Convert SQL to ActiveRecord - ruby-on-rails

What is the most appropriate way to convert the following SQL to an ActiveRecord query?
select count(*) from products where id in (
select product_id from store_locations
where store_id in (
select id from stores where store_definition_id = 1
)
)

This uses joins instead of sub queries, but if you're associations are setup correctly should work. I may have messed up the syntax a little bit, but I think it's right.
Product.joins(store_locations: :stores).where(stores: {store_definition_id: 1}).count
EDIT
The above is going to return more rows than you want as it each store_locations row will be returned with the product. Not good. So perhaps:
Product.where(id: StoreLocation.joins(:store).where(store: {store_definition_id: 1}).pluck(:product_id)).count

Related

Properly format an ActiveRecord query with a subquery in Postgres

I have a working SQL query for Postgres v10.
SELECT *
FROM
(
SELECT DISTINCT ON (title) products.title, products.*
FROM "products"
) subquery
WHERE subquery.active = TRUE AND subquery.product_type_id = 1
ORDER BY created_at DESC
With the goal of the query to do a distinct based on the title column, then filter and order them. (I used the subquery in the first place, as it seemed there was no way to combine DISTINCT ON with ORDER BY without a subquery.
I am trying to express said query in ActiveRecord.
I have been doing
Product.select("*")
.from(Product.select("DISTINCT ON (product.title) product.title, meals.*"))
.where("subquery.active IS true")
.where("subquery.meal_type_id = ?", 1)
.order("created_at DESC")
and, that works! But, it's fairly messy with the string where clauses in there. Is there a better way to express this query with ActiveRecord/Arel, or am I just running into the limits of what ActiveRecord can express?
I think the resulting ActiveRecord call can be improved.
But I would start improving with original SQL query first.
Subquery
SELECT DISTINCT ON (title) products.title, products.* FROM products
(I think that instead of meals there should be products?) has duplicate products.title, which is not necessary there. Worse, it misses ORDER BY clause. As PostgreSQL documentation says:
Note that the “first row” of each set is unpredictable unless ORDER BY is used to ensure that the desired row appears first
I would rewrite sub-query as:
SELECT DISTINCT ON (title) * FROM products ORDER BY title ASC
which gives us a call:
Product.select('DISTINCT ON (title) *').order(title: :asc)
In main query where calls use Rails-generated alias for the subquery. I would not rely on Rails internal convention on aliasing subqueries, as it may change anytime. If you do not take this into account you could merge these conditions in one where call with hash-style argument syntax.
The final result:
Product.select('*')
.from(Product.select('DISTINCT ON (title) *').order(title: :asc))
.where(subquery: { active: true, meal_type_id: 1 })
.order('created_at DESC')

Retrive records which are not referenced in other table, ActiveRecord query

There are 2 tables : User and Teacher. Teacher.user_id is from User. So, how do I find in a single query, all the users who are not in teachers.
I meant something along the lines :
User.not_in(Teacher.all)
You can use where.not query from ActiveRecord try something like below:
User.where.not(id: Teacher.pluck(:user_id).reject {|x| x.nil?})
Note: used reject method, in case you have nil values in some records.
The other users seem to have neglected the rails 3 tag (since removed based on the approved answer. My answer left for posterity) : Please try this
User.where("id NOT IN (?)",Teacher.pluck(:user_id).join(","))
This will become SELECT * FROM users WHERE id NOT IN (....) (two queries one to get the user_id from teachers and another to get the user(s) not in that list) and may fail based on the size of teacher table.
Other option is an arel table:
users = User.arel_table
User.where(users[:id].not_in(Teacher.select(:user_id).where("user_id IS NOT NULL")))
This should produce a single query similar to
SELECT * FROM users
WHERE id NOT IN ( SELECT user_id FROM teachers WHERE user_id IS NOT NULL)
(one query better performance) * syntax was not fully tested
Another single query option might be
User.joins("LEFT OUTER JOIN teachers ON teachers.user_id = users.id").
where("teachers.user_id IS NULL")
I think you should be able to do something like this
User.where.not(id: Teacher.ids)

Order with DISTINCT ids in rails with postgres

I have the following code to join two tables microposts and activities with micropost_id column and then order based on created_at of activities table with distinct micropost id.
Micropost.joins("INNER JOIN activities ON
(activities.micropost_id = microposts.id)").
where('activities.user_id= ?',id).order('activities.created_at DESC').
select("DISTINCT (microposts.id), *")
which should return whole micropost columns.This is not working in my developement enviornment.
(PG::InvalidColumnReference: ERROR: for SELECT DISTINCT, ORDER BY expressions must appear in select list
If I add activities.created_at in SELECT DISTINCT, I will get repeated micropost ids because the have distinct activities.created_at column. I have done a lot of search to reach here. But the problem always persist because of this postgres condition to avoid random selection.
I want to select based on order of activities.created_at with distinct micropost _id.
Please help..
To start with, we need to quickly cover what SELECT DISTINCT is actually doing. It looks like just a nice keyword to make sure you only get back distinct values, which shouldn't change anything, right? Except as you're finding out, behind the scenes, SELECT DISTINCT is actually acting more like a GROUP BY. If you want to select distinct values of something, you can only order that result set by the same values you're selecting -- otherwise, Postgres doesn't know what to do.
To explain where the ambiguity comes from, consider this simple set of data for your activities:
CREATE TABLE activities (
id INTEGER PRIMARY KEY,
created_at TIMESTAMP WITH TIME ZONE,
micropost_id INTEGER REFERENCES microposts(id)
);
INSERT INTO activities (id, created_at, micropost_id)
VALUES (1, current_timestamp, 1),
(2, current_timestamp - interval '3 hours', 1),
(3, current_timestamp - interval '2 hours', 2)
You stated in your question that you want "distinct micropost_id" "based on order of activities.created_at". It's easy to order these activities by descending created_at (1, 3, 2), but both 1 and 2 have the same micropost_id of 1. So if you want the query to return just micropost IDs, should it return 1, 2 or 2, 1?
If you can answer the above question, you need to take your logic for doing so and move it into your query. Let's say that, and I think this is pretty likely, you want this to be a list of microposts which were most recently acted on. In that case, you want to sort the microposts in descending order of their most recent activity. Postgres can do that for you, in a number of ways, but the easiest way in my mind is this:
SELECT micropost_id
FROM activities
JOIN microposts ON activities.micropost_id = microposts.id
GROUP BY micropost_id
ORDER BY MAX(activities.created_at) DESC
Note that I've dropped the SELECT DISTINCT bit in favor of using GROUP BY, since Postgres handles them much better. The MAX(activities.created_at) bit tells Postgres to, for each group of activities with the same micropost_id, sort by only the most recent.
You can translate the above to Rails like so:
Micropost.select('microposts.*')
.joins("JOIN activities ON activities.micropost_id = microposts.id")
.where('activities.user_id' => id)
.group('microposts.id')
.order('MAX(activities.created_at) DESC')
Hope this helps! You can play around with this sqlFiddle if you want to understand more about how the query works.
Try the below code
Micropost.select('microposts.*, activities.created_at')
.joins("INNER JOIN activities ON (activities.micropost_id = microposts.id)")
.where('activities.user_id= ?',id)
.order('activities.created_at DESC')
.uniq

Order by foreign key in activerecord: without a join?

I want to expand this question.
order by foreign key in activerecord
I'm trying to order a set of records based on a value in a really large table.
When I use join, it brings all the "other" records data into the objects.. As join should..
#table users 30+ columns
#table bids 5 columns
record = Bid.find(:all,:joins=>:users, :order=>'users.ranking DESC' ).first
Now record holds 35 fields..
Is there a way to do this without the join?
Here's my thinking..
With the join I get this query
SELECT * FROM "bids"
left join users on runner_id = users.id
ORDER BY ranking LIMIT 1
Now I can add a select to the code so I don't get the full user table, but putting a select in a scope is dangerous IMHO.
When I write sql by hand.
SELECT * FROM bids
order by (select users.ranking from users where users.id = runner_id) DESC
limit 1
I believe this is a faster query, based on the "explain" it seems simpler.
More important than speed though is that the second method doesn't have the 30 extra fields.
If I build in a custom select inside the scope, it could explode other searches on the object if they too have custom selects (there can be only one)
What you would like to achieve in active record writing is something along
SELECT b.* from bids b inner join users u on u.id=b.user_id order by u.ranking desc
In active record i would write such as:
Bids.joins("inner join users u on bids.user_id=u.id").order("u.ranking desc")
I think it's the only to make a join without fetching all attributes from the user models.

Rails 3 Comparing foreign key to list of ids using activerecord

I have a relationship between two models, Registers and Competitions. I have a very complicated dynamic query that is being built and if the conditions are right I need to limit Registration records to only those where it's Competition parent meets a certain criteria. In order to do this without select from the Competition table I was thinking of something along the lines of...
Register.where("competition_id in ?", Competition.where("...").collect {|i| i.id})
Which produces this SQL:
SELECT "registers".* FROM "registers" WHERE (competition_id in 1,2,3,4...)
I don't think PostgreSQL liked the fact that the in parameters aren't surrounded by parenthesis. How can I compare the Register foreign key to a list of competition ids?
you can make it a bit shorter and skip the collect (this worked for me in 3.2.3).
Register.where(competition_id: Competition.where("..."))
this will result in the following sql:
SELECT "registers".* FROM "registers" WHERE "registers"."competition_id" IN (SELECT "competitions"."id" FROM "competitions" WHERE "...")
Try this instead:
competitions = Competition.where("...").collect {|i| i.id}
Register.where(:competition_id => competitions)

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