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avgMergeState

Description​

The MergeState combinator can be applied to the avg function to merge partial aggregate states of type AverageFunction(avg, T) and return a new intermediate aggregation state.

Example usage​

The MergeState combinator is particularly useful for multi-level aggregation scenarios where you want to combine pre-aggregated states and maintain them as states (rather than finalizing them) for further processing. To illustrate, we'll look at an example in which we transform individual server performance metrics into hierarchical aggregations across multiple levels: Server level → Region level → Datacenter level.

First we create a table to store the raw data:

CREATE TABLE raw_server_metrics
(
    timestamp DateTime DEFAULT now(),
    server_id UInt32,
    region String,
    datacenter String,
    response_time_ms UInt32
)
ENGINE = MergeTree()
ORDER BY (region, server_id, timestamp);

We'll create a server-level aggregation target table and define an Incremental materialized view acting as an insert trigger to it:

CREATE TABLE server_performance
(
    server_id UInt32,
    region String,
    datacenter String,
    avg_response_time AggregateFunction(avg, UInt32)
)
ENGINE = AggregatingMergeTree()
ORDER BY (region, server_id);

CREATE MATERIALIZED VIEW server_performance_mv
TO server_performance
AS SELECT
    server_id,
    region,
    datacenter,
    avgState(response_time_ms) AS avg_response_time
FROM raw_server_metrics
GROUP BY server_id, region, datacenter;

We'll do the same for the regional and datacenter levels:

CREATE TABLE region_performance
(
    region String,
    datacenter String,
    avg_response_time AggregateFunction(avg, UInt32)
)
ENGINE = AggregatingMergeTree()
ORDER BY (datacenter, region);

CREATE MATERIALIZED VIEW region_performance_mv
TO region_performance
AS SELECT
    region,
    datacenter,
    avgMergeState(avg_response_time) AS avg_response_time
FROM server_performance
GROUP BY region, datacenter;

-- datacenter level table and materialized view

CREATE TABLE datacenter_performance
(
    datacenter String,
    avg_response_time AggregateFunction(avg, UInt32)
)
ENGINE = AggregatingMergeTree()
ORDER BY datacenter;

CREATE MATERIALIZED VIEW datacenter_performance_mv
TO datacenter_performance
AS SELECT
      datacenter,
      avgMergeState(avg_response_time) AS avg_response_time
FROM region_performance
GROUP BY datacenter;

We'll then insert sample raw data into the source table:

INSERT INTO raw_server_metrics (timestamp, server_id, region, datacenter, response_time_ms) VALUES
    (now(), 101, 'us-east', 'dc1', 120),
    (now(), 101, 'us-east', 'dc1', 130),
    (now(), 102, 'us-east', 'dc1', 115),
    (now(), 201, 'us-west', 'dc1', 95),
    (now(), 202, 'us-west', 'dc1', 105),
    (now(), 301, 'eu-central', 'dc2', 145),
    (now(), 302, 'eu-central', 'dc2', 155);

We'll write three queries for each of the levels:

SELECT
    server_id,
    region,
    avgMerge(avg_response_time) AS avg_response_ms
FROM server_performance
GROUP BY server_id, region
ORDER BY region, server_id;

┌─server_id─┬─region─────┬─avg_response_ms─┐
│       301 │ eu-central │             145 │
│       302 │ eu-central │             155 │
│       101 │ us-east    │             125 │
│       102 │ us-east    │             115 │
│       201 │ us-west    │              95 │
│       202 │ us-west    │             105 │
└───────────┴────────────┴─────────────────┘

We can insert more data:

INSERT INTO raw_server_metrics (timestamp, server_id, region, datacenter, response_time_ms) VALUES
    (now(), 101, 'us-east', 'dc1', 140),
    (now(), 201, 'us-west', 'dc1', 85),
    (now(), 301, 'eu-central', 'dc2', 135);

Let's check the datacenter-level performance again. Notice how the entire aggregation chain updated automatically:

SELECT
    datacenter,
    avgMerge(avg_response_time) AS avg_response_ms
FROM datacenter_performance
GROUP BY datacenter
ORDER BY datacenter;

┌─datacenter─┬────avg_response_ms─┐
│ dc1        │ 112.85714285714286 │
│ dc2        │                145 │
└────────────┴────────────────────┘

See also​