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<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd"><html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8" /><title>41.3. Materialized Views</title><link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="stylesheet.css" /><link rev="made" href="pgsql-docs@lists.postgresql.org" /><meta name="generator" content="DocBook XSL Stylesheets Vsnapshot" /><link rel="prev" href="rules-views.html" title="41.2. Views and the Rule System" /><link rel="next" href="rules-update.html" title="41.4. Rules on INSERT, UPDATE, and DELETE" /></head><body><div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/transitional" class="navheader"><table width="100%" summary="Navigation header"><tr><th colspan="5" align="center">41.3. Materialized Views</th></tr><tr><td width="10%" align="left"><a accesskey="p" href="rules-views.html" title="41.2. Views and the Rule System">Prev</a> </td><td width="10%" align="left"><a accesskey="u" href="rules.html" title="Chapter 41. The Rule System">Up</a></td><th width="60%" align="center">Chapter 41. The Rule System</th><td width="10%" align="right"><a accesskey="h" href="index.html" title="PostgreSQL 11.5 Documentation">Home</a></td><td width="10%" align="right"> <a accesskey="n" href="rules-update.html" title="41.4. Rules on INSERT, UPDATE, and DELETE">Next</a></td></tr></table><hr></hr></div><div class="sect1" id="RULES-MATERIALIZEDVIEWS"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h2 class="title" style="clear: both">41.3. Materialized Views</h2></div></div></div><a id="id-1.8.6.8.2" class="indexterm"></a><a id="id-1.8.6.8.3" class="indexterm"></a><a id="id-1.8.6.8.4" class="indexterm"></a><p>
Materialized views in <span class="productname">PostgreSQL</span> use the
rule system like views do, but persist the results in a table-like form.
The main differences between:
</p><pre class="programlisting">
CREATE MATERIALIZED VIEW mymatview AS SELECT * FROM mytab;
</pre><p>
and:
</p><pre class="programlisting">
CREATE TABLE mymatview AS SELECT * FROM mytab;
</pre><p>
are that the materialized view cannot subsequently be directly updated
and that the query used to create the materialized view is stored in
exactly the same way that a view's query is stored, so that fresh data
can be generated for the materialized view with:
</p><pre class="programlisting">
REFRESH MATERIALIZED VIEW mymatview;
</pre><p>
The information about a materialized view in the
<span class="productname">PostgreSQL</span> system catalogs is exactly
the same as it is for a table or view. So for the parser, a
materialized view is a relation, just like a table or a view. When
a materialized view is referenced in a query, the data is returned
directly from the materialized view, like from a table; the rule is
only used for populating the materialized view.
</p><p>
While access to the data stored in a materialized view is often much
faster than accessing the underlying tables directly or through a view,
the data is not always current; yet sometimes current data is not needed.
Consider a table which records sales:
</p><pre class="programlisting">
CREATE TABLE invoice (
invoice_no integer PRIMARY KEY,
seller_no integer, -- ID of salesperson
invoice_date date, -- date of sale
invoice_amt numeric(13,2) -- amount of sale
);
</pre><p>
If people want to be able to quickly graph historical sales data, they
might want to summarize, and they may not care about the incomplete data
for the current date:
</p><pre class="programlisting">
CREATE MATERIALIZED VIEW sales_summary AS
SELECT
seller_no,
invoice_date,
sum(invoice_amt)::numeric(13,2) as sales_amt
FROM invoice
WHERE invoice_date < CURRENT_DATE
GROUP BY
seller_no,
invoice_date
ORDER BY
seller_no,
invoice_date;
CREATE UNIQUE INDEX sales_summary_seller
ON sales_summary (seller_no, invoice_date);
</pre><p>
This materialized view might be useful for displaying a graph in the
dashboard created for salespeople. A job could be scheduled to update
the statistics each night using this SQL statement:
</p><pre class="programlisting">
REFRESH MATERIALIZED VIEW sales_summary;
</pre><p>
</p><p>
Another use for a materialized view is to allow faster access to data
brought across from a remote system through a foreign data wrapper.
A simple example using <code class="literal">file_fdw</code> is below, with timings,
but since this is using cache on the local system the performance
difference compared to access to a remote system would usually be greater
than shown here. Notice we are also exploiting the ability to put an
index on the materialized view, whereas <code class="literal">file_fdw</code> does
not support indexes; this advantage might not apply for other sorts of
foreign data access.
</p><p>
Setup:
</p><pre class="programlisting">
CREATE EXTENSION file_fdw;
CREATE SERVER local_file FOREIGN DATA WRAPPER file_fdw;
CREATE FOREIGN TABLE words (word text NOT NULL)
SERVER local_file
OPTIONS (filename '/usr/share/dict/words');
CREATE MATERIALIZED VIEW wrd AS SELECT * FROM words;
CREATE UNIQUE INDEX wrd_word ON wrd (word);
CREATE EXTENSION pg_trgm;
CREATE INDEX wrd_trgm ON wrd USING gist (word gist_trgm_ops);
VACUUM ANALYZE wrd;
</pre><p>
Now let's spell-check a word. Using <code class="literal">file_fdw</code> directly:
</p><pre class="programlisting">
SELECT count(*) FROM words WHERE word = 'caterpiler';
count
-------
0
(1 row)
</pre><p>
With <code class="command">EXPLAIN ANALYZE</code>, we see:
</p><pre class="programlisting">
Aggregate (cost=21763.99..21764.00 rows=1 width=0) (actual time=188.180..188.181 rows=1 loops=1)
-> Foreign Scan on words (cost=0.00..21761.41 rows=1032 width=0) (actual time=188.177..188.177 rows=0 loops=1)
Filter: (word = 'caterpiler'::text)
Rows Removed by Filter: 479829
Foreign File: /usr/share/dict/words
Foreign File Size: 4953699
Planning time: 0.118 ms
Execution time: 188.273 ms
</pre><p>
If the materialized view is used instead, the query is much faster:
</p><pre class="programlisting">
Aggregate (cost=4.44..4.45 rows=1 width=0) (actual time=0.042..0.042 rows=1 loops=1)
-> Index Only Scan using wrd_word on wrd (cost=0.42..4.44 rows=1 width=0) (actual time=0.039..0.039 rows=0 loops=1)
Index Cond: (word = 'caterpiler'::text)
Heap Fetches: 0
Planning time: 0.164 ms
Execution time: 0.117 ms
</pre><p>
Either way, the word is spelled wrong, so let's look for what we might
have wanted. Again using <code class="literal">file_fdw</code>:
</p><pre class="programlisting">
SELECT word FROM words ORDER BY word <-> 'caterpiler' LIMIT 10;
word
---------------
cater
caterpillar
Caterpillar
caterpillars
caterpillar's
Caterpillar's
caterer
caterer's
caters
catered
(10 rows)
</pre><p>
</p><pre class="programlisting">
Limit (cost=11583.61..11583.64 rows=10 width=32) (actual time=1431.591..1431.594 rows=10 loops=1)
-> Sort (cost=11583.61..11804.76 rows=88459 width=32) (actual time=1431.589..1431.591 rows=10 loops=1)
Sort Key: ((word <-> 'caterpiler'::text))
Sort Method: top-N heapsort Memory: 25kB
-> Foreign Scan on words (cost=0.00..9672.05 rows=88459 width=32) (actual time=0.057..1286.455 rows=479829 loops=1)
Foreign File: /usr/share/dict/words
Foreign File Size: 4953699
Planning time: 0.128 ms
Execution time: 1431.679 ms
</pre><p>
Using the materialized view:
</p><pre class="programlisting">
Limit (cost=0.29..1.06 rows=10 width=10) (actual time=187.222..188.257 rows=10 loops=1)
-> Index Scan using wrd_trgm on wrd (cost=0.29..37020.87 rows=479829 width=10) (actual time=187.219..188.252 rows=10 loops=1)
Order By: (word <-> 'caterpiler'::text)
Planning time: 0.196 ms
Execution time: 198.640 ms
</pre><p>
If you can tolerate periodic update of the remote data to the local
database, the performance benefit can be substantial.
</p></div><div class="navfooter"><hr /><table width="100%" summary="Navigation footer"><tr><td width="40%" align="left"><a accesskey="p" href="rules-views.html">Prev</a> </td><td width="20%" align="center"><a accesskey="u" href="rules.html">Up</a></td><td width="40%" align="right"> <a accesskey="n" href="rules-update.html">Next</a></td></tr><tr><td width="40%" align="left" valign="top">41.2. Views and the Rule System </td><td width="20%" align="center"><a accesskey="h" href="index.html">Home</a></td><td width="40%" align="right" valign="top"> 41.4. Rules on <code class="command">INSERT</code>, <code class="command">UPDATE</code>, and <code class="command">DELETE</code></td></tr></table></div></body></html>
