Re: syntax for reaching into records, specifically ts_stat results

Oleg,

This syntax works fine until I also want to get the "sentence_id"
column in there as well, so that I can differentiate one set of
ts_stat results from another. With the syntax where ts_stat is
treated like a table, it isn't possible to run ts_stat separately on
multiple tsvectors as I'm doing below.

Is there some generic record access syntax that I can use?

Thanks,
Dan

On Dec 9, 2008, at 3:04 PM, Oleg Bartunov wrote:

> try select * from ts_stat(....)
> btw, performance of ts_stat() was greatly improved in 8.4.
>
> Oleg
> On Tue, 9 Dec 2008, Dan Chak wrote:
>
>> Dear Postgres Folk,
>>
>> In working with tsvectors (added in 8.3), I've come to a place
>> where my syntax-fu has failed me. I've resorted to turning a
>> result set of records into strings so that I can regexp out the
>> record fields I need, rather than access them directly, as I'm sure
>> it's possible to do with the right syntactic formulation. Although
>> my solution works, I'm sure it's much less efficient than it could
>> be, and hope someone on the list can help do this the right way.
>>
>> Basically, I would like to transpose a series of tsvectors (one per
>> row) into columns. E.g., as tsvects, I have this:
>>
>> test=# select * from tsvects;
>> sentence_id | tsvect
>> -------------+------------------------------
>> 1 | 'fox':3 'brown':2 'quick':1
>> 2 | 'lazi':1 'eleph':3 'green':2
>>
>> Instead I want this:
>>
>> sentence_id | word | freq
>> -------------+-------+------
>> 1 | fox | 1
>> 1 | brown | 1
>> 1 | quick | 1
>> 2 | lazi | 1
>> 2 | eleph | 1
>> 2 | green | 1
>>
>> I am able to generate this with the following view, but the problem
>> is that to create it, I must first cast the ts_stat results to a
>> string, and then regexp out the pertinent pieces:
>>
>> create or replace view words as
>> select sentence_id,
>> substring(stat from '^\\(([^,]+),') as word,
>> substring(stat from ',([^,]+)\\)$') as freq
>> from (select sentence_id,
>> ts_stat('select tsvect from tsvects where sentence_id =
>> ' ||
>> tsvects.sentence_id)::text as stat
>> from tsvects
>> ) as foo;
>>
>> It seems like there should be a way to access fields in the records
>> returned from ts_stat directly, but I can't figure out how. Here's
>> the result of the subquery:
>>
>> test=# select sentence_id,
>> ts_stat('select tsvect from tsvects where sentence_id =
>> ' ||
>> tsvects.sentence_id)::text as stat
>> from tsvects;
>> sentence_id | stat
>> -------------+-------------
>> 1 | (fox,1,1)
>> 1 | (brown,1,1)
>> 1 | (quick,1,1)
>> 2 | (lazi,1,1)
>> 2 | (eleph,1,1)
>> 2 | (green,1,1)
>> (6 rows)
>>
>> If I try to get at the elements (which I believe are named 'word',
>> 'ndoc', 'nentry'), I get a variety of syntax errors:
>>
>> test=# select sentence_id,
>> test-# stat['word'],
>> test-# stat['nentry']
>> test-# from (select sentence_id,
>> test(# ts_stat('select tsvect from tsvects where
>> sentence_id = ' ||
>> test(# tsvects.sentence_id) as stat
>> test(# from tsvects
>> test(# ) as foo;
>> ERROR: cannot subscript type record because it is not an array
>>
>> If I say stat.word (instead of subscripting), I get 'missing FROM-
>> clause entry for table "stat"'. If I say foo.stat.word, I get
>> 'ERROR: schema "foo" does not exist'.
>>
>> Any ideas on how to get into these records with resorting to text
>> parsing?
>>
>> Thanks,
>> Dan
>>
>>
>
> Regards,
> Oleg
> _____________________________________________________________
> Oleg Bartunov, Research Scientist, Head of AstroNet (www.astronet.ru)
> Sternberg Astronomical Institute, Moscow University, Russia
> Internet: oleg(at)sai(dot)msu(dot)su, http://www.sai.msu.su/~megera/
> phone: +007(495)939-16-83, +007(495)939-23-83