lance-format / lance-format/lance

Horizontal merge insert should not rewrite join columns

Open
#3,862 1 comment 0 reactions 0 assignees View on GitHub

Nobody has claimed this yet.

enhancement
Dominant language
Rust
Stars
7.1k
Forks
852
Avg merge
3d 18h
Merged PRs (30d)
272

Description

When we perform a horizontal merge_insert we rewrite all columns that are modified. The join column cannot be modified and should not have to be rewritten.

However, we are rewriting the join column, which is slightly wasteful.

import lance
import pyarrow as pa
import shutil

shutil.rmtree("/tmp/test_dataset", ignore_errors=True)

ds = lance.write_dataset(pa.table({"id": range(100), "value": range(100), "other": range(100)}), "/tmp/test_dataset")
ds.merge_insert("id").when_matched_update_all().when_not_matched_insert_all().execute(pa.table({"id": range(50, 150), "value": range(50, 150)}))

frag = ds.get_fragments()[0]
data_file = frag.data_files()[0]

print(f"Fields={data_file.fields}") # This is actually [-2, -2, 2]
assert data_file.fields == [0, -2, 2]

Contributor guide

Open the contributing guide

First steps

  1. Read the whole issue, then the project's contributing guide.
  2. Comment on the issue to say you are picking it up — it saves two people doing the same work.
  3. Fork the repository and make your change on a branch.
  4. Open a pull request that references the issue number.

Research direction

Start with the merge_insert entry point shown in the Python reproduction and trace its Rust implementation to where updated fields are selected for horizontal merges. Use the supplied dataset and assertion to inspect the resulting data_file.fields. Done means the join column remains unchanged while modified columns are rewritten, with the reproduction passing.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Assessment

Tech stack
python, rust
Domain
data-engineering, database
Issue type
Bug
Difficulty
3/5
Estimated time
1-2 days
Activity status
Active
Clarity
Mostly clear
Newbie friendliness
64/100

Get new issues in your inbox

A short digest of beginner-friendly GitHub issues.