Re: Interesting difference between nvl() and coalesce()

From: Jonathan Lewis <jonathan_at_jlcomp.demon.co.uk>
Date: Mon, 9 Dec 2019 09:59:53 +0000
Message-ID: <CWXP265MB11914E4E88CC0079439F8374A5580_at_CWXP265MB1191.GBRP265.PROD.OUTLOOK.COM>

>> I learned this during UKOUG Techfest 19 where I attended a "SQL Syntax: Oracle vs. ANSI. Fight!" by Alex Nuijten & Chris Saxon. Useful conference. ROI++ :D

>>>> In hindsight, I guess I'm more flabbergasted by the fact that I have either completely forgotten about this, or have never run into this before. And both of those worry me equally :)"

That should cheer Stefan up a little bit.

Regards
Jonathan Lewis

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From: oracle-l-bounce_at_freelists.org <oracle-l-bounce_at_freelists.org> on behalf of Maris Elsins <elmaris_at_gmail.com> Sent: 09 December 2019 07:59
To: andysayer_at_gmail.com
Cc: knecht.stefan_at_gmail.com; Chris Taylor; Mark W. Farnham; Stefan Koehler; oracle-l-freelists; woodwardinformatics_at_strychnine.co.uk Subject: Re: Interesting difference between nvl() and coalesce()

Hi,

(I didn't read all the updates, sorry if this was already mentioned)

NVL<https://docs.oracle.com/en/database/oracle/oracle-database/19/sqlrf/NVL.html#GUID-3AB61E54-9201-4D6A-B48A-79F4C4A034B2> evaluates all arguments but COALESCE<https://docs.oracle.com/en/database/oracle/oracle-database/19/sqlrf/COALESCE.html#GUID-3F9007A7-C0CA-4707-9CBA-1DBF2CDE0C87> (returns the first non-null argument) stops at the first non-null argument.

I learned this during UKOUG Techfest 19 where I attended a "SQL Syntax: Oracle vs. ANSI. Fight!" by Alex Nuijten & Chris Saxon. Useful conference. ROI++ :D

---
Maris Elsins




On Mon, Dec 9, 2019 at 9:17 AM Andy Sayer <andysayer_at_gmail.com<mailto:andysayer_at_gmail.com>> wrote:
“In hindsight, I guess I'm more flabbergasted by the fact that I have either completely forgotten about this, or have never run into this before. And both of those worry me equally :)”

I’m in the “didn’t everyone know this difference?” camp. I think the main problem here is that the issue is such a simple difference, it’s one you’ll either learn very early on or never (or when you hit something that causes a problem). The description of coalesce doing short circuiting is in the docs but coalesce is such an early learnt function that you probably don’t look it up in the docs.

There’s probably a whole bunch of these nuances with simple functions that you either learn very early on in your career or don’t.

In fairness to NVL, I think it’s mostly used to replace nulls with a constant, so short circuit evaluation wouldn’t be a big deal most of the time (although probably never hurts).

Just my 2c,
Andy

On Mon, 9 Dec 2019 at 03:18, Stefan Knecht <knecht.stefan_at_gmail.com<mailto:knecht.stefan_at_gmail.com>> wrote:
Yeah that's exactly it, Chris.

I can see it making sense to evaluate both expressions in a SQL context, for perhaps some or other performance benefit.

But if you look at it purely from a procedural perspective:

x := nvl(some_var, some_func);

It doesn't make a whole lot of sense to execute f2 if f1 is not null.

In this particular case, I used this simply as a shorthand for if some_var is null then some_func else some_var end if;

And I can definitely now answer the question Michael asked in his post "how difficult would it be to find that bug?": hella, hella difficult.

As for Mark's comments - the reason we do this is the fact that the code needs to run in two distinct environments. In one, the value we test will never be null, and in some it will always be null. In the latter case, we need to use the function to do a little bit of extra work. Using coalesce() in this case in lieu of nvl() will do exactly what we need.

In hindsight, I guess I'm more flabbergasted by the fact that I have either completely forgotten about this, or have never run into this before. And both of those worry me equally :)


Cheers

Stefan





On Mon, Dec 9, 2019 at 1:37 AM Chris Taylor <christopherdtaylor1994_at_gmail.com<mailto:christopherdtaylor1994_at_gmail.com>> wrote:
oooooh like I said, I figured I was missing something.  LOL

  I didn't realize the issue was more about the original NVL/NVL2 functions.

I can definitely see that side of it on the one hand, but on the other, those are also designed that way and have been around for a long time.

I guess I'm just surprised anyone would be grumpy about a provided function , when that function documented behavior is , erm, well, documented :)

Chris

On Sun, Dec 8, 2019, 11:12 AM Michael D O'Shea/Woodward Informatics Ltd <woodwardinformatics_at_strychnine.co.uk<mailto:woodwardinformatics_at_strychnine.co.uk>> wrote:
Hi Chris, not wishing to put words into Stefan’s mouth, I believe he is just pointing out an unexpected behavioural difference between two inbuilt Oracle functions.

The surprise is that NVL, NVL2, ... DECODE would be DESIGNED IN THE FIRST PLACE to execute an expression or function twice. It just makes no sense. I cannot think of another programming language where a form of a null coalescing operator would execute a function/expression twice. This is far from normal behaviour or expectation. Actually it is a man-trap, especially if the function caused side effects from dual execution or order of execution.

Stefan asked why.

I postulate just sloppy programming by Oracle.

Of course chronologically NVL etc. came first. Perhaps the programmers that wrote COALESCE did it properly second time around, or perhaps it is prescribed this way in the ANSI/ISO specs?

Mike


Michael D. O’Shea, https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaeldoshea
Woodward Informatics Ltd, http://www.strychnine.co.uk


Am 08.12.2019 um 16:52 schrieb Chris Taylor <christopherdtaylor1994_at_gmail.com<mailto:christopherdtaylor1994_at_gmail.com>>:

I'm a little confused by this thread (though I understand the effect) .

Coalesce by design/creation is supposed to stop at the first not null evaluation.  That's what it's for.   It's not for evaluating all given arguments passed to it.

So if you have code that needs to evaluate "all the things", then coalesce isn't the code you're looking for, correct?

I know I'm probably missing something or not tracking, but that function is designed to stop evaluating at the first not null evaluation.

Chris

On Sun, Dec 8, 2019, 10:01 AM Michael D O'Shea/Woodward Informatics Ltd <woodwardinformatics_at_strychnine.co.uk<mailto:woodwardinformatics_at_strychnine.co.uk>> wrote:



> So it appears that both NVL() and NVL2() are executing the function in the second argument, regardless of whether the first argument is NULL or not.



Yes.

I ranted about this a few years ago now here:  http://www.strychnine.co.uk/2016/10/junk-dna-junk-oracle-part-0000002/



> Does anyone see a reason why this is?



My conclusion …. just sloppy programming. Of course given the codebase built upon NVL, other NULL handling functions, and those with a failover value (eg. DECODE), the behaviour cannot be fixed without breaking the existing user codebase, as you have observed.

Mike


Michael D. O’Shea, https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaeldoshea
Woodward Informatics Ltd, http://www.strychnine.co.uk<http://www.strychnine.co.uk/>



Am 08.12.2019 um 15:37 schrieb Mark W. Farnham <mwf_at_rsiz.com<mailto:mwf_at_rsiz.com>>:

As for repairing your code, if a bit of code is only valid for an inbound null argument, that check for is not null turning the guts into a no-op is the cohesive solution (also known in ancient times as a "firewall."). You can do that with a wrapper and protect the fragile function within a package body or use a wide variety of ways to project the fragility, or you can do it in the function. Try to avoid doing it twice (or n) though: repetitive firewalls instead of encapsulation can become significant and might underflow routine detection in profilers despite being wasteful in aggregate. Avoid also replicating the "if is not null" inline source code wrapper, which is an example of writing redundant "sprinkled all over" application code that retains the overhead even after the function is encapsulated.

THE PRECISE formulation of where to put "firewalls" has in the past been something of a religious war. I am agnostic on that religious war other than holding it should be done a single way in a given application suite.

mwf

-----Original Message-----
From: oracle-l-bounce_at_freelists.org<mailto:oracle-l-bounce_at_freelists.org> [mailto:oracle-l-bounce_at_freelists.org] On Behalf Of Stefan Koehler
Sent: Sunday, December 08, 2019 3:26 AM
To: knecht.stefan_at_gmail.com<mailto:knecht.stefan_at_gmail.com>
Cc: oracle-l-freelists
Subject: Re: Interesting difference between nvl() and coalesce()

Hello Stefan,
ah OK. Just to get the complete picture, please be also aware about the impact on the CBO if you gonna change the code.

https://jonathanlewis.wordpress.com/2018/02/13/coalesce-v-nvl/

Best Regards
Stefan Koehler

Independent Oracle performance consultant and researcher
Website: http://www.soocs.de<http://www.soocs.de/>
Twitter: _at_OracleSK

Stefan Knecht <knecht.stefan_at_gmail.com<mailto:knecht.stefan_at_gmail.com>> hat am 8. Dezember 2019 um 09:20 geschrieben:


Perhaps to add a bit of detail - here it wasn't just a performance thing. It literally broke the code, because we have logic in the function that's called in the second argument of nvl(), and that logic is only valid if the first argument that came in, was indeed NULL.

Sigh.
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Received on Mon Dec 09 2019 - 10:59:53 CET