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Retrieving and Querying Splink Results

When Splink returns results, it does so in the format of a SplinkDataFrame. This is needed to allow Splink to provide results in a uniform format across the different database backends

For example, when you run df_predict = linker.predict(), the result df_predict is a SplinkDataFrame.

A SplinkDataFrame is an abstraction of a table in the underlying backend database, and provides several convenience methods for interacting with the underlying table. For detailed information check the full API.

Converting to other types

You can convert a SplinkDataFrame into a Pandas dataframe using splink_df.as_pandas_dataframe().

To view the first few records use a limit statement: splink_df.as_pandas_dataframe(limit=10).

For large linkages, it is not recommended to convert the whole SplinkDataFrame to pandas because Splink results can be very large, so converting them into pandas can be slow and result in out of memory errors. Usually it will be better to use SQL to query the tables directly.

Querying tables

You can find out the name of the table in the underlying database using splink_df.physical_name. This enables you to run SQL queries directly against the results. You can execute queries using linker.misc.query_sql - this is the recommended approach as it's typically faster and more memory efficient than using pandas dataframes.

The following is an example of this approach, in which we use SQL to find the best match to each input record in a link_type="link_only" job (i.e remove duplicate matches):

# linker is a Linker with link_type set to "link_only"
df_predict = linker.predict(threshold_match_probability=0.75)

sql = f"""
with ranked as
(
select *,
row_number() OVER (
    PARTITION BY unique_id_l order by match_weight desc
    ) as row_number
from {df_predict.physical_name}
)

select *
from ranked
where row_number = 1
"""

df_query_result = linker.misc.query_sql(sql)  # pandas dataframe

Note that linker.misc.query_sql will return a pandas dataframe by default, but you can instead return a SplinkDataFrame as follows: 

df_query_result = linker.misc.query_sql(sql, output_type='splink_df')

Saving results

If you have a SplinkDataFrame, you may wish to store the results in some file outside of your database. As tables may be large, there are a couple of convenience methods for doing this directly without needing to load the table into memory. Currently Splink supports saving frames to either csv or parquet format. Of these we generally recommend the latter, as it is typed, compressed, column-oriented, and easily supports nested data.

To save results, simply use the methods to_csv() or to_parquet() - for example: 

df_predict = linker.inference.predict()
df_predict.to_parquet("splink_predictions.parquet", overwrite=True)
# or alternatively:
df_predict.to_csv("splink_predictions.csv", overwrite=True)

Creating a SplinkDataFrame

You can create a SplinkDataFrame for any table in your database. You will need to already have a linker to manage interactions with the database: 

import pandas as pd
import duckdb

from splink import Linker, SettingsCreator, DuckDBAPI
from splink.datasets import splink_datasets

con = duckdb.connect()
df_numbers = pd.DataFrame({"id": [1, 2, 3], "number": ["one", "two", "three"]})
con.sql("CREATE TABLE number_table AS SELECT * FROM df_numbers")

db_api = DuckDBAPI(connection=con)
df = splink_datasets.fake_1000

linker = Linker(df, settings=SettingsCreator(link_type="dedupe_only"), db_api=db_api)
splink_df = linker.table_management.register_table("number_table", "a_templated_name")
splink_df.as_pandas_dataframe()
```