Recursive Queries | SQL Fundamentals | Teradata Vantage - Recursive Queries - Advanced SQL Engine - Teradata Database

A recursive query is a way to query hierarchies of data, such as an organizational structure, bill of materials, and document hierarchy.

Specifying a Recursive Query

Example: Using the WITH RECURSIVE Clause

Consider the following employee table:

CREATE TABLE employee
   (employee_number INTEGER
   ,manager_employee_number INTEGER
   ,last_name CHAR(20)
   ,first_name VARCHAR(30));

The table represents an organizational structure containing a hierarchy of employee-manager data.

The following figure depicts what the employee table looks like hierarchically.

The following recursive query retrieves the employee numbers of all employees who directly or indirectly report to the manager with employee_number 801:

WITH RECURSIVE temp_table (employee_number) AS
( SELECT root.employee_number
  FROM employee root
  WHERE root.manager_employee_number = 801
UNION ALL
  SELECT indirect.employee_number
  FROM temp_table direct, employee indirect
  WHERE direct.employee_number = indirect.manager_employee_number
)
SELECT * FROM temp_table ORDER BY employee_number;

In the example, temp_table is a temporary named result set that can be referred to in the FROM clause of the recursive statement.

The initial result set is established in temp_table by the nonrecursive, or seed, statement and contains the employees that report directly to the manager with an employee_number of 801:

SELECT root.employee_number
FROM employee root
WHERE root.manager_employee_number = 801

The recursion takes place by joining each employee in temp_table with employees who report to the employees in temp_table. The UNION ALL adds the results to temp_table.

SELECT indirect.employee_number
FROM temp_table direct, employee indirect
WHERE direct.employee_number = indirect.manager_employee_number

Recursion stops when no new rows are added to temp_table.

The final query is not part of the recursive WITH clause and extracts the employee information out of temp_table:

SELECT * FROM temp_table ORDER BY employee_number;

Here are the results of the recursive query:

employee_number
---------------
1001
1002
1003
1004
1006
1008
1010
1011
1012
1014
1015
1016
1019

Using the RECURSIVE Clause in a CREATE VIEW Statement

Creating a view using the RECURSIVE clause is similar to preceding a query with the WITH RECURSIVE clause.

Consider the employee table that was presented in the previous example. The following statement creates a view named hierarchy_801 using a recursive query that retrieves the employee numbers of all employees who directly or indirectly report to the manager with employee_number 801:

CREATE RECURSIVE VIEW hierarchy_801 (employee_number) AS
( SELECT root.employee_number
  FROM employee root
  WHERE root.manager_employee_number = 801
UNION ALL
  SELECT indirect.employee_number
  FROM hierarchy_801 direct, employee indirect
  WHERE direct.employee_number = indirect.manager_employee_number
);

The seed statement and recursive statement in the view definition are the same as the seed statement and recursive statement in the previous recursive query that uses the WITH RECURSIVE clause, except that the hierarchy_801 view name is different from the temp_table temporary result name.

To extract the employee information, use the following SELECT statement on the hierarchy_801 view:

SELECT * FROM hierarchy_801 ORDER BY employee_number;

Here are the results:

employee_number
---------------
1001
1002
1003
1004
1006
1008
1010
1011
1012
1014
1015
1016
1019

Depth Control to Avoid Infinite Recursion

Here is an example that modifies the previous recursive query that uses the WITH RECURSIVE clause of the employee table to limit the depth of the recursion to five cycles:

WITH RECURSIVE temp_table (employee_number, depth) AS
( SELECT root.employee_number, 0 AS depth
  FROM employee root
  WHERE root.manager_employee_number = 801
UNION ALL
  SELECT indirect.employee_number, direct.depth+1 AS newdepth
  FROM temp_table direct, employee indirect
  WHERE direct.employee_number = indirect.manager_employee_number
  AND newdepth <= 5
)
SELECT * FROM temp_table ORDER BY employee_number;

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