I had a bit of trouble fully understanding the EAV concept or the pldb code. There's not a good overview of EAV architecture that doesn't focus on databases. I'm not much of a DB guy. So, I'm not sure if I got the essence of the EAV pattern with my new implementation, but here it is anyway:
I think the legacy of object-orientation was so embedded in my brain that I failed to see the simple solution: rows and columns. I was thinking of items in the map as "containers" of items, when I could have been thinking of them as rows in a table. The table is effectively a sparse matrix. The implementation's main map is of type { [row col]->Item }. It also uses two other maps: row-idx:{row->{col item}} and col-idx:{col->{row->item}}. Whenever an assoc occurs on key [r c] and item i, here is how the values are updated: main-map<-(assoc main-map [r c] i) row-idx<-(assoc-in row-idx [r c] i) col-idx<-(assoc-in col-idx [c r] i) This way, we efficiently maintain row-idx and col-idx, two complementary nested maps that mirror each others' structure. Did I get close to the EAV pattern here? Also, I wonder if this approach is scalable to higher-dimensional tables, for instance where each item is associated with a 3-tuple. On Monday, 18 April 2016 17:18:45 UTC-7, tbc++ wrote: > > Core.logic has one such implementation: > https://github.com/clojure/core.logic/blob/master/src/main/clojure/clojure/core/logic/pldb.clj > > <https://www.google.com/url?q=https%3A%2F%2Fgithub.com%2Fclojure%2Fcore.logic%2Fblob%2Fmaster%2Fsrc%2Fmain%2Fclojure%2Fclojure%2Fcore%2Flogic%2Fpldb.clj&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNGjJWdatQscPmDIx3xpBMuwPmOH7A> > > might be a place to start. > > On Mon, Apr 18, 2016 at 5:35 PM, JvJ <kfjwh...@gmail.com <javascript:>> > wrote: > >> Can you point me to a working example of one of these structures? >> >> On Monday, 18 April 2016 16:30:17 UTC-7, tbc++ wrote: >>> >>> And by "fairly common these days", I mean that I run into this sort of >>> structure a lot in clojure with anything that is trying to logic or query >>> operations. Probably isn't that common outside of projects in that domain. >>> >>> On Mon, Apr 18, 2016 at 5:28 PM, Timothy Baldridge <tbald...@gmail.com> >>> wrote: >>> >>>> assoc-in is defined in terms of assoc: >>>> https://github.com/clojure/clojure/blob/clojure-1.7.0/src/clj/clojure/core.clj#L5901 >>>> >>>> And this structure is fairly common these days, it's basically a index >>>> of tuples [e a v], and you're creating a eav index and then an av index. >>>> Datomic does this same sort of thing, for the datom [e a v t] it creates >>>> indices for :eavt :avet and a few others that escape my memory at the >>>> moment. >>>> >>>> On Mon, Apr 18, 2016 at 5:08 PM, JvJ <kfjwh...@gmail.com> wrote: >>>> >>>>> I'm implementing a map data structure where most of the values are >>>>> maps or sets, and these values can be cross-indexed by the keys they >>>>> contain. I don't know if it already has a name, but I'm calling it a >>>>> cross-map. It's similar to a two-way map, but they're not the same thing. >>>>> >>>>> For instance, a common operation would be something like "give me all >>>>> values of this map that contain the key :a." >>>>> >>>>> In order to do this efficiently, I'm maintaining a second map that >>>>> maps keys in the values of the main map to keys of the main map whose >>>>> values contain that key. >>>>> >>>>> If that sounds confusing, consider this: >>>>> main-map: >>>>> {:foo {:a 1 :b 2} :bar {:a 2 :c 4} :baz {:b 3 :c 5}} >>>>> >>>>> Corresponding cross-indices: >>>>> {:a #{:foo :bar} :b #{:foo :baz} :c #{:bar :baz}} >>>>> >>>>> As you can see, each key maintains references to those entries where >>>>> it is found. >>>>> >>>>> When a nested update occurs that adds an entry to one of the main >>>>> map's values, the efficient thing to do would be to simply conj that new >>>>> key onto its corresponding cross-index set. >>>>> >>>>> However, I am trying to implement this as a clojure IPersistentMap, >>>>> and the only method I can override is assoc, not assoc-in. >>>>> >>>>> Using regular assoc, I would have to compare the old value's keys to >>>>> the new value's keys and find the set difference of the two, which is not >>>>> an O(1) operation. >>>>> >>>>> Is there any way to override the behaviour of nested associations or >>>>> updates? >>>>> >>>>> Thanks >>>>> >>>>> -- >>>>> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google >>>>> Groups "Clojure" group. >>>>> To post to this group, send email to clo...@googlegroups.com >>>>> Note that posts from new members are moderated - please be patient >>>>> with your first post. >>>>> To unsubscribe from this group, send email to >>>>> clojure+u...@googlegroups.com >>>>> For more options, visit this group at >>>>> http://groups.google.com/group/clojure?hl=en >>>>> --- >>>>> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google >>>>> Groups "Clojure" group. >>>>> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send >>>>> an email to clojure+u...@googlegroups.com. >>>>> For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. >>>>> >>>> >>>> >>>> >>>> -- >>>> “One of the main causes of the fall of the Roman Empire was >>>> that–lacking zero–they had no way to indicate successful termination of >>>> their C programs.” >>>> (Robert Firth) >>>> >>> >>> >>> >>> -- >>> “One of the main causes of the fall of the Roman Empire was that–lacking >>> zero–they had no way to indicate successful termination of their C >>> programs.” >>> (Robert Firth) >>> >> -- >> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google >> Groups "Clojure" group. >> To post to this group, send email to clo...@googlegroups.com >> <javascript:> >> Note that posts from new members are moderated - please be patient with >> your first post. >> To unsubscribe from this group, send email to >> clojure+u...@googlegroups.com <javascript:> >> For more options, visit this group at >> http://groups.google.com/group/clojure?hl=en >> --- >> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups >> "Clojure" group. >> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an >> email to clojure+u...@googlegroups.com <javascript:>. >> For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. >> > > > > -- > “One of the main causes of the fall of the Roman Empire was that–lacking > zero–they had no way to indicate successful termination of their C > programs.” > (Robert Firth) > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Clojure" group. To post to this group, send email to clojure@googlegroups.com Note that posts from new members are moderated - please be patient with your first post. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to clojure+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/clojure?hl=en --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Clojure" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to clojure+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.