aggregate functions are not allowed in UPDATE

From: Alexander Farber <alexander(dot)farber(at)gmail(dot)com>
To: pgsql-general <pgsql-general(at)postgresql(dot)org>
Subject: aggregate functions are not allowed in UPDATE
Date: 2019-01-15 16:42:24
Message-ID: CAADeyWiQ6cnLR9C7xWnv5Y35-v+m6XR0nmRiPZ7kWbEOfyeB_Q@mail.gmail.com
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Good evening,

I have prepared a simple test case for my question:
https://www.db-fiddle.com/f/w1AYGpoZiWW9bLCYjHDk7H/0

There I create 3 tables:

CREATE TABLE users (
uid SERIAL PRIMARY KEY,
avg_time TEXT
);

CREATE TABLE games (
gid SERIAL PRIMARY KEY,
player1 INTEGER NOT NULL REFERENCES users(uid) ON DELETE CASCADE,
player2 INTEGER NOT NULL REFERENCES users(uid) ON DELETE CASCADE CHECK
(player1 <> player2)
);

CREATE TABLE moves (
mid BIGSERIAL PRIMARY KEY,
played timestamptz NOT NULL,
gid INTEGER NOT NULL REFERENCES games(gid) ON DELETE CASCADE,
uid INTEGER NOT NULL REFERENCES users(uid) ON DELETE CASCADE
);

And then I fill them with 3 test players and 2 test games (1 vs. 3 and 1
vs. 2):

INSERT INTO users (uid) VALUES
(1),
(2),
(3);

INSERT INTO games (gid, player1, player2) VALUES
(1, 2, 3),
(2, 1, 3),
(3, 1, 2);

INSERT INTO moves (played, gid, uid) VALUES
(NOW() + INTERVAL '1 hour', 2, 1),
(NOW() + INTERVAL '2 hour', 2, 3),
(NOW() + INTERVAL '3 hour', 2, 1), -- +1 hour
(NOW() + INTERVAL '4 hour', 2, 3),
(NOW() + INTERVAL '5 hour', 2, 1), -- +1 hour
(NOW() + INTERVAL '6 hour', 2, 3),
(NOW() + INTERVAL '7 hour', 2, 1), -- +1 hour
(NOW() + INTERVAL '8 hour', 2, 3),

(NOW() + INTERVAL '10 hour', 3, 1),
(NOW() + INTERVAL '20 hour', 3, 2),
(NOW() + INTERVAL '30 hour', 3, 1), -- +10 hours
(NOW() + INTERVAL '40 hour', 3, 2),
(NOW() + INTERVAL '50 hour', 3, 1), -- +10 hours
(NOW() + INTERVAL '60 hour', 3, 2),
(NOW() + INTERVAL '70 hour', 3, 1), -- +10 hours
(NOW() + INTERVAL '80 hour', 3, 2);

After that I am able to calculate the average time that the player 1 needs
to perform a move (11 hours):

WITH diffs AS (
SELECT
gid,
uid,
played - LAG(played) OVER(PARTITION BY gid ORDER BY played) AS diff
FROM moves
WHERE uid = 1
)
SELECT
uid, AVG(diff)
FROM diffs
GROUP BY uid;

But how to take that calculated value and store it in the "avg_time" text
column of the users table?

When I am trying

WITH diffs AS (
SELECT
gid,
uid,
played - LAG(played) OVER(PARTITION BY gid ORDER BY played) AS diff
FROM moves
WHERE uid = 1
)
UPDATE users SET
avg_time = TO_CHAR(AVG(diff), 'HH24:MI')
FROM diffs;

the syntax error is unfortunately printed by PostgreSQL 10:

aggregate functions are not allowed in UPDATE

Regards
Alex

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