>From the Flatbuffers internals doc[1] it appears they are the same: "Strings >are simply a vector of bytes, and are always null-terminated."
[1]: https://google.github.io/flatbuffers/flatbuffers_internals.html -David On Wed, Jul 7, 2021, at 05:08, Wes McKinney wrote: > On Tue, Jul 6, 2021 at 6:33 PM Micah Kornfield <emkornfi...@gmail.com> wrote: > > > > > > > > Right, I had wanted to focus the discussion on Flight as I think schema > > > evolution or multiplexing streams (more so the latter) is a property of > > > the > > > transport and not the stream format itself. If we are leaning towards just > > > schema evolution then maybe it makes sense to discuss it for the IPC > > > stream > > > format and leverage that in Flight. I'd be interested in what others > > > think. > > > > I tend to agree, I think stream multiplexing is likely a transport level > > issue. IMO I think schema evolution should be consistent with the IPC > > stream format and flight. > > > > > > > Nate: it may be worth starting a separate discussion about more general > > > metadata in the IPC message. I'm not aware of why key-value metadata was > > > chosen/if opaque bytes were considered in the past. > > > > > > I think this was an unfortunate design of the key value metadata in > > Schema.fbs, but I don't think I was around when this decision was made. > > I agree that it's unfortunate that we did not use [ byte ] instead of > string for the value in the KeyValue metadata — I think this was more > of an oversight than a deliberate choice (e.g. it was not our intent > to require binary data to be base64-encoded — this is something that > we have to do when encoding binary data in Thrift KeyValue metadata > for Parquet, for example). Is the binary representation of [byte] > different from string? > > > > > Side Question: Why isn't the IPC stream format a series of the flight > > > protobufs? > > > > In addition to what David said, protobufs can't be read directly from a > > memory-mapped file (they need decoding). This was one of the design > > considerations of using flatbuffers and IPC Stream/File format. > > > > I was thinking Micah's comment is more that whatever we do, it should be > > > clearly specified and edge cases should be considered, especially if we > > > might want to 'backport' this into the stream format later. > > > > > > Yes, for dictionaries we just need to be careful to define semantics and > > ensure implementations are validating them with regards to dictionaries. > > There likely isn't any need to change current implementations though. > > > > On Mon, Jun 28, 2021 at 1:25 PM David Li <lidav...@apache.org> wrote: > > > > > Right, I had wanted to focus the discussion on Flight as I think schema > > > evolution or multiplexing streams (more so the latter) is a property of > > > the > > > transport and not the stream format itself. If we are leaning towards just > > > schema evolution then maybe it makes sense to discuss it for the IPC > > > stream > > > format and leverage that in Flight. I'd be interested in what others > > > think. > > > > > > Especially if we are looking at multiplexing streams - I would wonder if > > > that's actually better served by making it easier to implement using the > > > Flight implementation as it stands (by managing concurrent RPC calls > > > and/or > > > performing the union-of-structs encoding trick for you), instead of having > > > to change the protocol. > > > > > > Nate: it may be worth starting a separate discussion about more general > > > metadata in the IPC message. I'm not aware of why key-value metadata was > > > chosen/if opaque bytes were considered in the past. Off the top of my head > > > if it's for on-disk storage and fully application-defined it may make > > > sense > > > to store as a separate file alongside the Arrow file (indexed by record > > > batch index) where you can take advantage of whatever format is most > > > suitable. > > > > > > -David > > > > > > On Sun, Jun 27, 2021, at 07:50, Gosh Arzumanyan wrote: > > > > Hi guys, > > > > > > > > 1. Regarding IPC vs Flight: in fact my initial suggestion was to add > > > > this > > > > feature starting from the IPC(I moved initial write up steps to the > > > bottom > > > > of the doc). Afterwards David suggested focusing on Flight and that's > > > > how > > > > we ended up with the protobufs change in the proposal. This being said I > > > do > > > > think that the place where this should be impemented is a good question > > > on > > > > its own. Maybe it makes sense to have this kind of a feature in IPC and > > > > somehow use it in Flight, maybe not. > > > > 2. The point about dictionaries deserves a dedicated section in the > > > > proposal. Nate and David brought it up and shared some insights. I'll > > > > try > > > > to aggregate them and we can continue the discussion form there. > > > > > > > > Cheers, > > > > Gosh > > > > > > > > On Sat., 26 Jun. 2021, 17:26 Nate Bauernfeind, < > > > natebauernfe...@deephaven.io> > > > > wrote: > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > makes it more difficult to bring schema evolution back into the > > > > > > > > IPC Stream format (i.e. it would live only in flight) > > > > > > > > > > > > > > Gosh's proposal extends the flatbuffer structures not the > > > protobufs. > > > > > Can > > > > > > > you help me understand how difficult it would be to bring the > > > > > `schema_id` > > > > > > > approach to the IPC stream format? > > > > > > > > > > > > I thought we were talking solely about the Flight Protobuf > > > definitions - > > > > > > not the Flatbuffers (and the Google doc at least only talks about > > > > > > the > > > > > > Protobufs). > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > I somehow missed that schema_id is being added to protobuf in the > > > document. > > > > > It feels to me that the schema_id is a property that would ideally > > > > > only > > > > > apply to the RecordBatch. I better understand Micah's dictionary > > > concerns, > > > > > now, too. > > > > > > > > > > > Side Question: Why isn't the IPC stream format a series of the > > > > > > flight > > > > > > > protobufs? It's a real shame that there is no standard way to > > > > > > > capture/replay a stream with app_metadata. (Obviously ignoring the > > > > > > > annoyances around protobuf wrapping flatbuffers.) > > > > > > > > > > > > The IPC format was defined long before Flight, and Flight's > > > app_metadata > > > > > > was added after Flight's initial definition. Note an IPC message > > > > > > does > > > > > have > > > > > > a provision for key-value metadata, though I think APIs for that are > > > not > > > > > > fully exposed. (See ARROW-6940: > > > > > > https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/ARROW-6940 and despite my > > > comments > > > > > > there perhaps we need to unify or at least consider how Flight's > > > > > > app_metadata relates to the IPC message custom_metadata. Also > > > perhaps see > > > > > > ARROW-1059.) > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > KeyValue unfortunately is string to string. In flatbuffer strings are > > > only > > > > > UTF-8 or 7-bit ASCII. The app_metadata on the other hand is opaque > > > bytes. > > > > > The latter is a bit more useful. > > > > > > > > > > -- > > > > > > > > > > > > >
