[CALCITE-4918] Add a VARIANT data type

• Type: Bug
• Status: Open
• Priority: Major
• Resolution: Unresolved
• Labels: pull-request-available
• Assignee: Mihai Budiu
• Reporter: Julian Hyde
• Created: 03/Dec/21 00:37
• Updated: 15/Nov/24 21:22

Description

Add a VARIANT data type. It would be a tagged union, and allow values of multiple types to be stored, along with a type indicator so that the actual type of each value can be discerned.

VARIANT is not in the SQL standard. I know of three databases that have a VARIANT type: MSSQL, Snowflake, Teradata. Calcite's VARIANT type will probably draw from all three; however, the goal is not full compliance with any of them, but useful functionality.

Issue Links

• is depended upon by: CALCITE-4919 Add a function to parse a JSON string into a VARIANT object
• relates to: CALCITE-1257 Late-binding schema
• relates to: CALCITE-4872 UNKNOWN SqlTypeName erroneously treated as NULL
• links to: GitHub Pull Request #3947