ARQ - Aggregates

ARQ includes support for GROUP BY and counting. This was previously an ARQ extension but is now legal SPARQL 1.1

GROUP BY

A GROUP BY clause transforms a result set so that only one row will appear for each unique set of grouping variables. All other variables from the query pattern are projected away and are not available in the SELECT clause.

PREFIX

SELECT ?p ?q
{ . . .
}
GROUP BY ?p ?q

SELECT * will include variables from the GROUP BY but no others. This ensures that results are always the same - including other variables from the pattern would involve choosing some value that was not constant across each section of the group and so lead to indeterminate results.

The GROUP BY clause can involve an expression. If the expression is named, then the value is included in the columns, before projection. An unnamed expression is used for grouping but the value is not placed in the result set formed by the GROUP BY clause.

SELECT ?productId ?cost
{ . . .
}
GROUP BY ?productId (?num * ?price AS ?cost)

HAVING

A query may specify a HAVING clause to apply a filter to the result set after grouping. The filter may involve variables from the GROUP BY clause or aggregations.

SELECT ?p ?q
{ . . .
}
GROUP BY ?p ?q
HAVING (count(distinct *) > 1)

Aggregation

Currently supported aggregations:

Aggregator	Description
`count(*)`	Count rows of each group element, or the whole result set if no `GROUP BY`.
`count(distinct *)`	Count the distinct rows of each group element, or the whole result set if no `GROUP BY`.
`count(?var)`	Count the number of times `?var` is bound in a group.
`count(distinct ?var)`	Count the number of distinct values `?var` is bound to in a group.
`sum(?x)`	Sum the variable over the group (non-numeric values and unbound values are ignored).

When a variable is used, what is being counted is occurrences of RDF terms, that is names. It is not a count of individuals because two names can refer to the same individual.

If there was no explicit GROUP BY clause, then it is as if the whole of the result set forms a single group element. Equivalently, it is GROUP BY of no variables. Only aggregation expressions make sense in the SELECT clause as theer are no variables from the query pattern to project out.

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