Improve typcache: cache negative lookup results, add invalidation logic

Enterprise / PostgreSQL - Tom Lane [sss.pgh.pa.us] - 28 November 2014 11:19 UTC

Previously, if the typcache had for example tried and failed to find a hash opclass for a given data type, it would nonetheless repeat the unsuccessful catalog lookup each time it was asked again. This can lead to a significant amount of useless bufmgr traffic, as in a recent report from Scott Marlowe. Like the catalog caches, typcache should be able to cache negative results. This patch arranges that by making use of separate flag bits to remember whether a particular item has been looked up, rather than treating a zero OID as an indicator that no lookup has been done.

Also, install a credible invalidation mechanism, namely watching for inval events in pg_opclass. The sole advantage of the lack of negative caching was that the code would cope if operators or opclasses got added for a type mid-session; to preserve that behavior we have to be able to invalidate stale lookup results. Updates in pg_opclass should be pretty rare in production systems, so it seems sufficient to just invalidate all the dependent data whenever one happens.

Adding proper invalidation also means that this code will now react sanely if an opclass is dropped mid-session. Arguably, that's a back-patchable bug fix, but in view of the lack of complaints from the field I'll refrain from back-patching. (Probably, in most cases where an opclass is dropped, the data type itself is dropped soon after, so that this misfeasance has no bad consequences.)

e384ed6 Improve typcache: cache negative lookup results, add invalidation logic.
src/backend/utils/cache/typcache.c | 190 ++++++++++++++++++++++++------------
1 file changed, 127 insertions(+), 63 deletions(-)

Upstream: git.postgresql.org

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