postgres lag and window to create cohort table [duplicate] - postgresql

Question

I am trying to create crosstab queries in PostgreSQL such that it automatically generates the crosstab columns instead of hardcoding it. I have written a function that dynamically generates the column list that I need for my crosstab query. The idea is to substitute the result of this function in the crosstab query using dynamic sql.
I know how to do this easily in SQL Server, but my limited knowledge of PostgreSQL is hindering my progress here. I was thinking of storing the result of function that generates the dynamic list of columns into a variable and use that to dynamically build the sql query. It would be great if someone could guide me regarding the same.
-- Table which has be pivoted
CREATE TABLE test_db
(
kernel_id int,
key int,
value int
);
INSERT INTO test_db VALUES
(1,1,99),
(1,2,78),
(2,1,66),
(3,1,44),
(3,2,55),
(3,3,89);
-- This function dynamically returns the list of columns for crosstab
CREATE FUNCTION test() RETURNS TEXT AS '
DECLARE
key_id int;
text_op TEXT = '' kernel_id int, '';
BEGIN
FOR key_id IN SELECT DISTINCT key FROM test_db ORDER BY key LOOP
text_op := text_op || key_id || '' int , '' ;
END LOOP;
text_op := text_op || '' DUMMY text'';
RETURN text_op;
END;
' LANGUAGE 'plpgsql';
-- This query works. I just need to convert the static list
-- of crosstab columns to be generated dynamically.
SELECT * FROM
crosstab
(
'SELECT kernel_id, key, value FROM test_db ORDER BY 1,2',
'SELECT DISTINCT key FROM test_db ORDER BY 1'
)
AS x (kernel_id int, key1 int, key2 int, key3 int); -- How can I replace ..
-- .. this static list with a dynamically generated list of columns ?

Answer 1

You can use the provided C function crosstab_hash for this.
The manual is not very clear in this respect. It's mentioned at the end of the chapter on crosstab() with two parameters:
You can create predefined functions to avoid having to write out the
result column names and types in each query. See the examples in the
previous section. The underlying C function for this form of crosstab
is named crosstab_hash.
For your example:
CREATE OR REPLACE FUNCTION f_cross_test_db(text, text)
RETURNS TABLE (kernel_id int, key1 int, key2 int, key3 int)
AS '$libdir/tablefunc','crosstab_hash' LANGUAGE C STABLE STRICT;
Call:
SELECT * FROM f_cross_test_db(
'SELECT kernel_id, key, value FROM test_db ORDER BY 1,2'
,'SELECT DISTINCT key FROM test_db ORDER BY 1');
Note that you need to create a distinct crosstab_hash function for every crosstab function with a different return type.
Related:
PostgreSQL row to columns
Your function to generate the column list is rather convoluted, the result is incorrect (int missing after kernel_id), it can be replaced with this SQL query:
SELECT 'kernel_id int, '
|| string_agg(DISTINCT key::text, ' int, ' ORDER BY key::text)
|| ' int, DUMMY text'
FROM test_db;
And it cannot be used dynamically anyway.

Answer 2

#erwin-brandstetter: The return type of the function isn't an issue if you're always returning a JSON type with the converted results.
Here is the function I came up with:
CREATE OR REPLACE FUNCTION report.test(
i_start_date TIMESTAMPTZ,
i_end_date TIMESTAMPTZ,
i_interval INT
) RETURNS TABLE (
tab JSON
) AS $ab$
DECLARE
_key_id TEXT;
_text_op TEXT = '';
_ret JSON;
BEGIN
-- SELECT DISTINCT for query results
FOR _key_id IN
SELECT DISTINCT at_name
FROM report.company_data_date cd
JOIN report.company_data_amount cda ON cd.id = cda.company_data_date_id
JOIN report.amount_types at ON cda.amount_type_id = at.id
WHERE date_start BETWEEN i_start_date AND i_end_date
AND interval_type_id = i_interval
LOOP
-- build function_call with datatype of column
IF char_length(_text_op) > 1 THEN
_text_op := _text_op || ', ' || _key_id || ' NUMERIC(20,2)';
ELSE
_text_op := _text_op || _key_id || ' NUMERIC(20,2)';
END IF;
END LOOP;
-- build query with parameter filters
RETURN QUERY
EXECUTE '
SELECT array_to_json(array_agg(row_to_json(t)))
FROM (
SELECT * FROM crosstab(''SELECT date_start, at.at_name, cda.amount ct
FROM report.company_data_date cd
JOIN report.company_data_amount cda ON cd.id = cda.company_data_date_id
JOIN report.amount_types at ON cda.amount_type_id = at.id
WHERE date_start between $$' || i_start_date::TEXT || '$$ AND $$' || i_end_date::TEXT || '$$
AND interval_type_id = ' || i_interval::TEXT || ' ORDER BY date_start'')
AS ct (date_start timestamptz, ' || _text_op || ')
) t;';
END;
$ab$ LANGUAGE 'plpgsql';
So, when you run it, you get the dynamic results in JSON, and you don't need to know how many values were pivoted:
select * from report.test(now()- '1 week'::interval, now(), 1);
tab
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
[{"date_start":"2015-07-27T08:40:01.277556-04:00","burn_rate":0.00,"monthly_revenue":5800.00,"cash_balance":0.00},{"date_start":"2015-07-27T08:50:02.458868-04:00","burn_rate":34000.00,"monthly_revenue":15800.00,"cash_balance":24000.00}]
(1 row)
Edit: If you have mixed datatypes in your crosstab, you can add logic to look it up for each column with something like this:
SELECT a.attname as column_name, format_type(a.atttypid, a.atttypmod) AS data_type
FROM pg_attribute a
JOIN pg_class b ON (a.attrelid = b.relfilenode)
JOIN pg_catalog.pg_namespace n ON n.oid = b.relnamespace
WHERE n.nspname = $$schema_name$$ AND b.relname = $$table_name$$ and a.attstattarget = -1;"

Answer 3

I realise this is an older post but struggled for a little while on the same issue.
My Problem Statement:
I had a table with muliple values in a field and wanted to create a crosstab query with 40+ column headings per row.
My Solution was to create a function which looped through the table column to grab values that I wanted to use as column headings within the crosstab query.
Within this function I could then Create the crosstab query. In my use case I added this crosstab result into a separate table.
E.g.
CREATE OR REPLACE FUNCTION field_values_ct ()
RETURNS VOID AS $$
DECLARE rec RECORD;
DECLARE str text;
BEGIN
str := '"Issue ID" text,';
-- looping to get column heading string
FOR rec IN SELECT DISTINCT field_name
FROM issue_fields
ORDER BY field_name
LOOP
str := str || '"' || rec.field_name || '" text' ||',';
END LOOP;
str:= substring(str, 0, length(str));
EXECUTE 'CREATE EXTENSION IF NOT EXISTS tablefunc;
DROP TABLE IF EXISTS temp_issue_fields;
CREATE TABLE temp_issue_fields AS
SELECT *
FROM crosstab(''select issue_id, field_name, field_value from issue_fields order by 1'',
''SELECT DISTINCT field_name FROM issue_fields ORDER BY 1'')
AS final_result ('|| str ||')';
END;
$$ LANGUAGE plpgsql;

Answer 4

The approach described here worked well for me.
Instead of retrieving the pivot table directly. The easier approach is to let the function generate a SQL query string. Dynamically execute the resulting SQL query string on demand.