Tree-Structured
Indexes
Chapter 10
Comp 521 – Files and Databases Fall 2010 1
Introduction
As for any index, 3 alternatives for data entries k*:
index refers to actual data record with key value k
index refers to list of <k, rid> pairs
index refers to list of <k, [rid list]>
Choice is orthogonal to the indexing technique
used to locate data entries k*.
Tree-structured indexing techniques support
both range searches and equality searches.
ISAM: static structure; B+ tree: dynamic,
adjusts gracefully under inserts and deletes.
Comp 521 – Files and Databases Fall 2010 2
Range Searches
“Find all students with gpa > 3.0”
If data is in sorted file, do binary search to find first such
student, then scan to find others.
Cost of binary search can be quite high (must read entire page
to access one record).
Simple idea: Create an `index’ file.
k1 k2 kN Index File
Page 1 Page 2 Page 3 Page N Data File
Can do binary search on (smaller) index file!
Comp 521 – Files and Databases Fall 2010 3
ISAM – Indexed Sequential Access Method
index entry
P K P K 2 P K m Pm
0 1 1 2
Index file may be quite large.
Can be applied hierarchically!
Non-leaf
Pages
Leaf
Pages
Overflow
page
Primary pages
Leaf pages contain data entries (i.e. actual records or <key, rid> pairs.
Comp 521 – Files and Databases Fall 2010 4
Comments on ISAM
File creation: Leaf (data) pages allocated
sequentially, sorted by search key; then index
pages allocated, then space for overflow pages. Data
Pages
Index entries: <search key value, page id>;
they `direct’ search for data entries,
which are in leaf pages.
Index Pages
Search: Start at root; use key comparisons
to go to leaf. Cost log F N
F = # entries/index pg, N = # leaf pgs
Overflow pages
Insert: Find leaf data entry belongs to,
put it there if space is available, else allocate an
overflow page, put it there, and link it in.
Delete: Find and remove from leaf; if empty overflow page, de-
allocate.
Static tree structure: inserts/deletes affect only leaf pages.
Comp 521 – Files and Databases Fall 2010 5
Example ISAM Tree
Each node can hold 2 entries; no need for
`next-leaf-page’ pointers. (Why?)
Root
40
20 33 51 63
10* 15* 20* 27* 33* 37* 40* 46* 51* 55* 63* 97*
Comp 521 – Files and Databases Fall 2010 6
After Inserting 23*, 48*, 41*, 42* ...
“Static” Root
Index 40
Pages
20 33 51 63
Primary
Leaf
10* 15* 20* 27* 33* 37* 40* 46* 51* 55* 63* 97*
Pages
Overflow 23* 48* 41* “Dynamic”
Pages
42*
Comp 521 – Files and Databases Fall 2010 7
... Then Deleting 42*, 51*, 97*
Root
40
20 33 51 63
10* 15* 20* 27* 33* 37* 40* 46* 55* 63*
23* 48* 41*
Note that 51* appears in index, but not in leaf!
Comp 521 – Files and Databases Fall 2010 8
B+ Tree: Most Widely Used Index
Insert/delete at log F N cost; keep tree balanced.
(F = fanout, N = # leaf pages)
Minimum 50% occupancy. Each internal non-
root node contains d <= m <= 2d entries. The
parameter d is called the order of the tree.
Supports equality and range-searches efficiently.
Index Entries
(Direct search)
Data Entries
("Sequence set")
Comp 521 – Files and Databases Fall 2010 9
Example B+ Tree
Search begins at root, and key comparisons
direct it to a leaf (as in ISAM).
Search for 5*, 15*, all data entries >= 24* ...
Root
13 17 24 30
2* 3* 5* 7* 14* 16* 19* 20* 22* 24* 27* 29* 33* 34* 38* 39*
Based on the search for 15*, we know it is not in the tree!
Comp 521 – Files and Databases Fall 2010 10
B+ Trees in Practice
Typical order: 100. Typical fill-factor: 67%.
average fanout = 133
Typical capacities:
Height 4: 1334 = 312,900,700 records
Height 3: 1333 = 2,352,637 records
Can often hold top levels in buffer pool:
Level 1 = 1 page = 8 Kbytes
Level 2 = 133 pages = 1 Mbyte
Level 3 = 17,689 pages = 133 Mbytes
Comp 521 – Files and Databases Fall 2010 11
Inserting into a B+ Tree
Find correct leaf L.
Put data entry onto L.
If L has enough space, done!
Else, must split L (into L and a new node L2)
• Allocate new node
• Redistribute entries evenly
• Copy up middle key.
• Insert index entry pointing to L2 into parent of L.
This can happen recursively
To split index node, redistribute entries evenly, but push up
middle key. (Contrast with leaf splits.)
Splits “grow” tree; root split increases height.
Tree growth: gets wider or one level taller at top.
Comp 521 – Files and Databases Fall 2010 12
Inserting 8* into Example B+ Tree
Observe how
minimum
occupancy is
guaranteed in
Entry to be inserted in parent node.
both leaf and 5 (Note that 5 is copied up and
continues to appear in the leaf.)
index pg splits.
Note difference 2* 3* 5* 7* 8*
between copy-
up and push-up; Entry to be inserted in parent node.
(Note that 17 is pushed up and only
be sure you 17
appears once in the index.)
understand the
reasons for this. 5 13 24 30
Comp 521 – Files and Databases Fall 2010 13
Example B+ Tree After Inserting 8*
Root
17
5 13 24 30
2* 3* 5* 7* 8* 14* 16* 19* 20* 22* 24* 27* 29* 33* 34* 38* 39*
Notice that root was split, leading to increase in height.
In this example, we can
avoid split by redistributing
entries; however, this is
usually not done
in practice.
Comp 521 – Files and Databases Fall 2010 14
Deleting a Data Entry from a B+ Tree
Start
at root, find leaf L with entry, if it exists.
Remove the entry.
If L is at least half-full, done!
If L has only d-1 entries,
• Try to re-distribute, borrowing keys from sibling
(adjacent node with same parent as L).
• If redistribution fails, merge L and sibling.
Ifmerge occurred, must delete entry (pointing to L
or sibling) from parent of L.
Merge could propagate to root, decreasing height.
Comp 521 – Files and Databases Fall 2010 15
Example Tree After (Inserting 8*,
Then) Deleting 19* and 20* ...
Before:
Root
17
5 13 27 30
2* 3* 5* 7* 8* 14* 16* 22* 24* 27* 29* 33* 34* 38* 39*
Deleting 19* is easy.
Deleting 20* is done with redistribution.
Notice how middle key is copied up.
Comp 521 – Files and Databases Fall 2010 16
... And Then Deleting 24*
Must merge (twice).
Observe `toss’ of index
entry (27) in first merge 30
and `pull down’ of index
entry (17) in second. 22* 27* 29* 33* 34* 38* 39*
Root
Result: 5 13 17 30
2* 3* 5* 7* 8* 14* 16* 22* 27* 29* 33* 34* 38* 39*
Comp 521 – Files and Databases Fall 2010 17
Example of Non-leaf Redistribution
Tree is shown below during deletion of 24*. (What
could be a possible initial tree?)
In contrast to previous example, can redistribute
entry from left child of root to right child.
Root
22
5 13 17 20 30
2* 3* 5* 7* 8* 14* 16* 17* 18* 20* 21* 22* 27* 29* 33* 34* 38* 39*
Comp 521 – Files and Databases Fall 2010 18
Example of Non-leaf Redistribution
Tree is shown below during deletion of 24*. (What
could be a possible initial tree?)
In contrast to previous example, can redistribute
entry from left child of root to right child.
Root
22
5 13 17 20 30
2* 3* 5* 7* 8* 14* 16* 17* 18* 20* 21* 22* 27* 29* 33* 34* 38* 39*
Comp 521 – Files and Databases Fall 2010 19
After Redistribution
Intuitively, entries are redistributed by ‘pushing
through’ the splitting entry in the parent node.
It suffices to re-distribute index entry with key 20;
we’ve re-distributed 17 as well for illustration.
Root
17
5 13 20 22 30
2* 3* 5* 7* 8* 14* 16* 17* 18* 20* 21* 22* 27* 29* 33* 34* 38* 39*
Comp 521 – Files and Databases Fall 2010 20
Prefix Key Compression
Important to increase fan-out. (Why?)
Key values in index entries only “direct traffic”;
can often compress them.
E.g., If we have adjacent index entries with search
key values Dannon Yogurt, David Smith and
Devarakonda Murthy, we can abbreviate David Smith
to Dav. (The other keys can be compressed too ...)
• Is this correct? Not quite! What if there is a data entry
Davey Jones? (Can only compress David Smith to Davi)
• In general, while compressing, must leave each index entry
greater than every key value (in any subtree) to its left.
Insert/delete must be suitably modified.
Comp 521 – Files and Databases Fall 2010 21
Bulk Loading of a B+ Tree
Ifwe have a large collection of records, and we
want to create a B+ tree on some field, doing so
by repeatedly inserting records is very slow.
Bulk Loading can be done much more efficiently.
Initialization: Sort all data entries, insert pointer
to first (leaf) page in a new (root) page.
Root
Sorted pages of data entries; not yet in B+ tree
3* 4* 6* 9* 10* 11* 12* 13* 20* 22* 23* 31* 35* 36* 38* 41* 44*
Comp 521 – Files and Databases Fall 2010 22
Bulk Loading (Contd.)
Root
Index entries for leaf 10 20
pages always
Data entry pages
entered into right- 6 12 23 35
not yet in B+ tree
most index page just
above leaf level.
3* 4* 6* 9* 10* 11* 12* 13* 20* 22* 23* 31* 35* 36* 38* 41* 44*
When this fills up,
it splits. (Split may Root 20
go up right-most
path to the root.) 10 35 Data entry pages
not yet in B+ tree
Much faster than
repeated inserts, 6 12 23 38
especially if one
considers locking! 3* 4* 6* 9* 10* 11* 12* 13* 20* 22* 23* 31* 35* 36* 38* 41* 44*
Comp 521 – Files and Databases Fall 2010 23
Summary of Bulk Loading
Option 1: multiple inserts.
Slow.
Does not give sequential storage of leaves.
Option 2: Bulk Loading
Has advantages for concurrency control.
Fewer I/Os during build.
Leaves will be stored sequentially (and linked, of
course).
Can control “fill factor” on pages.
Comp 521 – Files and Databases Fall 2010 24
A Note on “Order”
Order (d) concept replaced by physical space
criterion in practice (`at least half-full’).
Index pages can typically hold many more entries
than leaf pages.
Variable sized records and search keys mean differnt
nodes will contain different numbers of entries.
Even with fixed length fields, multiple records with
the same search key value (duplicates) can lead to
variable-sized data entries (if we use Alternative (3)).
Comp 521 – Files and Databases Fall 2010 25
Summary
Tree-structured indexes are ideal for range-
searches, also good for equality searches.
ISAM is a static structure.
Only leaf pages modified; overflow pages needed.
Overflow chains can degrade performance unless size
of data set and data distribution stay constant.
B+ tree is a dynamic structure.
Inserts/deletes leave tree height-balanced; log F N cost.
High fanout (F) means depth rarely more than 3 or 4.
Almost always better than maintaining a sorted file.
Comp 521 – Files and Databases Fall 2010 26
Summary (Contd.)
Typically, 67% occupancy on average.
Usually preferable to ISAM, modulo locking
considerations; adjusts to growth gracefully.
If data entries are data records, splits can change rids!
Key compression increases fanout, reduces height.
Bulk loading can be much faster than repeated
inserts for creating a B+ tree on a large data set.
Most widely used index in database management
systems because of its versatility. One of the most
optimized components of a DBMS.
Comp 521 – Files and Databases Fall 2010 27
