Patent ID: 8738645

Claim:
A computer-implemented method of querying data from a system including a cluster of nodes, comprising: under control of one or more computing systems configured with executable instructions, receiving an instance query and a summary query, wherein the instance query provides for data transformation and the summary query provides for combining one or more results from the instance query, the instance query distinct from the summary query; determining a first set of nodes of the cluster that stores data corresponding to the instance query; scheduling a plurality of jobs corresponding to the instance query and the summary query, each job to be executed on a single node; causing each of the first set of nodes to process the instance query, at least a portion of the first set of nodes operable to process the instance query in parallel; determining a second set of nodes, each of the second set of nodes being a parent node to at least one child node of the first set of nodes in a hierarchical node structure, wherein at least one node is able to reside in the first set and the second set of nodes such that the at least one node may operate as a child node during processing of the instance query and a parent node during processing of the summary query; causing each of the second set of nodes to process the summary query using results from the instance query on each respective child node; and storing results of the summary query to a specified location.