Status

Current state: Accepted

Discussion thread: https://lists.apache.org/thread/k6s50gcgznon9v1oylyh396gb5kgrwmd

Vote thread: https://lists.apache.org/thread/659wfgm94oq7484q2bjsqr02xv7r0r4y

JIRA: FLINK-32350 - Getting issue details... STATUS

Released: 1.18.0

Please keep the discussion on the mailing list rather than commenting on the wiki (wiki discussions get unwieldy fast).

Motivation

Stored procedure provides a convenient way to encapsulate complex logic to perform data manipulation or administrative tasks in external storage systems.  It's widely used in traditional databases and popular compute engines like Trino for it's convenience. 

However, Flink currently does not support calling stored procedure directly, which limits its ability to intergrate with external systems and makes it harder for users to access/manage their data in external systems with Flink.

Therefore, we propose adding support for call stored procedure in Flink to enable better integration with external storage systems. This will allow users access/manage their data  smoothly with just executing one call statement in Flink and bring users more efficient data processing workflows.

With this FLIP,  Flink will allow connector developers to develop their own built-in stored procedures, and then enables users to call these predefiend stored procedures .

Note: In this FLIP, we don't intend to allow users to customize their own stored procedure  for we don't want to expose too much to users too early.


Public Interfaces

Syntax

We propose the following synatax to call a stored procedure:

CALL [catalog_name.][database_name.]procedure_name ([ expression [, expression]* ] )

Note: The expression can be a function call.

To make user can know the procedures provided , we propose the follwing synatax to show the procedures:

SHOW PROCEDURES [ ( FROM | IN ) [catalog_name.]database_name ] [ [NOT] (LIKE | ILIKE) <sql_like_pattern> ]


Public interfaces changes

First, we propose a new interface name ProcedureContext  to provide a context for stored procedure. Currently, it provides StreamExecutionEnvironment to enable stored procedure to run a Flink job.

/** A context to provide necessary context used by stored procedure. */
@PublicEvolving
public interface ProcedureContext {

    /** Return the StreamExecutionEnvironment where the procedure is called. */
    StreamExecutionEnvironment getExecutionEnvironment();
}

Note: To avoid exposing to much to early to devs, we only put  StreamExecutionEnvironment to the ProcedureContext currently since it's the most needed for stored procedure. If we find we stored procedure will need other things, we put add it to the ProcedureContext in the future.


then, we propose a new interface Procedure for stored procedure. The stored procedure providers are expected to implement Procedure  to define their own procedure.

/**
 * Base interface representing a stored procedure that can be executed by Flink. An stored procedure
 * accepts zero, one, or multiple input parameters and then return the execution result of the
 * stored procedure.
 *
 * <p>The behavior of {@link Procedure} can be defined by implements a custom call method. An call
 * method must be declared publicly, not static, and named <code>call</code>. Call methods can also
 * be overloaded by implementing multiple methods named <code>call</code>. Currently, it doesn't
 * allows users to custom their own procedure, the customer {@link Procedure} can only be provided
 * by {@link Catalog}. To provide {@link Procedure}, {@link Catalog} must implement {@link
 * Catalog#getProcedure(ObjectPath)}.
 *
 * <p>When calling a stored procedure, Flink will always pass the <code>
 * org.apache.flink.table.procedure.ProcedureContext</code> which provides
 * StreamExecutionEnvironment currently as the first parameter of the <code>call</code> method. So,
 * the custom call method must accept the <code>org.apache.flink.table.procedure.ProcedureContext
 * </code> as the first parameter, and the other parameters of the <code>call</code> method are the
 * actual parameter of the stored procedure.
 *
 * <p>By default, input and output data types are automatically extracted using reflection. The
 * input arguments are derived from one or more {@code call()} methods. If the reflective
 * information is not sufficient, it can be supported and enriched with {@link DataTypeHint} and
 * {@link ProcedureHint}. If it's used to hint input arguments, it should only hint the input
 * arguments that start from the second argument since the first argument is always <code>
 * ProcedureContext</code> which doesn't need to be annotated with data type hint.
 *
 * <p>Note: The return type of the {@code call()} method should always be T[] where T can be atomic
 * type, Row, Pojo. Either an explicit composite type or an atomic type that is implicitly wrapped
 * into a row consisting of one field.
 *
 * <p>The following examples with pseudocode show how to write a stored procedure:
 *
 * <pre>{@code
 * // a stored procedure that try to rewrite data files for iceberg, it accept STRING
 * // and return an array of explicit ROW < STRING, STRING >.
 * class IcebergRewriteDataFilesProcedure implements Procedure {
 *   public @DataTypeHint("ROW< rewritten_data_files_count STRING, added_data_files_count STRING >")
 *          Row[] call(ProcedureContext procedureContext, String tableName) {
 *     // planning for scanning the table to do rewriting
 *     Table table = loadTable(tableName);
 *     List<CombinedScanTask> combinedScanTasks = planScanTask(table);
 *
 *     // now, rewrite the files according to the planning task
 *     StreamExecutionEnvironment env = procedureContext.getExecutionEnvironment();
 *     DataStream<CombinedScanTask> dataStream = env.fromCollection(combinedScanTasks);
 *     RowDataRewriter rowDataRewriter =
 *         new RowDataRewriter(table(), caseSensitive(), fileIO(), encryptionManager());
 *     List<DataFile> addedDataFiles;
 *     try {
 *       addedDataFiles = rowDataRewriter.rewriteDataForTasks(dataStream, parallelism);
 *     } catch (Exception e) {
 *       throw new RuntimeException("Rewrite data file error.", e);
 *     }
 *
 *     // replace the current files
 *     List<DataFile> currentDataFiles = combinedScanTasks.stream()
 *             .flatMap(tasks -> tasks.files().stream().map(FileScanTask::file))
 *             .collect(Collectors.toList());
 *     replaceDataFiles(currentDataFiles, addedDataFiles, startingSnapshotId);
 *
 *     // return the result for rewriting
 *     return new Row[] {Row.of(currentDataFiles.size(), addedDataFiles.size())};
 *   }
 * }
 *
 * // a stored procedure that accepts either LONG or STRING and
 * // return an array of STRING without without datatype hint.
 * class RollbackToSnapShotProcedure implements Procedure {
 *   public String[] call(ProcedureContext procedureContext, String tableName, Long snapshot) {
 *     Table table = loadTable(tableName);
 *     Long previousSnapShotId = table.currentSnapshot();
 *     table.manageSnapshots().rollbackTo(snapshotId).commit();
 *     return new String[] {
 *             "previous_snapshot_id: " + previousSnapShotId,
 *             "current_snapshot_id " + snapshot
 *     };
 *   }
 * }
 * }</pre>
 *
 * <p>In the API, a stored procedure can be used as follows:
 *
 * <pre>{@code
 * // for SQL users
 * TableEnvironment tEnv = ...
 * tEnv.executeSql("CALL rollback_to_snapshot('t', 1001)");
 * }</pre>
 */
@PublicEvolving
public interface Procedure {}


To make datatype hint available for Procedure , we propose annotation ProcedureHint  just like FunctionHint.

@PublicEvolving
@Retention(RetentionPolicy.RUNTIME)
@Target({ElementType.TYPE, ElementType.METHOD})
public @interface ProcedureHints {
    ProcedureHint[] value();
}


@PublicEvolving
@Retention(RetentionPolicy.RUNTIME)
@Target({ElementType.TYPE, ElementType.METHOD})
@Repeatable(ProcedureHints.class)
public @interface ProcedureHint {

    DataTypeHint[] input() default @DataTypeHint();

    boolean isVarArgs() default false;

    String[] argumentNames() default {""};

    DataTypeHint output() default @DataTypeHint();
}


Finally, we propose to add an new interface to Catalog  to provide Procedure  according to name; The connector devopler can then return the actual procedure in this method.

Besides, we propose to add an new interface for catalog to list the procedures

@PublicEvolving
public interface Catalog {
    /**
     * Get the procedure. procedure name should be handled in a case insensitive way.
     *
     * @param procedurePath path of the procedure
     * @return the requested function
     * @throws ProcedureNotExistException if the function does not exist in the catalog
     * @throws CatalogException in case of any runtime exception
     */
   default Procedure getProcedure(ObjectPath procedurePath)
            throws ProcedureNotExistException, CatalogException {
      throw new UnsupportedOperationException(String.format("getProcedure is not implemented for %s.", this.getClass()));     
   }

   /**
     * List the names of all procedures in the given database. An empty list is returned if no procedure. 
     *
     * @param dbName name of the database.
     * @return a list of the names of the procedures in this database
     * @throws DatabaseNotExistException if the database does not exist
     * @throws CatalogException in case of any runtime exception
     */
    default List<String> listProcedures(String dbName) throws DatabaseNotExistException, CatalogException {
       throw new UnsupportedOperationException(String.format("listProcedures is not implemented for %s.", this.getClass()));    
    }
 }


/** Exception for trying to operate on a procedure that doesn't exist. */
@PublicEvolving
public class ProcedureNotExistException extends Exception {
    private static final String MSG = "Procedure %s does not exist in Catalog %s.";

    public ProcedureNotExistException(String catalogName, ObjectPath functionPath) {
        this(catalogName, functionPath, null);
    }

    public ProcedureNotExistException(
            String catalogName, ObjectPath functionPath, Throwable cause) {
        super(String.format(MSG, functionPath.getFullName(), catalogName), cause);
    }
}


Proposed Changes

1:  In method FunctionCatalogOperatorTable#lookupOperatorOverloads, if the passed SqlFunctionCategory  is USER_DEFINED_PROCEDURE ,  get the procedure in Catalog  with the given SqlIdentifier,  and then wrap it to BridginSqlProcedure  which is intance of SqlFunction.

2: In BridgingSqlProcedure,  the type inference logic for procedure follows the  style of function, which will try to extract the datatype of arguments and return value from the call  method in the procedure or DataTypeHint  if annotated. The logic for extract datatype for procedure will much reuse the code for function but with a little of  adjustment for Procedure.

3: Add a class name SqlCallProcedureConverter which is used to convert the SqlNode for call procedure to CallProcedureOperation. In SqlCallProcedureConverter, if the SqlNode is instance of SqlBasicCall  and the operator is instance of SqlProcedureCallOperator, it should be call procedure statement, then convert it to CallProcedureOperation contains the procedure and the expression for arguments.

4: In method TableEnvironmentImpl#executeInternal, if the Operation  is intance of CallProcedureOperation , construnct a ProcedureContext, and pass it with the arguments specified by user to call the corresponding method procedure#call(xxx).

5: Get the result of procedure#call(xxx) , which should be T[]. Build a TableResult with the result so that the SqlClient can show the result of the call procedure to users.

Compatibility, Deprecation, and Migration Plan

N/A

Test Plan

UT & IT


Rejected Alternatives

If there are alternative ways of accomplishing the same thing, what were they? The purpose of this section is to motivate why the design is the way it is and not some other way.