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Incorrect results with `annotate` + `values` + `union` in Django

Jump to edit to see more real-life code example, that doesn't work after changing the query order

Here are my models:

class ModelA(models.Model):
    field_1a = models.CharField(max_length=32)
    field_2a = models.CharField(max_length=32)


class ModelB(models.Model):
    field_1b = models.CharField(max_length=32)
    field_2b = models.CharField(max_length=32)

Now, create 2 instances each:

ModelA.objects.create(field_1a="1a1", field_2a="1a2")
ModelA.objects.create(field_1a="2a1", field_2a="2a2")
ModelB.objects.create(field_1b="1b1", field_2b="1b2")
ModelB.objects.create(field_1b="2b1", field_2b="2b2")

If I'll query for only one model with annotations, I get something like that:

>>> ModelA.objects.all().annotate(field1=F("field_1a"), field2=F("field_2a")).values("field1", "field2")
[{"field1": "1a1", "field2": "1a2"}, {"field1": "2a1", "field2": "2a2"}]

This is correct behavior. The problem starts, when I want to get union of those two models:

# model A first, with annotate
query = ModelA.objects.all().annotate(field1=F("field_1a"), field2=F("field_2a"))
# now union with model B, also annotated
query = query.union(ModelB.objects.all().annotate(field1=F("field_1b"), field2=F("field_2b")))
# get only field1 and field2
query = query.values("field1", "field2")

# the results are skewed:
assert list(query) == [
    {"field1": 1, "field2": "1a1"},
    {"field1": 1, "field2": "1b1"},
    {"field1": 2, "field2": "2a1"},
    {"field1": 2, "field2": "2b1"},
]

The assert passes correctly, which means that the results are wrong. It seems like the values() didn't match the variable name, it just iterated over the object as on a tuple. The value of field1 is actually the object's ID, and field2 is field1.

This is pretty easy to fix in such simple models, but my real models are quite complex, and they have a different number of fields. How do I union them correctly?

EDIT

Below you can find an extended example that fails regardless of the order of union() and values() - the models are slightly bigger now, and it seems that the different fields count somehow confuses Django:

# models

class ModelA(models.Model):
    field_1a = models.CharField(max_length=32)
    field_1aa = models.CharField(max_length=32, null=True)
    field_1aaa = models.CharField(max_length=32, null=True)
    field_2a = models.CharField(max_length=32)
    extra_a = models.CharField(max_length=32)


class ModelB(models.Model):
    extra = models.CharField(max_length=32)
    field_1b = models.CharField(max_length=32)
    field_2b = models.CharField(max_length=32)
# test

ModelA.objects.create(field_1a="1a1", field_2a="1a2", extra_a="1extra")
    ModelA.objects.create(field_1a="2a1", field_2a="2a2", extra_a="2extra")
    ModelB.objects.create(field_1b="1b1", field_2b="1b2", extra="3extra")
    ModelB.objects.create(field_1b="2b1", field_2b="2b2", extra="4extra")

    values = ("field1", "field2", "extra")

    query = (
        ModelA.objects.all()
        .annotate(
            field1=F("field_1a"), field2=F("field_2a"), extra=F("extra_a")
        )
        .values(*values)
    )
    query = query.union(
        ModelB.objects.all()
        .annotate(field1=F("field_1b"), field2=F("field_2b"))
        .values(*values)
    )
# outcome

assert list(query) == [
        {"field1": "1a1", "field2": "1a2", "extra": "1extra"},
        {"field1": "2a1", "field2": "2a2", "extra": "2extra"},
        {"field1": "3extra", "field2": "1b1", "extra": "1b2"},
        {"field1": "4extra", "field2": "2b1", "extra": "2b2"},
    ]
over 4 years ago · Santiago Trujillo
1 answers
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0

I dug through the docs and must admit I did not fully understand why your approach did not work (according to my understanding it should). What I believe is that applying union to querysets with different field names seems to be producing strange effects.

Anyway, applying values before doing the union seems to produce correct results:

query = ModelA.objects.all().annotate(field1=F("field_1a"), field2=F("field_2a")).values('field1', 'field2')
query = query.union(ModelB.objects.all().annotate(field1=F("field_1b"), field2=F("field_2b")).values('field1', 'field2'))

Which results in this queryset

[
    {'field1': '1a1', 'field2': '1a2'}, 
    {'field1': '1b1', 'field2': '1b2'}, 
    {'field1': '2a1', 'field2': '2a2'}, 
    {'field1': '2b1', 'field2': '2b2'}
]
over 4 years ago · Santiago Trujillo Report
Answer question
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