Introduction To Reverse Key Indexes: Part II (Another Myth Bites The Dust)

In Part I, we saw how with Reverse Key Indexes, Oracle will basically take the indexed value, reverse it and then index the reversed value. As a result, data that would ordinarily be logically sorted within an index structure will now be randomly distributed. This therefore negates the use of Reverse Key Indexes with range predicates, with the CBO not even considering them in its costings.

This is all the information we need to dispel a rather bizarre suggestion that has been doing the rounds regarding using Reverse Key Indexes to deal with LIKE predicates that have a leading wildcard. For example, such a suggestion can be found here and within an OTN discussion here.

Basically the suggestion is to:

1) Create a Reverse Key Index on the column to be searched with a LIKE predicate having a leading wildcard (such %, _).

2) Instead of writing the query as usual, e.g.

SELECT * FROM bowie_table WHERE name LIKE ‘%BOWIE’

rewrite the query programmatically such as:

SELECT * FROM bowie_table WHERE name LIKE ‘EIWOB%’;

by reversing the required text and now having the wildcard at the end.

The Reverse Key Index stores the data in a reversed format identical to say ‘EIWOB’, so Oracle should be able to use the Reverse Key Index to efficiently find all rows that start with ‘EIWOB’ as they’re all grouped together within the index structure, right ?

Ummm, wrong.

Ignoring the fact the example in the above link is somewhat meaningless as it uses a leading and a trailing wildcard in both queries and so assuming the first query only has a leading wildcard and the second query only has a trailing wildcard, this suggested use of a Reverse Key Index can not possibly work on any current version of Oracle.

There are a few fundamental problems with this suggestion but in summary not only will it not work but worse, it will actually return the wrong results.

The suggestion is correct as far as indeed, using a normal index to return data with a LIKE statement containing a leading wildcard will negate the use of an index range scan, the CBO doesn’t even consider it. An index hint may push Oracle to use a Full Index Scan, but not an Index Range Scan.

However using a Reverse Index Key to solve this is unfortunately doomed to failure for two very simple reasons.

One, as we have already seen, Oracle also ignores Index Range Scans for Reverse Key Indexes with range predicates and unfortunately, a query such as WHERE name LIKE ‘EIWOB%’ is a range scan. The CBO simply doesn’t consider the Reverse Key Index in it’s deliberations.

Two, is of course that Oracle has no possible way of knowing that when you say LIKE ‘EIWOB%’, what you really mean is search for all records ending with BOWIE, LIKE ‘%BOWIE’. How can Oracle possibly know this ? If it could use the index (which it can’t) Oracle would only reverse the search string around anyways and use the index to look for indexed entries beginning with ‘BOWIE’ within the index structure, remembering everything is of course stored in reverse within the index.

So Oracle is actually searching for all records starting with ‘EIWOB’, not ending with ‘BOWIE’ which are two entirely different things.

The net result of using this suggested strategy is not good.

1) Oracle ignores the Reverse Key Index anyways as a LIKE ‘EIWOB%’ is a range predicate
2) Oracle therefore performs a Full Table Scan anyways
3) As the query is effectively searching for all records that start with ‘EIWOB’, not as expected all records that end with ‘BOWIE’, the two queries in the example will actually return completely different results

The Reverse Key Indexes Part II Demo shows how this suggested use of a Reverse Key Index is a very very bad idea …

However, if you want to solve the issue of efficiently finding the results of a LIKE ‘%BOWIE’, there are some possible approaches one could take that will use an index and return correct results.

One possible solution (as mentioned in the OTN link listed at the beginning) is to create a Function-Based Index using the REVERSE Function, (Warning: this function is undocumented and unsupported):

CREATE INDEX bowie_reverse_func_i ON bowie(REVERSE(name));

A query such as WHERE REVERSE(name) LIKE ‘EIWOB%’ or better still WHERE REVERSE(name) LIKE REVERSE(‘%BOWIE’) can now both potentially use the index.

The reverse function will reverse the name column (from say ‘DAVID BOWIE’ to ‘EIWOB DIVAD’) and the LIKE range predicate can work with the index as it’s a Function-Based index rather than a Reverse Key Index and it’s not using a LIKE with a leading wildcard. A column containing ‘DAVID BOWIE’, but stored as ‘EIWOB DIVAD’ within the index, can be found efficiently via an index range scan using this Function-Based Index.

I’ve included an example on effectively using a Function-Based Index with the Reverse Function at the end of the above demo. There’s also a discussion and other alternatives at Gints Plivna’s Blog.

Another alternative is to use an Oracle Text Index, which also has the capability of dealing logically with queries such as %BOWIE% but as they say, that’s a topic for another day.

More on Reverse Key Indexes to come as well.