Hi all,

I have a table with 18m rows in a data warehouse. 3 m rows have a '-1' value
and 15 m rows have mostly distinct values. Is this a good candidate for a
histogram index? I searched for info but couldn't find anything useful (a
point in the direction of good documentation of this would be helpful).
TIA,

jabs.

"jabs" <no (AT) email (DOT) com> wrote

Hi jabs,

The selectivity of the column where the value = -1:

S = 3M / (3M + 15M) = 0.16666 (Subtract any NULLS from the 15M)

If No Histogram is Used: Then the selectivity of the column is
assumed to be uniformly distributed across -1 and all of the other
distinct values. You need to ascertain how many other distinct values
you have in the 15M. You imply that the 15M have many distinct values
If so, this is fairly selective; therefore, the column may be a good
choice for use as an index.

If a Histogram is Used: Then the data distribution information is
stored in the dictionary. This allows the optimizer to use this
information and compute the correct selectivity based on the data
distribution. In the above example, the selectivity, based on the
histogram data, is 0.1666. This may not be high enough to indicate to
the optimizer to use an index on the column in the execution plan; I'm
not sure based on what you've provided.

I hope this helps to indicate the general thinking in determining if
histograms can help.

Steve

Thank you both for your help!

"Stephen_CA" <stephen.bell (AT) sympatico (DOT) ca> wrote