Joining tables in queries google sheets - google-sheets

Question

Basically I have two google sheets that look something like this:
a table where people can put in their email and select what kind of foo they are using
email
foo
example#email.com
This Foo
and then another table with information about the foo
foo name
foo type
foo boolean1
foo boolean2
This Foo
String
True
True
That Foo
Number
False
True
Other Foo
String
False
False
In a Separate Sheet I'd like to have a dashboard-like view of things wherein I would have counts of various things like number of people, how many of each type of Foo, etc
Where I'm having trouble is figuring out how to pull things like "Number of people who have selected String foos" and such
like, basically i want the google-query equivalent to (in sql)
SELECT COUNT(p.*) FROM people p JOIN info i on p.foo = i.foo_name GROUP BY i.foo_type WHERE i.foo_type = 'String'
What I would be looking for is a table that looks like this:
Data
Count
Active Roster
4
String
3
Number
1

Answer 1

I have also seen many solutions that have complicated formulas using VLOOKUP, INDEX, MATCH, etc.
I decided to write a user function to combine tables, or as I refer to it, de-normalize the database. I wrote the function DENORMALIZE() to support INNER, LEFT, RIGHT and FULL joins. By nesting function calls one can join unlimited tables in theory.
DENORMALIZE(range1, range2, primaryKey, foreignKey, [joinType])
Parameters:
range1, the main table as a named range, a1Notation or an array
range2, the related table as a named range, a1Notation or an array
primaryKey, the unique identifier for the main table, columns start with "1"
foreignKey, the key in the related table to join to the main table, columns start with "1"
joinType, type of join, "Inner", "Left", "Right", "Full", optional and defaults to "Inner", case insensitive
Returns: results as a two dimensional array
Result Set Example:
=QUERY(denormalize("Employees","Orders",1,3), "SELECT * WHERE Col2 = 'Davolio' AND Col8=2", FALSE)
EmpID
LastName
FirstName
OrderID
CustomerID
EmpID
OrderDate
ShipperID
1
Davolio
Nancy
10285
63
1
8/20/1996
2
1
Davolio
Nancy
10292
81
1
8/28/1996
2
1
Davolio
Nancy
10304
80
1
9/12/1996
2
Other Examples:
=denormalize("Employees","Orders",1,3)
=denormalize("Employees","Orders",1,3,"full")
=QUERY(denormalize("Employees","Orders",1,3,"left"), "SELECT * ", FALSE)
=QUERY(denormalize("Employees","Orders",1,3), "SELECT * WHERE Col2 = 'Davolio'", FALSE)
=QUERY(denormalize("Employees","Orders",1,3), "SELECT * WHERE Col2 = 'Davolio' AND Col8=2", FALSE)
=denormalize("Orders","OrderDetails",1,2)
// multiple joins
=denormalize("Employees",denormalize("Orders","OrderDetails",1,2),1,3)
=QUERY(denormalize("Employees",denormalize("Orders","OrderDetails",1,2),1,3), "SELECT *", FALSE)
=denormalize(denormalize("Employees","Orders",1,3),"OrderDetails",1,2)
=QUERY(denormalize("Employees",denormalize("Orders","OrderDetails",1,2),1,3), "SELECT *", FALSE)
=QUERY(denormalize(denormalize("Employees","Orders",1,3),"OrderDetails",4,2), "SELECT *", FALSE)
function denormalize(range1, range2, primaryKey, foreignKey, joinType) {
var i = 0;
var j = 0;
var index = -1;
var lFound = false;
var aDenorm = [];
var hashtable = [];
var aRange1 = "";
var aRange2 = "";
joinType = DefaultTo(joinType, "INNER").toUpperCase();
// the 6 lines below are used for debugging
//range1 = "Employees";
//range1 = "Employees!A2:C12";
//range2 = "Orders";
//primaryKey = 1;
//foreignKey = 3;
//joinType = "LEFT";
// Sheets starts numbering columns starting with "1", arrays are zero-based
primaryKey -= 1;
foreignKey -= 1;
// check if range is not an array
if (typeof range1 !== 'object') {
// Determine if range is a1Notation and load data into an array
if (range1.indexOf(":") !== -1) {
aRange1 = ss.getRange(range1).getValues();
} else {
aRange1 = ss.getRangeByName(range1).getValues();
}
} else {
aRange1 = range1;
}
if (typeof range2 !== 'object') {
if (range2.indexOf(":") !== -1) {
aRange2 = ss.getRange(range2).getValues();
} else {
aRange2 = ss.getRangeByName(range2).getValues();
}
} else {
aRange2 = range2;
}
// make similar structured temp arrays with NULL elements
var tArray1 = MakeArray(aRange1[0].length);
var tArray2 = MakeArray(aRange2[0].length);
var lenRange1 = aRange1.length;
var lenRange2 = aRange2.length;
hashtable = getHT(aRange1, lenRange1, primaryKey);
for(i = 0; i < lenRange2; i++) {
index = hashtable.indexOf(aRange2[i][foreignKey]);
if (index !== -1) {
aDenorm.push(aRange1[index].concat(aRange2[i]));
}
}
// add left and full no matches
if (joinType == "LEFT" || joinType == "FULL") {
for(i = 0; i < lenRange1; i++) {
//index = aDenorm.indexOf(aRange1[i][primaryKey]);
index = aScan(aDenorm, aRange1[i][primaryKey], primaryKey)
if (index == -1) {
aDenorm.push(aRange1[i].concat(tArray2));
}
}
}
// add right and full no matches
if (joinType == "RIGHT" || joinType == "FULL") {
for(i = 0; i < lenRange2; i++) {
index = aScan(aDenorm, aRange2[i][foreignKey], primaryKey)
if (index == -1) {
aDenorm.push(tArray1.concat(aRange2[i]));
}
}
}
return aDenorm;
}
function getHT(aRange, lenRange, key){
var aHashtable = [];
var i = 0;
for (i=0; i < lenRange; i++ ) {
//aHashtable.push([aRange[i][key], i]);
aHashtable.push(aRange[i][key]);
}
return aHashtable;
}
function MakeArray(length) {
var i = 0;
var retArray = [];
for (i=0; i < length; i++) {
retArray.push("");
}
return retArray;
}
function DefaultTo(valueToCheck, valueToDefault) {
return typeof valueToCheck === "undefined" ? valueToDefault : valueToCheck;
}
// Search a multi-dimensional array for a value
function aScan(aValues, searchStr, searchCol) {
var retval = -1;
var i = 0;
var aLen = aValues.length;
for (i = 0; i < aLen; i++) {
if (aValues[i][searchCol] == searchStr) {
retval = i;
break;
}
}
return retval;
}
You can make a copy of the google sheet with data and examples here:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1vziuF8gQcsOxTLEtlcU2cgTAYL1eIaaMTAoIrAS7mnE/edit?usp=sharing