Feature: NN Vector search and similarity masking (partial vector search)

[orimay]

Is your feature request related to a problem?

I would like to be able to mask search vector, so that the masked points were not affecting similarity nor NN search. This would've been an amazing feature, allowing for complex dynamic search by some or many, but not all fields.

I am having a table with points:

DELETE FROM test;

DEFINE INDEX test_point ON test FIELDS point MTREE DIMENSION 3 DIST COSINE;

INSERT INTO test [
	{ id: test:0, point: [ 0f, 0f, 0f ] },
	{ id: test:1, point: [ 0f, 1f, 0f ] },
	{ id: test:2, point: [ 0f, 1f, 1f ] },
	{ id: test:3, point: [ 0f, 0f, 1f ] },
	{ id: test:4, point: [ 1f, 0f, 0f ] },
	{ id: test:5, point: [ 1f, 1f, 0f ] },
	{ id: test:6, point: [ 1f, 1f, 1f ] },
	{ id: test:7, point: [ 1f, 0f, 1f ] },
];

and I would like to query it by only two components, ignoring, let's say, the middle one. Currently, it's not possible

Describe the solution

I would like to be able to query it like this:

LET $pt = [ 0f, NONE, 1f ];

SELECT
    id,
    point,
    vector::similarity::cosine(point, $pt) AS similarity
FROM
    test
ORDER BY
    similarity DESC PARALLEL
;

This way, the second component won't influence similarity nor search as if it wasn't existing. Here's what I'd like to get:

[
	{
		id: test:0,
		point: [ 0, 0, 0 ],
		similarity: NaN
	},
	{
		id: test:1,
		point: [ 0, 1, 0 ],
		similarity: NaN
	},
	{
		id: test:2,
		point: [ 0, 1, 1 ],
		similarity: 1
	},
	{
		id: test:3,
		point: [ 0, 0, 1 ],
		similarity: 1
	},
	{
		id: test:6,
		point: [ 1, 1, 1 ],
		similarity: 0.7071067811865475f
	},
	{
		id: test:7,
		point: [ 1, 0, 1 ],
		similarity: 0.7071067811865475f
	},
	{
		id: test:4,
		point: [ 1, 0, 0 ],
		similarity: 0
	},
	{
		id: test:5,
		point: [ 1, 1, 0 ],
		similarity: 0
	}
]

Alternative methods

It's possible to use manual SELECT with WHERE condition, but it doesn't scale well.

SurrealDB version

https://surrealist.app/query

Contact Details

dmitrii.a.baranov@gmail.com

Is there an existing issue for this?

• I have searched the existing issues

Code of Conduct

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