Oracle 19c Automatic Indexing: Poor Data Clustering With Autonomous Databases Part III (Star)

In Part I we looked at a scenario where an index was deemed to be too inefficient for Automatic Indexing to create a VALID index, because of the poor clustering of data within the table.

In Part II we improved the data clustering but the previous SQLs could still not generate a new Automatic Index because they had effectively been blacklisted.

So how do we get Automatic Indexing to improve the performance of these queries?

Basically, we need to run some new SQL statements to those previously run which have not been blacklisted, that can make the Automatic Indexing process kick in and create the necessary indexes.

For example, if we now run the following SQL statements that have not previously run:

select * from nickcave where code=1;

select * from nickcave where code=2;

select * from nickcave where code=3;

 

And now wait for the next Automatic Indexing process period and look at the following (partial) Automatic Indexing report:

 

REPORT

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
GENERAL INFORMATION
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Activity start               : 22-JUN-2020 04:26:31
Activity end                 : 22-JUN-2020 04:27:25
Executions completed         : 1
Executions interrupted       : 0
Executions with fatal error  : 0

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
SUMMARY (AUTO INDEXES)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Index candidates                              : 0
Indexes created (visible / invisible)         : 1 (1 / 0)
Space used (visible / invisible)              : 167.77 MB (167.77 MB / 0 B)
Indexes dropped                               : 0
SQL statements verified                       : 3
SQL statements improved (improvement factor)  : 3 (76x)
SQL plan baselines created                    : 0
Overall improvement factor                    : 76x


INDEX DETAILS
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The following indexes were created:
------------------------------------------------------------------------
| Owner | Table    | Index                | Key  | Type   | Properties |
------------------------------------------------------------------------
| BOWIE | NICKCAVE | SYS_AI_dh8pumfww3f4r | CODE | B-TREE | NONE       |
------------------------------------------------------------------------

VERIFICATION DETAILS
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The performance of the following statements improved:
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Parsing Schema Name  : BOWIE
SQL ID               : 5k1wmtu7um5q9
SQL Text             : select * from nickcave where code=1
Improvement Factor   : 76x

Execution Statistics:
-----------------------------

                   Original Plan                   Auto Index Plan
                   ----------------------------  ----------------------------
Elapsed Time (s):  1725103                       106145
CPU Time (s):      1534305                       62314
Buffer Gets:       291835                        779
Optimizer Cost:    9125                          792
Disk Reads:        0                             197
Direct Writes:     0                             0
Rows Processed:    500000                        100000
Executions:        5                             1

 

We can see that an index has indeed now been created on the CODE column because one of the new statements is now deemed to be 76x more efficient thanks to the new index.

If we look at details of this new Automatic Index:

 

SQL> select index_name, auto, constraint_index, visibility, compression, status, num_rows, leaf_blocks, clustering_factor
from user_indexes where table_name='NICKCAVE';

INDEX_NAME           AUT CON VISIBILIT COMPRESSION   STATUS     NUM_ROWS LEAF_BLOCKS CLUSTERING_FACTOR
-------------------- --- --- --------- ------------- -------- ---------- ----------- -----------------
SYS_AI_dh8pumfww3f4r YES NO  VISIBLE   DISABLED      VALID      10000000       19518             57983

SQL> select index_name, column_name, column_position from user_ind_columns
where table_name='NICKCAVE'
order by index_name, column_position;

INDEX_NAME           COLUMN_NAME          COLUMN_POSITION
-------------------- -------------------- ---------------
SYS_AI_dh8pumfww3f4r CODE                               1

 

We can see that the index is now indeed VALID and VISIBLE with a much improved Clustering Factor at just 57983.

If we now re-run newer SQL statement:

 

SQL> select * from nickcave where code=1;

100000 rows selected.

Execution Plan
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
| Id  | Operation                              | Name                | Rows  | Bytes | Cost (%CPU)| Time     |
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
|   0 | SELECT STATEMENT                      |                      |  100K | 3613K |  792   (2) | 00:00:01 |
|   1 |  PX COORDINATOR                       |                      |       |       |            |          |
|   2 |   PX SEND QC (RANDOM)                 | :TQ10001             |  100K | 3613K |  792   (2) | 00:00:01 |
|   3 |    TABLE ACCESS BY INDEX ROWID BATCHED| NICKCAVE             |  100K | 3613K |  792   (2) | 00:00:01 |
|   4 |     BUFFER SORT                       |                      |       |       |            |          |
|   5 |      PX RECEIVE                       |                      |  100K |       |  205   (4) | 00:00:01 |
|   6 |       PX SEND HASH (BLOCK ADDRESS)    | :TQ10000             |  100K |       |  205   (4) | 00:00:01 |
|   7 |        PX SELECTOR                    |                      |       |       |            |          |
|*  8 |           INDEX RANGE SCAN            | SYS_AI_dh8pumfww3f4r |  100K |       |  205   (4) | 00:00:01 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Predicate Information (identified by operation id):
---------------------------------------------------

   8 - access("CODE"=1)

Statistics
----------------------------------------------------------
          12  recursive calls
           0  db block gets
         779  consistent gets
           0  physical reads
         176  redo size
     2363897  bytes sent via SQL*Net to client
       73914  bytes received via SQL*Net from client
        6668  SQL*Net roundtrips to/from client
           2  sorts (memory)
           0  sorts (disk)
      100000  rows processed

 

We notice the SQL statement is now indeed using this new Automatic Index.

If we now re-run our original SQL statement that had been using a FTS execution plan and that we couldn’t make Automatic Indexing create a VALID index because when originally run, the data clustering was too poor within the table:

SQL> select * from nickcave where code=42;

100000 rows selected.

Execution Plan
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
| Id  | Operation                              | Name                | Rows  | Bytes | Cost (%CPU)| Time     |
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
|   0 | SELECT STATEMENT                      |                      |  100K | 3613K |  792   (2) | 00:00:01 |
|   1 |  PX COORDINATOR                       |                      |       |       |            |          |
|   2 |   PX SEND QC (RANDOM)                 | :TQ10001             |  100K | 3613K |  792   (2) | 00:00:01 |
|   3 |    TABLE ACCESS BY INDEX ROWID BATCHED| NICKCAVE             |  100K | 3613K |  792   (2) | 00:00:01 |
|   4 |     BUFFER SORT                       |                      |       |       |            |          |
|   5 |      PX RECEIVE                       |                      |  100K |       |  205   (4) | 00:00:01 |
|   6 |       PX SEND HASH (BLOCK ADDRESS)    | :TQ10000             |  100K |       |  205   (4) | 00:00:01 |
|   7 |        PX SELECTOR                    |                      |       |       |            |          |
|*  8 |         INDEX RANGE SCAN              | SYS_AI_dh8pumfww3f4r |  100K |       |  205   (4) | 00:00:01 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Predicate Information (identified by operation id):
---------------------------------------------------

    8 - access("CODE"=42)

Statistics
----------------------------------------------------------
          14  recursive calls
           4  db block gets
         780  consistent gets
         198  physical reads
       15224  redo size
     2363897  bytes sent via SQL*Net to client
       73914  bytes received via SQL*Net from client
        6668  SQL*Net roundtrips to/from client
           2  sorts (memory)
           0  sorts (disk)
      100000  rows processed

 

This query is now also finally using the newly created index, because the CBO now too deems it to be more efficient with an index based execution plan.

The moral of the story. Automatic Indexing may initially deem a potential index to not be efficient enough to be created. However, things may change such as the clustering of table data (or the distribution of data values, etc. etc.) that may make a new index now viable. This though requires a NEW SQL statement to be executed, such that a non-blacklisted SQL can invoke the Automatic Indexing process to create the necessary Automatic Index.

Of course, things may change in the future. Future releases may have the facility to automatically re-cluster the data in tables optimally based on existing workloads and may also have a mechanism to identify that things have sufficient “changed” such that previously “failed” SQL statements from an Automatic Indexing perspective may warrant reevaluation.

This has only been tested up to version Oracle Database 19.5 of the Oracle Autonomous Database environments.