ActiveRecord Query Union
Here's a quick little module I wrote that allows you to UNION multiple scopes. It also returns the results as an instance of ActiveRecord::Relation.
module ActiveRecord::UnionScope def self.included(base) base.send :extend, ClassMethods end module ClassMethods def union_scope(*scopes) id_column = "#{table_name}.id" sub_query = scopes.map { |s| s.select(id_column).to_sql }.join(" UNION ") where "#{id_column} IN (#{sub_query})" end endend
Here's the gist: https://gist.github.com/tlowrimore/5162327
Edit:
As requested, here's an example of how UnionScope works:
class Property < ActiveRecord::Base include ActiveRecord::UnionScope # some silly, contrived scopes scope :active_nearby, -> { where(active: true).where('distance <= 25') } scope :inactive_distant, -> { where(active: false).where('distance >= 200') } # A union of the aforementioned scopes scope :active_near_and_inactive_distant, -> { union_scope(active_nearby, inactive_distant) }end
I also have encountered this problem, and now my go-to strategy is to generate SQL (by hand or using to_sql
on an existing scope) and then stick it in the from
clause. I can't guarantee it's any more efficient than your accepted method, but it's relatively easy on the eyes and gives you a normal ARel object back.
watched_news_posts = Post.joins(:news => :watched).where(:watched => {:user_id => id})watched_topic_posts = Post.joins(:post_topic_relationships => {:topic => :watched}).where(:watched => {:user_id => id})Post.from("(#{watched_news_posts.to_sql} UNION #{watched_topic_posts.to_sql}) AS posts")
You can do this with two different models as well, but you need to make sure they both "look the same" inside the UNION -- you can use select
on both queries to make sure they will produce the same columns.
topics = Topic.select('user_id AS author_id, description AS body, created_at')comments = Comment.select('author_id, body, created_at')Comment.from("(#{comments.to_sql} UNION #{topics.to_sql}) AS comments")
Based on Olives' answer, I did come up with another solution to this problem. It feels a little bit like a hack, but it returns an instance of ActiveRelation
, which is what I was after in the first place.
Post.where('posts.id IN ( SELECT post_topic_relationships.post_id FROM post_topic_relationships INNER JOIN "watched" ON "watched"."watched_item_id" = "post_topic_relationships"."topic_id" AND "watched"."watched_item_type" = "Topic" WHERE "watched"."user_id" = ? ) OR posts.id IN ( SELECT "posts"."id" FROM "posts" INNER JOIN "news" ON "news"."id" = "posts"."news_id" INNER JOIN "watched" ON "watched"."watched_item_id" = "news"."id" AND "watched"."watched_item_type" = "News" WHERE "watched"."user_id" = ? )', id, id)
I'd still appreciate it if anybody has any suggestions to optimize this or improve the performance, because it's essentially executing three queries and feels a little redundant.