Accuracy of One Specific Query Vector

After a vector index is created, you may be interested to know how accurate your vector searches are. One possibility might be to run two queries using the same query vector, that is, one performing an approximate search using a vector index and the other performing an exact search without an index. Then, you need to manually compare the results to determine the real accuracy of your index.

Instead, you can use an index accuracy report provided by the DBMS_VECTOR.INDEX_ACCURACY_QUERY procedure. This procedure provides an accuracy report for a top-K index search for a specific query vector and a specific target accuracy. For syntax and parameter details, see INDEX_ACCURACY_QUERY.

declare
    q_v VECTOR; 
    report varchar2(128);
begin 
    q_v := to_vector('[0,1,1,0,0]');
    report := dbms_vector.index_accuracy_query(
        OWNER_NAME => 'COSMOS', 
        INDEX_NAME => 'GALAXIES_HNSW_IDX',
        qv => q_v, top_K =>10, 
        target_accuracy =>90 );
    dbms_output.put_line(report); 
end; 
/

The preceding example computes the top-10 accuracy of the GALAXIES_HNSW_IDX vector index using the embedding corresponding to the NGC 1073 galaxy and a 90% accuracy requested.

Accuracy achieved (100%) is 10% higher than the Target Accuracy requested (90%)

The possible parameters are:

• owner_name: Index owner name

• index_name: Index name

• qv: Query vector

• top_K: Top K value for accuracy computation

• target_accuracy: Target accuracy for the index

Accuracy of Automatically Captured Query Vectors

An overloaded version of the DBMS_VECTOR.INDEX_ACCURACY_REPORT function allows you to capture from your past workloads, accuracy values achieved by your approximate searches using a particular vector index for a certain period of time. Query vectors used for approximate searches are captured automatically in memory and persisted to a catalog table every hour.

The INDEX_ACCURACY_REPORT function computes the achieved accuracy using the captured query vectors for a given index. To compute the achieved accuracy for each query vector, the function compares the result set of approximate similarity searches with exact similarity searches for the same query vectors.

The accuracy findings are stored in dictionary and exposed using the DBA_VECTOR_INDEX_ACCURACY_REPORT dictionary view.

Here is a usage example of this function using the galaxies scenario:

VARIABLE t_id NUMBER;
BEGIN
  :t_id := DBMS_VECTOR.INDEX_ACCURACY_REPORT('VECTOR', 'GALAXIES_HNSW_IDX');
END;
/

You can also run the following statement to get the corresponding task identifier:

SELECT DBMS_VECTOR.INDEX_ACCURACY_REPORT('VECTOR', 'GALAXIES_HNSW_IDX');

The following are possible parameters for the INDEX_ACCURACY_REPORT function:

• owner_name (IN): Index owner name
• ind_name (IN): Index name
• start_time (IN): Query vectors captured from this time are considered for the accuracy computation. A NULL start_time uses query vectors captured in the last 24 hours.
• end_time (IN): Query vectors captured until this time are considered for accuracy computation. A NULL end_time uses query vectors captured from start_time until the current time.
• Return Values: A numeric task ID if the accuracy for the given index was successfully computed. Otherwise, a NULL task ID is returned.

You can see the analysis results using the DBA_VECTOR_INDEX_ACCURACY_REPORT view:

desc DBA_VECTOR_INDEX_ACCURACY_REPORT

 Name                                      Null?    Type
 ----------------------------------------- -------- ----------------------------
 TASK_ID                                            NUMBER
 TASK_TIME                                          TIMESTAMP(6)
 OWNER_NAME                                         VARCHAR2(128)
 INDEX_NAME                                         VARCHAR2(128)
 INDEX_TYPE                                         VARCHAR2(16)
 MIN_TARGET_ACCURACY                                NUMBER
 MAX_TARGET_ACCURACY                                NUMBER
 NUM_VECTORS                                        NUMBER
 MEDIAN_ACHIEVED_ACCURACY                           NUMBER
 MIN_ACHIEVED_ACCURACY                              NUMBER
 MAX_ACHIEVED_ACCURACY                              NUMBER

Select target accuracy values in the following statement:

SELECT MIN_TARGET_ACCURACY, MAX_TARGET_ACCURACY, num_vectors, MIN_ACHIEVED_ACCURACY, MEDIAN_ACHIEVED_ACCURACY, MAX_ACHIEVED_ACCURACY 
FROM DBA_VECTOR_INDEX_ACCURACY_REPORT WHERE task_id = 1;

MIN_TARGET_ACCURACY MAX_TARGET_ACCURACY NUM_VECTORS MIN_ACHIEVED_ACCURACY MEDIAN_ACHIEVED_ACCURACY MAX_ACHIEVED_ACCURACY
------------------- ------------------- ----------- --------------------- ------------------------ ---------------------
                  1                  10           2                    49                       57                    65
                 11                  20           3                    60                       73                    83
                 21                  30           3                    44                       64                    84
                 31                  40           2                    63                     76.5                    90
                 41                  50           3                    63                       81                    90
                 61                  70           2                    57                       68                    79
                 71                  80           3                    79                       87                    89
                 81                  90           3                    70                       71                    78
                 91                 100           4                    67                     79.5                    88

Each row in the output represents a bucket of 10 target accuracy values: 1-10, 11-20, 21-30, … , 91-100.

Consider the following partial statement that runs an approximate similarity search for a particular query vector and a particular target accuracy:

SELECT ...
FROM ...
WHERE ...
ORDER BY VECTOR_DISTANCE( embedding, :my_query_vector, COSINE )
FETCH APPROXIMATE FIRST 3 ROWS ONLY WITH TARGET ACCURACY 65;

Once the preceding approximate similarity search is run and captured by your accuracy report task, the value of NUM_VECTORS would be increased by one in row 6 (bucket values between 61 and 70) of the results of the select statement on the DBA_VECTOR_INDEX_ACCURACY_REPORT view for your task. NUM_VECTORS represents the number of query vectors that fall in a particular target accuracy bucket.

MIN_ACHIEVED_ACCURACY, MEDIAN_ACHIEVED_ACCURACY, and MAX_ACHIEVED_ACCURACY are the actual achieved accuracy values for the given target accuracy bucket.