No exposed ability to grab custom maps from output

[caamartin35]

Right now as I see it there is no ability to grab a custom map from the output. This is important when aggregating results using something like collect. Specifically, I have code that collects three nodes into a map as below:

MATCH (n:Model) 
      OPTIONAL MATCH (n)-[:LeftLink]->(d_left)
      OPTIONAL MATCH (n)-[:RightLink]->(d_right) 
      RETURN collect({{ node:n, d_left:d_left, d_right:d_right }}) as res;

This result in res being a BoltList of BoltMaps. Unfortunately because BoltMap isnt exposed, I cannot unpack this with something like let maps = row.get::<Vec<BoltMap>>("res").unwrap(); and because Row does not implement From<BoltType> I cannot use Row either.

I have made local changes that include a new exposed type call Map that wraps BoltMap and a exposes a single get method to allow users to use arbitrary output from the graph.

// row.rs

/// A map very similar to a `HashMap` that implements `TryFrom<BoltType>` to allow for retrieval.
#[derive(Debug)]
pub struct Map {
  inner: BoltMap,
}

impl Map {
  pub fn new(inner: BoltMap) -> Self {
    Map { inner }
  }

  pub fn get<T: std::convert::TryFrom<BoltType>>(&self, key: &str) -> Option<T> {
    self.inner.get(key)
  }
}

// convert.rs

impl TryFrom<BoltType> for Map {
  type Error = Error;

  fn try_from(input: BoltType) -> Result<Map> {
    match input {
      BoltType::Map(n) => Ok(Map::new(n)),
      _ => Err(Error::ConversionError),
    }
  }
}

If these changes seem reasonable I can create a pull request, or really any feedback on this would be appreciated. Maybe I am missing something already available to do this. Thanks!

[tausifcreates]

+1 please open a pr

[knutwalker]

You're right, getting a BoltMap is not possible right now, and there are other Bolt types that are not publicly accessible.

Before we're talking about adding a PR for this, I am currently rewriting a lot of the "get" functions to be based on serde instead of various TryFrom<BoltType>. It's not done yet, but you could play around with it if you want, it's in my fork: https://github.com/knutwalker/neo4rs/tree/serde-get

With this change .get::<Vec<BoltMap>> should work, as should .get::<CustomStruct> where CustomStruct is something that implements serde::Deserialize. The next release is planned for when the serde integration is finished, but I can't give a date for this. I would prefer to not do anymore in between releases that expose more of the BoltTypes, only for it to be changed again once the serde stuff is done.

[tausifcreates]

You're right, getting a BoltMap is not possible right now...

Thanks so much for your update, Eagerly waiting for this feat to drop.

[knutwalker]

We've just release 0.7.0-rc.1, the following should work (in fact, I'm gonna add this as a test case):

#[derive(Debug, Deserialize, PartialEq)]
struct Model {
    node: Node,
    d_left: Option<Node>,
    d_right: Option<Node>,
}

// optional if you want to map the row itself, not just the `res` column
#[derive(Deserialize)]
struct Res {
    res: Vec<Model>,
}

let model1 = BoltNode::new(BoltInteger::new(1), BoltList::new(), BoltMap::new());
let model2 = BoltNode::new(BoltInteger::new(2), BoltList::new(), BoltMap::new());
let models = HashMap::from_iter([("node", model1), ("d_left", model2)]);
let models = BoltList::from(vec![models.into()]);

let row = Row::new(
    vec!["res".into()].into(),
    vec![BoltType::List(models)].into(),
);

let m1 = row.get::<Vec<Model>>("res").unwrap();
let m2 = row.to::<Res>().unwrap().res;

assert_eq!(m1, m2);
assert_eq!(m1.len(), 1);

let m = &m1[0];

assert_eq!(m.node.id(), 1);
assert_eq!(m.d_left.as_ref().unwrap().id(), 2);
assert_eq!(m.d_right.as_ref(), None);