Add planner support function for starts_with()
When starts_with() and the equivalent ^@ operator were added, they
were plugged into the planner in only a rather half-baked way.
Selectivity estimation got taught about the operator, but the
other infrastructure associated with LIKE/regex matching wasn't
updated. This causes these operators to be planned more stupidly
than a functionally-equivalent LIKE/regex pattern [1]/messages/by-id/CADT4RqB13KQHOJqqQ+WXmYtJrukS2UiFdtfTvT-XA3qYLyB6Cw@mail.gmail.com.
With the (admittedly later) introduction of planner support functions,
it's really quite easy to do better. The attached patch adds a planner
support function for starts_with(), with these benefits:
* A condition such as "textcol ^@ constant" can now use a regular
btree index, not only an SP-GiST index, so long as the index's
collation is C. (This works just like "textcol LIKE 'foo%'".)
* "starts_with(textcol, constant)" can be optimized the same as
"textcol ^@ constant".
I also rejiggered match_pattern_prefix() a bit, with the effect
that fixed-prefix LIKE and regex patterns are now more like
starts_with() in another way: if you apply one to an SPGiST-indexed
column, you'll get an index condition using ^@ rather than two
index conditions with >= and <. That should be more efficient
at runtime, though I didn't try to do any performance testing.
regards, tom lane
[1]: /messages/by-id/CADT4RqB13KQHOJqqQ+WXmYtJrukS2UiFdtfTvT-XA3qYLyB6Cw@mail.gmail.com
Attachments:
planner-support-for-starts-with-1.patchtext/x-diff; charset=us-ascii; name=planner-support-for-starts-with-1.patchDownload+94-22
On 10/9/21, 10:24 AM, "Tom Lane" <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us> wrote:
With the (admittedly later) introduction of planner support functions,
it's really quite easy to do better. The attached patch adds a planner
support function for starts_with(), with these benefits:
The patch looks reasonable to me.
Nathan
"Bossart, Nathan" <bossartn@amazon.com> writes:
On 10/9/21, 10:24 AM, "Tom Lane" <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us> wrote:
With the (admittedly later) introduction of planner support functions,
it's really quite easy to do better. The attached patch adds a planner
support function for starts_with(), with these benefits:
The patch looks reasonable to me.
Pushed, thanks for reviewing!
regards, tom lane