FetchedRows

FetchedRows is a term used in software development to denote the collection of data rows returned by a fetch operation from a data source, such as a database, a web API, or a file. It represents the actual data values retrieved rather than the query itself or metadata.

In practice, fetchedRows may be stored as a list, array, or other container in memory, and is used for downstream tasks such as rendering user interfaces, processing business logic, or exporting data. The source of the fetch could be a SQL query, a REST endpoint, or an ORM method; many frameworks expose a function that returns the fetchedRows or fills a local collection with the rows.

Fetching strategies: eager fetching loads all rows into fetchedRows at once, while lazy or streaming fetching adds rows to fetchedRows as they become available. Pagination and cursors can influence the size and lifetime of fetchedRows, limiting memory usage and enabling incremental rendering.

Considerations: the consistency of fetchedRows depends on the state of the data source; if the underlying data changes after fetch, fetchedRows may become stale. Large result sets can consume significant memory, so developers often implement pagination, filtering, or streaming. The term is often used informally; some languages or frameworks may name the concept differently (for example, resultSet, rows, or records).

See also: result set, cursor, fetch, pagination, lazy loading, data access layer.