[Feature Request] Default value for fields

[brucemen]

Currently, we're using Vespa for realtime application and many kafka stream apps pushing data from kafka into Vespa.

The problem that we face is update document with condition and set. If a document is not exits, it's ok but if other kafka streams push the document without a field, for example A (type int). After that we're using condition and set on that document, plus we using increment A by 1 then nothing happened. Maybe we need some way to declare default value for a field. @bratseth

I also notice that condition and set is doc level, maybe we need something like that at field level. It would be great !!!

Thanks you.

[kkraune]

Hi, there is no default value setting for fields in Vespa - you can use https://docs.vespa.ai/documentation/document-processing.html to make sure a field always has a value when written to

I am not sure I understand the question about the field level, as the condition is field-based: https://docs.vespa.ai/documentation/reference/document-select-language.html. If you write only to one field per update and instead do more updates, it could help - but that is more load. An example will help here

[brucemen]

Hi @kkraune, i think default value would be convenient to Vespa users. Document Proccessing may be helpful but it still complicated for dynamic usecase (add/remove/rename multi field).

[jobergum]

Conditional updates on field level is supported. Default values is currently not. So maybe this is a feature request for having to specify default values in the schema?

[brucemen]

Yes, like many databases, its very useful and remove complicated logic on user side.

[brucemen]

About Conditional and set updates on field level, i mean this syntax:

{
    "update": "id:customers:customers::147",
    "create": true,
    "fields": {
        "viewtime_sum": {
            "condition": "condition1",
            "increment": 100
        },
        "view_count": {
            "condition": "condition2",
            "increment": 1
        }
    }
}

But it's ok for user do a separate update.

[kkraune]

ok, I will change this to a feature request for default field values then - thanks for the input!