Expression¶

Expression is an extension of the TreeNode abstraction for executable expressions (in the Catalyst Tree Manipulation Framework).

abstract class Expression
extends TreeNode[Expression]

Expression is an executable TreeNode that can be evaluated and produce a JVM object (for an InternalRow) in the faster code-generated or the slower interpreted modes.

Contract¶

Evaluation Result DataType¶

dataType: DataType

The DataType of the result of evaluating this expression

Generating Java Source Code¶

doGenCode(
  ctx: CodegenContext,
  ev: ExprCode): ExprCode

Generates a Java source code (for Whole-Stage Java Code Generation)

Used when:

Expression is requested to generate a Java code

Interpreted Expression Evaluation¶

eval(
  input: InternalRow = null): Any

Interpreted expression evaluation that evaluates this expression to a JVM object for a given InternalRow (and skipping generating a corresponding Java code)

eval is a slower "relative" of the code-generated expression evaluation

nullable¶

nullable: Boolean

Implementations¶

BinaryExpression¶

LeafExpression¶

TernaryExpression¶

Other Expressions¶

Code-Generated Expression Evaluation¶

genCode(
  ctx: CodegenContext): ExprCode

genCode returns a ExprCode with a Java source code for expression evaluation (on an input InternalRow).

Similar to doGenCode but supports expression reuse using Subexpression Elimination.

genCode is a faster "relative" of the interpreted expression evaluation.

genCode is used when:

CodegenContext is requested to subexpressionEliminationForWholeStageCodegen, subexpressionElimination and generateExpressions
GenerateSafeProjection utility is used to create a Projection
others

reduceCodeSize¶

reduceCodeSize(
  ctx: CodegenContext,
  eval: ExprCode): Unit

reduceCodeSize does its work only when all of the following are met:

Length of the generated code is above spark.sql.codegen.methodSplitThreshold
INPUT_ROW (of the input CodegenContext) is defined
currentVars (of the input CodegenContext) is not defined

This needs your help

FIXME When would the above not be met? What's so special about such an expression?

reduceCodeSize sets the value of the input ExprCode to the fresh term name for the value name.

In the end, reduceCodeSize sets the code of the input ExprCode to the following:

[javaType] [newValue] = [funcFullName]([INPUT_ROW]);

The funcFullName is the fresh term name for the name of the current expression node.

deterministic Flag¶

Expression is deterministic when evaluates to the same result for the same input(s). An expression is deterministic if all the child expressions are.

Note

A deterministic expression is like a pure function in functional programming languages.

val e = $"a".expr

import org.apache.spark.sql.catalyst.expressions.Expression
assert(e.isInstanceOf[Expression])
assert(e.deterministic)

Demo¶

// evaluating an expression
// Use Literal expression to create an expression from a Scala object
import org.apache.spark.sql.catalyst.expressions.{Expression, Literal}
val e: Expression = Literal("hello")

import org.apache.spark.sql.catalyst.expressions.EmptyRow
val v: Any = e.eval(EmptyRow)

// Convert to Scala's String
import org.apache.spark.unsafe.types.UTF8String
val s = v.asInstanceOf[UTF8String].toString
assert(s == "hello")