Re: How to "paste two tables side-by-side"? - Mailing list pgsql-general

From Kynn Jones
Subject Re: How to "paste two tables side-by-side"?
Date
Msg-id c2350ba40802270522s6ace8045recacb2a92afda30a@mail.gmail.com
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In response to How to "paste two tables side-by-side"?  ("Kynn Jones" <kynnjo@gmail.com>)
Responses Re: How to "paste two tables side-by-side"?
List pgsql-general
On Wed, Feb 27, 2008 at 7:39 AM, Kynn Jones <kynnjo@gmail.com> wrote:
Suppose I have two tables, A and B, with k(A) and k(B) columns respectively, and let's assume to begin with that they have the same number of rows r(A) = r(B) = r.

What's the simplest way to produce a table C having r rows and k(A) + k(B) columns, and whose i-th row consists of the k(A) columns of the i-th row of A followed by the k(B) columns of the i-th row of B (for i = 1,...,r)?  (By "i-th row of A" I mean the i-th row of the listing one would get from "SELECT * FROM A", and likewise for B.)

Expanding on my own post here, it occurred to me that it would be very nice to have a function (say) index, that, when used in a SELECT list, would yield the position in the corresponding table of the current row.  E.g. the expression

  SELECT index(*) FROM A;

would produce the same table as

  SELECT generate_series( 1, r(A) );

It would also be useful to have a "subscripting function" s (which may be regarded as somewhat of the inverse of index()) that, given a table expression E, and an "index expression" I (which could be a single index or range, or a list of such), will return the table consisting of the rows in E designated by the indices in I).  For example, either one these queries

  SELECT s( A, 1, 2, 3 );
  SELECT * FROM s( A, 1, 2, 3 );

would produce the same table as

  SELECT * FROM A LIMIT 3;

Does anything like index() or s() exist?  If not, are there other functions that may be useful in an implementation of index() or s()?

Thanks!

Kynn

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