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If the key is string, this code is working

dataset = Dataset[{
    <|"a" -> 1, "b" -> "x"|>,
    <|"a" -> 2, "b" -> "y"|>,
    <|"a" -> 3, "b" -> "z"|>,
    <|"a" -> 4, "b" -> "x"|>,
    <|"a" -> 5, "b" -> "y"|>,
    <|"a" -> 6, "b" -> "z"|>}];
dataset[GroupBy["b"]]

But the key is not always string(such as the result of Counts), for example:

dataset2 = Dataset[{
    <|"a" -> 1, 9 -> "x"|>,
    <|"a" -> 2, 9 -> "y"|>,
    <|"a" -> 3, 9 -> "z"|>,
    <|"a" -> 4, 9 -> "x"|>,
    <|"a" -> 5, 9 -> "y"|>,
    <|"a" -> 6, 9 -> "z"|>}];
dataset2[GroupBy[9]]

As we see, when the key is a digtal 9, the code cannot run normally..How to groupy it in such case?

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1 Answer 1

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We must use Key[9] in place of 9:

dataset2[GroupBy[Key[9]]]

dataset screenshot

Note that dataset visualizer does not do a very good job with the result (non-string association keys often confuse it). It is easier to see that we have obtained the correct result by unwrapping the data:

dataset2[GroupBy[Key[9]]] // Normal

(* <| "x" -> {<|"a" -> 1, 9 -> "x"|>, <|"a" -> 4, 9 -> "x"|>}
    , "y" -> {<|"a" -> 2, 9 -> "y"|>, <|"a" -> 5, 9 -> "y"|>}
    , "z" -> {<|"a" -> 3, 9 -> "z"|>, <|"a" -> 6, 9 -> "z"|>}
    |>
*)

Query Operator vs. Normal Function

This is a case where a query operator has different semantics from its liked-named function counterpart.

The normal function GroupBy takes a function argument for grouping purposes. Using the string "b" as a grouping function does not produce a particularly useful result:

dataset // Normal // GroupBy["b"]

(* <| "b"[<|"a" -> 1, "b" -> "x"|>] -> {<|"a" -> 1, "b" -> "x"|>}
    , "b"[<|"a" -> 2, "b" -> "y"|>] -> {<|"a" -> 2, "b" -> "y"|>}
    , "b"[<|"a" -> 3, "b" -> "z"|>] -> {<|"a" -> 3, "b" -> "z"|>}
    , "b"[<|"a" -> 4, "b" -> "x"|>] -> {<|"a" -> 4, "b" -> "x"|>}
    , "b"[<|"a" -> 5, "b" -> "y"|>] -> {<|"a" -> 5, "b" -> "y"|>}
    , "b"[<|"a" -> 6, "b" -> "z"|>] -> {<|"a" -> 6, "b" -> "z"|>}
    |>
*)

When using the GroupBy function, we must use Key["b"] instead of "b":

dataset // Normal // GroupBy[Key["b"]]

(* <| "x" -> {<|"a" -> 1, "b" -> "x"|>, <|"a" -> 4, "b" -> "x"|>}
    , "y" -> {<|"a" -> 2, "b" -> "y"|>, <|"a" -> 5, "b" -> "y"|>}
    , "z" -> {<|"a" -> 3, "b" -> "z"|>, <|"a" -> 6, "b" -> "z"|>}
    |>
*)

By contrast, the GroupBy query operator receives special treatment. The Details section of the Dataset documentation says this:

Syntactic Sugar

Functions such as CountsBy, GroupBy, and TakeLargestBy normally take another function as one of their arguments. When working with associations in a Dataset, it is common to use this "by" function to look up the value of a column in a table.

To facilitate this, Dataset queries allow the syntax "string" to mean Key["string"] in such contexts. For example, the query operator GroupBy["string"] is automatically rewritten to GroupBy[Key["string"]] before being executed.

Similarly, the expression GroupBy[dataset,"string"] is rewritten as GroupBy[dataset,Key["string"]].

It is because of this query syntactic sugar that we can omit the Key[...] wrapper for strings -- and only strings. So in a query we can write GroupBy["b"] but not GroupBy[9].

The moral of this story is that we cannot safely assume that a query operator behaves in exactly the same fashion as a function with the same name.

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