how to return number of records as a part of a select statement? - postgresql

Question

I'd like to know if there is a way to include row numbers (basically telling me how many records I'm getting back from a database query).
I have the following SQL query
SELECT w.widget_id, w.class_id, wg.name classname, wg.label AS classgroup, c.label, c.seq,
g.name AS group, p.name, p.type, CASE WHEN v.value IS NOT NULL THEN v.value WHEN g2p.value IS NOT NULL THEN g2p.value ELSE p.value END AS value
FROM widgets_to_categories w
INNER JOIN widget_classes c ON w.class_id = c.class_id
JOIN classes_to_param_groups t2g ON c.class_id = t2g.class_id
JOIN widget_groups g ON t2g.group_id = g.group_id
JOIN param_groups_to_params g2p ON t2g.group_id = g2p.group_id
JOIN provisioning_params p ON g2p.param_id = p.param_id
INNER JOIN widget_cat_groups wg ON c.class_group_id = wg.class_group_id
LEFT JOIN widget_values v ON(w.widget_id=v.device_id AND p.param_id=v.param_id AND g.name=v.group_name )
WHERE w.widget_id=8 ORDER BY c.class_id ASC
And it returns data like:
widget_id | class_id | classname | classgroup | label | seq | group | name | type | value
8 | 1 | toy | group A | test label | 1 | toy | reg | text | af
8 | 1 | toy | group A | test label | 1 | reg2 | fall | text | 25327
8 | 1 | toy | group A | test label | 1 | reg2 | pd | text | dvaa
8 | 1 | toy | group A | test label | 1 | reg2 | ext | text | 28235
8 | 1 | toy | group A | test label | 1 | reg1 | ext | text | 28230
8 | 1 | toy | group A | test label | 1 | toy | meec | text | 094F22DE501
8 | 1 | toy | group A | test label | 1 | toy | mmap | text | 0|
8 | 1 | toy | group A | test label | 1 | reg1 | fna | text | 26014
8 | 1 | toy | group A | test label | 1 | reg1 | fall | text | t-123
8 | 1 | toy | group A | test label | 1 | toy | uen | boolean | false
8 | 1 | toy | group A | test label | 1 | toy | adminpd |
I'd like to know if there's a way to have the database auto generate and return another column that is just an identifier for the row, like so:
id |widget_id | class_id | classname | classgroup | label | seq | group | name | type | value
1 | 8 | 1 | toy | group A | test label | 1 | toy | reg | text | af
2 | 8 | 1 | toy | group A | test label | 1 | reg2 | fall | text | 25327
3 | 8 | 1 | toy | group A | test label | 1 | reg2 | pd | text | dvaa
4 | 8 | 1 | toy | group A | test label | 1 | reg2 | ext | text | 28235
5 | 8 | 1 | toy | group A | test label | 1 | reg1 | ext | text | 28230
6 | 8 | 1 | toy | group A | test label | 1 | toy | meec | text | 094F22DE501
7 | 8 | 1 | toy | group A | test label | 1 | toy | mmap | text | 0|
8 | 8 | 1 | toy | group A | test label | 1 | reg1 | fna | text | 26014
9 | 8 | 1 | toy | group A | test label | 1 | reg1 | fall | text | t-123
10 | 8 | 1 | toy | group A | test label | 1 | toy | uen | boolean | false
11 | 8 | 1 | toy | group A | test label | 1 | toy | adminpd | boolean | false
I think I can do this by selecting into a temporary table.. I haven't figured out the syntax on how to do it yet... But I'm also wondering if there's another simpler way.
Once I get the data back from the database, having this ID field makes it eaiser to manipulate.
Thanks.

Answer 1

You can use the row_number window function to keep track of each row number.
Like so:
create table foo
(
id serial,
val text
);
INSERT INTO foo (val)
VALUES ('One'), ('Two'), ('Three');
SELECT f.*, row_number() OVER(ORDER BY val)
FROM foo AS f
ORDER BY val;
Here's an SQL Fiddle which shows this:
http://sqlfiddle.com/#!15/0c434/2
Additional options:
You could count the result with a query of the form:
SELECT count(*)
FROM
(
SELECT *
FROM foo
);
Or you may be able to get the row count back as part of the Postgres library you're using. For example, psycopg2 (Python) and DBI (Perl) allow for this (with some caveats). The library you're using may offer something similar.