Patent · US Expired

Evaluation of grouping sets by reduction to group-by clause, with or without a rollup operator, using temporary tables

US6775681B1 · kind B1 · utility

80Cited by
6References
27Claims
0Family size

Assignee

Inventors

Key dates

Filing dateFeb 26, 2002
Grant dateAug 10, 2004
Priority date
Expiry dateJan 30, 2023

Classification

  • Technology area (CPC Y)Emerging Cross-Sectional Technologies
  • CPC primaryY10S707/99943
  • WIPO fieldComputer technology
  • WIPO sectorElectrical engineering

Abstract

Methods are provided for efficiently evaluating database queries that include a grouping sets specification, by reducing the grouping sets specification to one or more combinations of groupings that are computable with simple GROUP BY clauses, with or without a rollup operator, wherein the GROUP BY clauses and rollup operators are efficient operations that can be computed with a single data sort. Computational costs are further minimized by computing a grouping from records generated from computation of a previously computed grouping. An optimization algorithm is described which determines the respective grouping combinations to which the grouping sets specification is reduced and the respective GROUP BY clauses, to minimize computational costs. Furthermore, an intermediate grouping, that is, a grouping that is not specified by the query, is included in a query evaluation plan in some instances, to compute specified groupings when doing so reduces computational costs.

Source: USPTO / EPO open patent data. Objective bibliographic and citation counts.