Types for arrays

  • BIGINT[]

    • Alias: INTEGER[]

  • VARCHAR[]

    • Aliases: CHAR[], BPCHAR[], STRING[], TEXT[]

  • BOOL[]

    • Aliases: BOOLEAN[]

Description

The BIGINT[], VARCHAR[], and BOOL[] types are used to store arrays of integers, arrays of strings, and arrays of boolean values, respectively.

The length of arrays in the same column of the table may not be the same.

Arrays can be used to store vectors such as embeddings (vector representations) of texts or images.

Examples

Create a table array_table and insert values of type VARCHAR and type VARCHAR[] into it:

CREATE TABLE array_table(text_column VARCHAR, array_column VARCHAR[]);

INSERT INTO array_table VALUES
    ('I love Tengri', ['I','love', 'Tengri']),
    ('I adore Tengri', ['I','adore', 'Tengri']);

SELECT * FROM array_table;
+----------------+------------------+
|   text_column  |   array_column   |
+----------------+------------------+
| I love Tengri  | {I,love,Tengri}  |
+----------------+------------------+
| I adore Tengri | {I,adore,Tengri} |
+----------------+------------------+

Note that in program output, arrays are displayed with curly braces {} and text values in them — without quotes.

Now let’s create an array_table table with columns of type BIGINT and BIGINT[] and insert numeric values and arrays of numbers into it:

CREATE TABLE array_table(number_column BIGINT, array_column BIGINT[]);

INSERT INTO array_table VALUES
    (2025, [2,0,2,5]),
    (0025, [0,0,2,5]);

SELECT * FROM array_table;
+---------------+--------------+
| number_column | array_column |
+---------------+--------------+
| 2025          | {2,0,2,5}    |
+---------------+--------------+
| 25            | {0,0,2,5}    |
+---------------+--------------+

Note that the numeric value 0025 in the programme output is cast to the normal form 25, and arrays in the programme output are shown through curly braces {}.