan over a physical extent is
then implemented by a file scan.
Extents vs. Strict Extents
A strict extent contains the objects (or their OIDs) of a class excluding
those of its subclasses. A non-strict extent contains the objects of a class
and all objects of its subclasses.
Given a class C, any strict extent of a subclass C 0 of C is called a subextent
of C.

Obviously, the two classifications are orthogonal. Applying them both re-
sults in the four possibilities presented graphically in Fig. 33.4. [166] strongly
argues that strict extents are the method of choice. The reason is that only
this way the query optimizer might exploit differences for extents. For example,
there might be an index on the age of Manager but not for Employee. This
difference can only be exploited for a query including a restriction on age, if we
have strict extents.
However, strict extents result in initial query plans including UNION oper-
ators. Consider the query
select e
from e in Employee
where e.salary > 100.000
33.3. CARDINALITIES AND COST FUNCTIONS 499

C: {id1 } C: {id1 }
logical

C1 : {id2 } C2 : {id3 } C1 : {id1 , id2 } {id1 , id3 }

C: ob1 C: ob1
physical
C1 : ob2 C2 : ob3 C1 : ob1 , ob2 C2 : ob1 , ob3

excluding including

Figure 33.4: Implementation of Extents

The initial plan is

σsa>100.000 (χsa:x.salary ((Employee[x] ∪ M anager[x]) ∪ CEO[x]))

Hence, algebraic equivalences are needed to reorder UNION operators with

other algebraic operators. The most important equivalences are

e1 ∪ e2 ≡ e2 ∪ e1 (33.1)
e1 ∪ (e2 ∪ e3 ) ≡ (e1 ∪ e2 ) ∪ e3 (33.2)
σp (e1 ∪ e2 ) ≡ σp (e1 ) ∪ σp (e2 ) (33.3)
χa:e (e1 ∪ e2 ) ≡ χa:e (e1 ) ∪ χa:e (e2 ) (33.4)
(e1 ∪ e2 ) 1p e3 ≡ (e1 1p e3 ) ∪ (e2 1p e3 ) (33.5)

Equivalences containing the UNION operator sometimes involve tricky typing

constraints. These go beyond the current chapter and the reader is refered to
[526].

33.3 Cardinalities and Cost Functions

500 CHAPTER 33. ISSUES INTRODUCED BY OQL
Chapter 34

Issues Introduced by XPath

34.1 A Naive XPath-Interpreter and its Problems

34.2 Dynamic Programming and Memoization

[285, 287, 286]

34.3 Naive Translation of XPath to Algebra

34.4 Pushing Duplicate Elimination

34.5 Avoiding Duplicate Work

34.6 Avoiding Duplicate Generation

[357]

34.7 Index Usage and Materialized Views

[43]

34.8 Cardinalities and Costs

34.9 Bibliography

501
502 CHAPTER 34. ISSUES INTRODUCED BY XPATH
Chapter 35

Issues Introduced by XQuery

35.1 Reordering in Ordered Context

35.2 Result Construction

[242, 243] [687]

35.3 Unnesting Nested XQueries

Unnesting with error: [572]
[508, 510, 509, 511]

35.4 Cardinalities and Cost Functions

cardinality: [142, 818, 819, 651] [7]
XPathLearner: [483]
Polyzotis et al (XSKETCH): [592, 593, 590], [594]

35.5 Bibliography
[512] [765] [199]
Numbering: [241] Timber [392] TAX Algebra [393], physical algebra of Tim-
ber [573]
Structural Joins [21, 716]
SAL: [63], TAX: [393], XAL: [249]

• XML Statistics for hidden web: [8]

• XPath selectivity for internet scale: [7]

• StatiX: [250]

• IMAX: incremental statistics [606]

• Metrics for XML Document Collections: [428]

503
504 CHAPTER 35. ISSUES INTRODUCED BY XQUERY

• output size containment join: [788]

• Bloom Histogram: [789]

View and XML: [2]

Quilt: [116]
Timber: [392] Monet: [663] Natix: NoK: [845]
Correlated XPath: [846]
Wood: [810, 811, 812]
Path based approach to Storage (XRel): [839]
Grust: [317, 319, 318, 320, 758]
Liefke: Loop fusion etc.: [482]
Benchmarking: XMach-1: [83], MBench: [641] XBench: [566, 831, 832],
XMark: [664] XOO7: [91]
Rewriting: [203, 309, 310]
[202, 368]
Incremental Schema Validation: [87, 571]
Franklin (filtering): [206]
Chapter 36

Outlook

What we did not talk about: multiple query optimization, semantic query
optimization, special techniques for optimization in OBMSs, multi-media data
bases, object-relational databases, spatial databases, temporal databases, and
query optimization for parallel and distributed database systems.

Multi Query Optimization? [675]

Parametric/Dynamic/Adaptive Query Optimization? [30, 31, 32, 28,

307, 300] [388, 389, 405, 770]
[40]

Parallel Database Systems?

Distributed Database Systems? [439]

Recursive Queries?

Multi Database Systems?

Temporal Database Systems?

Spatial Database Systems?

Translation of Triggers and Updates?

Online Queries (Streams)?

Approximate Answers? [278]

505
506 CHAPTER 36. OUTLOOK
Appendix A

Query Languages?

A.1 Designing a query language

requirements
design principles for object-oriented query languages: [367] [74]

A.2 SQL

A.3 OQL

A.4 XPath

A.5 XQuery

A.6 Datalog

507
508 APPENDIX A. QUERY LANGUAGES?
Appendix B

Query Execution Engine (?)

• Overview Books: [347, 270]

• Overview: Graefe [294, 295]

• Implementation of Division [291, 299, 301]

• Implementation of Division and set-containment joins [603]

• Hash vs. Sort: [296, 304]

• Heap-Filter Merge Join: [293]

• Hash-Teams

509
510 APPENDIX B. QUERY EXECUTION ENGINE (?)
Appendix C

Glossary of Rewrite and

Optimization Techniques

trivopt Triviale Auswertungen bspw. solche für widersprüchliche Prädikate

werden sofort vorgenommen. Dies ist eine Optimierungstechnik, die oft
bereits auf der Quellebene durchgeführt wird.

pareval Falls ein Glied einer Konjunktion zu false evaluiert, werden die restlichen
Glieder nicht mehr evaluiert. Dies ergibt sich automatisch durch die Ver-
wendung von hintereinanderausgeführten Selektionen.

pushnot Falls ein Prädikat die Form ¬(p1 ∧ p2 ) hat, so ist pareval nicht an-
wendbar. Daher werden Negationen nach innen gezogen. Auf ¬p1 ∨ ¬p2
ist pareval dann wieder anwendbar. Das Durchschieben von Negationen
ist auch im Kontext von NULL-Werten unabdingbar für die Korrektheit.
Dies ist eine Optimierungstechnik, die oft bereits auf der Quellebene
durchgeführt wird.

bxp Verallgemeinert man die in pareval und notpush angesprochene Prob-

lematik, so führt dies auf die Optimierung von allgemeinen booleschen
Prädikaten.

trans Durch Ausnutzen der Transitivität von Vergleichsoperationen können

neue Selektionsprädikate gewonnen und Konstanten propagiert werden.
Diese Optimierungstechnik erweitert den Suchraum und wird ebenfalls auf
der Quellebene durchgeführt. Bei manchen Systemen wir dieser Schritt
nicht durchgeführt, falls sehr viele Relationen zu joinen sind, um den
Suchraum nicht noch weiter zu vergrößern [275, 276].

selpush Selektionen werden so früh wie möglich durchgeführt. Diese Technik

führt nicht immer zu optimalen Auswertungsplänen und stellt somit eine
Heuristik dar. Diese Optimierungstechnik schränkt den Suchraum ein.

projpush Die Technik zur Behandlung von Projektionen ist nicht ganz so ein-
fach wie die der Selektion. Zu unterscheiden ist hier, ob es sich um eine
Projektion mit Duplikateliminierung handelt oder nicht. Je nach dem

511
512APPENDIX C. GLOSSARY OF REWRITE AND OPTIMIZATION TECHNIQUES

ist es sinnvoll, die Projektion zur Wurzel des Operatorgraphen zu ver-

schieben oder zu den Blättern hin. Die Projektion verringert den Spe-
icherbedarf von Zwischenergebnissen, da die Tupel weniger Attribute en-
thalten. Handelt es sich um eine duplikateliminierende Projektion, so wird
möglicherweise auch die Anzahl der Tupel verringert. Duplikatelimina-
tion als solche ist aber eine sehr teure Operation. Diese wird üblicherweise
durch Sortieren implementiert. Bei großen Datenmengen gibt es allerdings
bessere Alternativen. Auch Hash-basierte Verfahren eignen sich zur Du-
plikateliminierung. Diese Optimierungstechnik schränkt den Suchraum
ein.

grouppush Pushing a grouping operation past a join can lead to better plans.

crossjoin Ein Kreuzprodukt, das von einer Selektion gefolgt wird, wird wenn
immer möglich in eine Verbundoperation umgewandelt. Diese Optimierung-
stechnik schränkt den Suchraum ein, da Pläne mit Kreuzprodukten ver-
mieden werden.

nocross Kreuzprodukte werden wenn immer möglich vermieden oder, wenn

dies nicht möglich ist, erst so spät wie möglich durchgeführt. Diese
Technik verringert den Suchraum, führt aber nicht immer zu optimalen
Auswertungsplänen.

semjoin Eine Verbundoperation kann durch eine Semiverbundoperation erset-

zt werden, wenn nur die Attribute einer Relation weitere Verwendung
finden.

joinor Die Auswertungsreihenfolge von Verbundoperationen ist kritisch. Da-

her wurden eine Reihe von Verfahren entwickelt, die optimale oder quasi-
optimale Reihenfolge von Verbundoperationen zu bestimmen. Oft wird
dabei der Suchraum auf Listen von Verbundoperationen beschränkt. Die
Motivation hierbei ist das Verkleinern des Suchraums und die Beschränkung
auf nur eine zu erzeugenden Zwischenrelation. Dieses Verfahren garantiert
nicht mehr ein optimales Ergebnis.

joinpush Tables that are guaranteed to produce a single tuple are always
pushed to be joined first. This reduces the search space. The single tuple
condition can be evaluated by determining whether all key attributes of
a relation are fully qualified. [275, 276].

elimredjoin Eliminate redundant join operations. See Sections. . . XXX

indnest Eine direkte Evaluierung von geschachtelten Anfragen wird durch

geschachtelte Schleifen vorgenommen. Dabei wird eine Unteranfrage für
jede erzielte Bindung der äußeren Anfrage evaluiert. Dies erfordert quadratis-
chen Aufwand und ist deshalb sehr ineffizient. Falls die innere Anfrage
unabhängig von der äußeren Anfrage evaluiert werden kann, so wird diese
herausgezogen und getrennt evaluiert. Weitere Optimierungen geschachtel-
ter Anfragen sind möglich.
 513

unnest Entschachtelung von Anfragen [161, 162, 268, 424, 429, 430, 586, 719,
721, 722]

compop Oft ist es sinnvoll, mehrere Operationen zu einer komplexeren zusam-

menzufassen. Beispielsweise können zwei hintereinander ausgeführte Se-
lektionen durch eine Selektion mit einem komplexeren Prädikat ersetzt
werden. Ebenso kann auch das Zusammenfassen von Verbundoperatio-
nen, Selektionen und Projektionen sinnvoll sein.

comsubexpr Gemeinsame Teilausdrücke werden nur einfach evaluiert. Hierunter

fallen zum einen Techniken, die das mehrmalige Lesen vom Hintergrund-
speicher verhindern, und zum anderen Techniken, die Zwischenergebnisse
von Teilausdrücken materialisieren. Letzteres sollte nur dann angewen-
det werden, falls die k-malige Auswertung teurer ist als das einmalige
Auswerten und das Erzeugen des Ergebnisses mit k-maligem Lesen, wobei
k die Anzahl der Vorkommen im Plan ist.

dynminmax Dynamisch gewonnene Minima und Maxima von Attributwerten

können für die Erzeugung von zusätzlichen Restriktionen herangezogen
werden. Diese Technik funktioniert auch sehr gut für unkorrelierte An-
fragen. Dabei werden min- und max-Werte herangezogen um zusätzliche
Restriktionen für die Anfrage zu gewinnen. [429, 275, 276]

pma Predicate Move around moves predicates between queries and subqueries.
Mostly they are duplicated in order to yield as many restrictions in a block
as possible [474]. As a special case, predicates will be pushed into view
definitions if they have to be materialized temporarily [275, 276].

exproj For subqueries with exist prune unnecessary entries in the select clause.
The intention behind is that attributes projected unnecessarily might in-
fluence the optimizer’s decision on the optimal access path [275, 276].

vm View merging expands the view definition within the query such that is
can be optimized together with the query. Thereby, duplicate accesses to
the view are resolved by different copies of the views definition in order
to facilitate unnesting [275, 276, 586].

inConstSet2Or A predicate of the form x ∈ {a1 , . . . , an } is transformed into

a sequence of disjunctions x = a1 ∨ . . . ∨ x = an if the ai are constants in
order to allow index or-ing (TID list operations or bitvector operations)
[275, 276].

like1 If the like predicate does not start with %, then a prefix index can be
used.

like2 The pattern is analyzed to see whether a range of values can be extracted
such that the pattern does not have to be evaluated on all tuples. The
result is either a pretest or an index access. [275, 276].

like3 Special indexes supporting like predicates are introduced.

514APPENDIX C. GLOSSARY OF REWRITE AND OPTIMIZATION TECHNIQUES

sort Vorhandene Sortierungen können für verschiedene Operatoren ausgenutzt

werden. Falls keine Sortierung vorhanden ist, kann es sinnvoll sein, diese
zu erzeugen [709]. Z.B. aufeinanderfolgende joins, joins und gruppierun-
gen. Dabei kann man die Gruppierungsattribute permutieren, um sie mit
einer gegebenen Sortierreihenfolge in Einklang zu bringen [275, 276].

aps Zugriffspfade werden eingesetzt, wann immer dies gewinnbringend möglich

ist. Beispielsweise kann die Anfrage

select count(*) from R;

durch einen Indexscan effizient ausgewertet werden [145].

tmpidx Manchmal kann es sinnvoll sein, temporäre Zugriffspfade anzulegen.

optimpl Für algebraische Operatoren existieren im allgemeinen mehrere Im-

plementierungen. Es sollte hier immer die für einen Operator im vorliegen-
den Fall billigste Lösung ausgewählt werden. Ebenfalls von Bedeutung ist
die Darstellung des Zwischenergebnisses. Beispielsweise können Relatio-
nen explizit oder implizit dargestellt werden, wobei letztere Darstellung
nur Zeiger auf Tupel oder Surrogate der Tupel enthält. Weitergedacht
führt diese Technik zu den TID-Listen-basierten Operatoren.

setpipe Die Evaluation eines algebraischen Ausdrucks kann entweder mengenori-

entiert oder nebenläufig (pipelining) erfolgen. Letzteres erspart das Erzeu-
gen von großen Zwischenergebnissen.

tmplay Das temporäre Ändern eines Layouts eines Objektes kann durchaus
sinnvoll sein, wenn die Kosten, die durch diese Änderung entstehen, durch
den Gewinn der mehrmaligen Verwendung dieses Layouts mehr als kom-
pensiert werden. Ein typisches Beispiel ist Pointer-swizzling.

matSubQ If a query is not unnested, then for every argument combination

passed to the subquery, the result is materialized in order to avoid du-
plicate computation of the same subquery expression for the same argu-
ment combination [275, 276]. This technique is favorable for detachment
[734, 808, 840]

AggrJoin Joins with non-equi join predicates based on ≤ or <, can be pro-
cessed more efficiently than by a cross product with a subsequent selection
[164].

ClassHier Class hierarchies involve the computation of queries over a union

of extents (if implemented that way). Pushing algebraic operations past
unions allows often for more efficient plans [166].

AggrIDX Use an index to determine aggregate values like min/max/avg/count.

rid/tidsort When several tuples qualify during an index scan, the resulting
TIDs can be sorted in order to guarantee sequential access to the base
relation.
 515

multIDX Perform operations like union and disjunction on the outcome of an

index scan.

multIDXsplit If two ranges are queried within the same query ([1-10],[20-30])
consider multIDX or use a single scan through the index [1-30] with an
additional qualification predicate.

multIDXor Queries with more conditions on indexed attributes can be evalu-

ated by more complex combinations of index scans and tid-list/bitvector
operations. (A = 5 and (B = 3 or B = 4)).

scanDirChange During multiple sequential scans of relation (e.g. for a block-

wise nested loop join), the direction of the scan can be changed in order
to reuse as much of the pages in the buffer as possible.

lock The optimizer should chose the correct locks to set on tables. For example,
if a whole table is scanned, a table lock should be set.

expFunMat Expensive functions can be cached during query evaluation in

order to avoid their multiple evaluation for the same arguments [355].

expFunFil Easiser to evaluate predicates that are implied by more expensive

predicates can serve as filters in order to avoid the evaluation of the ex-
pensive predicate on all tuples.

stop Stop evaluation after the first tuple qualifies. This is good for existential
subqueries, universal subqueries (disqualify), semi-joins for distinct results
and the like.

expensive projections 1. zum Schluss, da dort am wenigsten verschiedene

Werte
2. durchschieben, falls cache fuer Funktionsergebnisse dadurch vermieden
werden kann
OO-Kontext: problematisch: objekte muessen fuer funktionen/methoden
als ganzes vorhanden sein. daher ist eine einfache strategie nicht moeglich.

distinct/sorting select distinct a,b,c

...
order by a,b

kann auch nach a,b,c sortiert werden. stoert gar nicht, vereinfacht aber
die duplikateliminierung. nur ein sortieren notwendig.

index access • by key

• by key range
• by dashed key range (set of keys/key ranges)
• index anding/oring
516APPENDIX C. GLOSSARY OF REWRITE AND OPTIMIZATION TECHNIQUES

alternative operator implementations e.g. join: nlj bnlj hj grace-hash

hybrid-hash smj diag-join star-join

distpd Push-down or Pull-up distinct.

aggregate with distinct select a, agg(distinct b)

...
group by a
===>
sort on a,b
dup elim
group a,sum(b)
alternative: aggr(distinct *) is implemented such that it uses a hashtable
to eliminate duplicates this is only good, if the number of groups is smal-
land the number of distinct values in each group is small.

XXX - use keys, inclusion dependencies, fds etc. (all user specified and de-
rived) (propagate keys over joins as fds), (for a function call: derived IU is
functional dependend on arguments of the function call if function is de-
terministic) (keys can be represented as sets of IUs or as bitvectors(given
numbering of IUs)) (numbering inprecise: bitvectors can be used as filters
(like for signatures))
Appendix D

Useful Formulas

The following identities can be found in the book by Graham, Knuth, and
Patashnik [308].

We use the following definition of binomial coefficients:

  ( n!
n k!(n−k)! if 0 ≤ k ≤ n
= (D.1)
k 0 else

We start with some simple identities.

   
n n
= (D.2)
k n−k
   
n n n−1
= (D.3)
k k k−1
   
n n−1
k = n (D.4)
k k−1
   
n n−1
(n − k) = n (D.5)
k k
   
n n−1
(n − k) = n (D.6)
k n−k−1
     
n n−1 n−1
= + (D.7)
k k k−1
     
r m r r−k
= (D.8)
m k k m−k

517
518 APPENDIX D. USEFUL FORMULAS

The following identities are good for sums of binomial coefficients.

n  
X n
= 2n (D.9)
k
k=0
n    
X k n+1
= (D.10)
m m+1
k=0
n      
X m+k m+n+1 m+n+1
= = (D.11)
k m+1 n
k=0
n    
X m−n+k m+1
= (D.12)
k n
k=0

From Identities D.2 and D.11 it follows that

m    
X k+r m+r+1
= (D.13)
r r+1
k=0

For sums of products, we have

n     
X r s r+s
= (D.14)
m+k n−k m+n
k=0
n     
X l−k q+k l+q+1
= (D.15)
m n m+n+1
k=0
n     
X l s l+s
= (D.16)
m+k n+k l−m+n
k=0
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Appendix E

ToDo

• size of a query in rel alg: [621]

• [787]

• Integrating Buffer Issues into Query Optimization: [180, 404]

• Integrating concurrency control issues into query optimization: [531, 532]

• [86]

• where do we put ”counting page accesses”?

• control, A∗ , ballooning: [523, 522]

• Bypass Plans

• Properties (rather complete list, partial ordering, plan independent prop-

erties: store them somewhere else (dpstructure or memostructure))

• describe prep-phase of plan generator

• reuse plans: [678]

• estimating query compilation time: [380]

• cost model [683]

• sensivitity of QO to storage access cost parameters [619] (and join selec-

tivities on join order: [444] [papier ist nicht ernst zu nehmen])

• magic set and semi join reducers [70, 72, 71, 149, 288, 538, 536, 538, 537,
680, 725, 838]

• join indexes and clustering tuples of different relations with 1:n relation-
ship [197, 345, 772, 773, 703]

• B-Trees with space filling curves (Bayer)

• Prefetching [793]

579
580 APPENDIX E. TODO

• feedback to optimizer [436]

• compression [26, 48, 141, 177, 222, 221, 283, 289] [547, 614, 635, 684, 685,
744, 798, 809]

• semantic QO SQO: [1, 73, 146, 279, 311, 425, 426, 441, 447] [548, 556,
557, 579, 698, 706, 708, 821] [475]

• join processing with nonclustered indexes: [549]

• join+buffer: [806]

• removal/elimination of redundant joins [558, 742]

• benchmark(ing): Gray Book: [312]; papers: [83, 91, 566, 641, 664, 837,
831, 832]

• dynamic qo: [570] [28, 770] [38] [405]

• unnesting: [574, 612]

• prefetching: [578, 577, 713, 793]

• Starburst: [586, 587]

• BXP: [90, 223, 265, 322, 341, 376, 420, 591, 618, 705, 712, 715, 419]
BXP complexity: [68] BXP var infl: [406]

• joins: [596]

• query folding: [598]

• quantification: [94, 93, 157, 158, 610, 603, 801] [397]

• outerjoins: [75, 76, 186, 263, 255, 254, 611, 626]

• partial match + hashing: [605]

• OODB indexing by class division: [164, 609]

• decision support [613]

• tree structured databases: [620]

• Rosenthal: [629, 615, 630, 631, 616, 625, 628, 627]

• conj. queries [623]

• aggregation/(generalized proj): [97, 164, 256, 634] [326, 327, 350]

• do nest/unnest to optimize duplicate work: [632]

e1 1A1 =A2 e2 ≡ µg (e1 1A1 =A2 Γg;=A2 ;id (e2 ))

• join size: [624]

• fragmentation: [645]
 581

• eqv: [20, 19]

• alg eqvs union/difference: [649] [787]

• other sagiv: [647, 648]

• bayesian approach to QO: [679]

• cache query plans: [678]

• joins for horizontally fragmentation: [671]

• partitioning: [49, 89, 339, 409, 551]

• MQO: [25, 115, 113, 676, 675, 848]

• indexing+caching: [674]

• rule-based QO: [686, 59, 60, 251]

• rule-based IRIS: [196]

• cost: [726] [771]

• search space: [753], join ordering: [755]

• access path: [109, 794, 835, 84]

• eff aggr: [253] [800]

• misc: [804] [9] [13]

• access paths: bitmaps [817]

• dist db: [33, 34, 82, 184, 829] Donald’s state of the art: [439]

• [121, 122]

• eqv: bags [22, 189]

• eqvs old: [23]

• DB2: norwegian analysis: [29]

• nested: [41]

• Genesis/Praire/Batory: [50, 54, 53, 55, 185]

• eqvs OO: [61, 62]

• dupelim: [78]

• (generalized) division: [107, 183, 301, 291]

• early aggregation

• chunks-wise processing [198, 298]

582 APPENDIX E. TODO

• temporal intersection join: [323]

• 2nd ord sig: Güting: [331]

• classics: [336]

• smallest first: [340]

• Hwang/Yu: [375]

• Kambayashi: [408]

• Koch [434], Lehnert [465]

• I/O cost reduction for (hash) joins: [486, 516]

• dist nest: [227]

• band join: [491]

• Donovan (TODS 76,1,4) Decision Support: [212]

• whenever materialize something (sort, hash join, etc) compute min/max

of some attributes and use these as additional selection predicates

• determine optimal page access sequence and buffer size to access pairs
(x,y) of pages where join partners of one relation lie on x and of the
other on y (Fotouhi, Pramanik [248], Merret, Kambayashi, Yasuura [516],
Omiecinski [549], Pramanik, Ittner [596], Chan, Ooi [117])

• Scarcello, Greco, Leone: [652]

• Sigmod05:

– proactive reoptimization [40]

– robust query optimizer [39]
– stacked indexed views [193]
– NF2 -approach to processing nested sql queries [100]
– efficient computatio of multiple groupby queries [143]

• LOCI: [569]

• Wavelet synopses: [274]

• Progress Indicators: [127, 493, 494]

• PostgresExperience: [786]

• Chaudhuri sigmod 05: [39]