lance-format / lance-format/lance

Support settings columns with expressions in merge_insert

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

Description

Support queries like:

MERGE INTO <dataset>
USING <source>
ON dataset.id = source.id
WHEN MATCHED AND target.text <> source.text THEN UPDATE
  SET text = source.text,
      updated_at = timestamp_now(),
      text_embedding = embedding(source.text)
WHEN NOT MATCHED THEN INSERT
  (text, created_at, updated_at, text_embedding)
  VALUES
  (source.text, timestamp_now(), timestamp_now(), embedding(source.text))

This would allow deferring computations, such as embedding functions, until we find they are actually needed.

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 by locating the merge_insert implementation and tracing how its MATCHED UPDATE and NOT MATCHED INSERT clauses handle settings. Use the SQL example as the behavioral target, including expressions such as timestamp_now() and embedding(source.text), and verify that computation is deferred until the affected rows require it.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Assessment

Tech stack
rust, sql
Domain
databases
Issue type
Feature
Difficulty
4/5
Estimated time
3-5 days
Activity status
Stale
Clarity
Mostly clear
Newbie friendliness
35/100

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