Re: strange index behaviour with different statistics target

On Tue, 13 Jan 2009, Tom Lane wrote:

> Jeff Frost <jeff@frostconsultingllc.com> writes:
>> So, my question is, should changing the stats target on the shape column
>> affect the stats for the content_id and content_type columns?
>
> It would change the size of the sample for the table, which might
> improve the accuracy of the stats.  IIRC you'd still get the same number
> of histogram entries and most-common-values for the other columns, but
> they might be more accurate.

Why would they be more accurate?  Do they somehow correlate with the other
column's histogram and most-common-values when the stats target is increased
on that column?

The planner is choosing a plan I like for the query, I'm just trying to
understand why it's doing that since the planner thinks the gist index is
going to give it a single row (vs the 2827 rows it actually gets) and the fact
that the cost didn't change for perusing the gist index.  I guess I was
expecting the estimated rowcount and cost for perusing the gist index to go up
and when it didn't I was pleasantly surprised to find I got a plan I wanted
anyway.

>
>> Also, why does the index on content_id win out over the compound index
>> on (content_type, content_id)?
>
> It's deciding (apparently correctly, from the explain results) that the
> larger index isn't increasing the selectivity enough to be worth its
> extra search cost.  I suppose content_type = 'Story' isn't very
> selective in this table?

Ah!  You're right, especially with this content_id!

--
Jeff Frost, Owner     <jeff@frostconsultingllc.com>
Frost Consulting, LLC     http://www.frostconsultingllc.com/
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