khalidmammadov opened a new pull request, #43651: URL: https://github.com/apache/spark/pull/43651
### What changes were proposed in this pull request? This PR adds a new method df.explainString() which produces the same output as df.explain() but instead of printing it returns the output as String. This output then can be manipupated easily by users and saved to external drives. This is frequently needed feature for performance optimization purposes. Users often want to look into this output in running systems and so would like to save/extract this output from running systems (with some settings toggle) for later analysis. Current API only provided for Scala i.e. `df.queryExecution.toString()` and also not located in intuitive place where average Spark user (i.e. non Expert/Scala dev) can see it immediately. For Python there are various workaround provided in Stackoverflow pages most of which suggesting to use internal Spark APIs e.g.: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/54124386/capturing-the-result-of-explain-in-pyspark Alternatively, I see most ofthen Python users just capturing std output as below which is another workaround and not first choice for regular Spark/Pyhton users. ``` with io.StringIO() as buf ...`: df.explain(True) ``` So, it would help users a lot to have this output avalilable as: `df.explainString()` i.e. next to `df.explain()` so users can easily locate it and use. ### Why are the changes needed? To help users debug performance issues on running systems ### Does this PR introduce _any_ user-facing change? Yes, adds a new DataFrame method ### How was this patch tested? New unit tests ### Was this patch authored or co-authored using generative AI tooling? No -- This is an automated message from the Apache Git Service. To respond to the message, please log on to GitHub and use the URL above to go to the specific comment. To unsubscribe, e-mail: [email protected] For queries about this service, please contact Infrastructure at: [email protected] --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [email protected] For additional commands, e-mail: [email protected]
