Hoe sql met-recursieve instructie geïnterpreteerd?

Er vindt hier geen "recursie" plaats en ik denk dat je hier in de war raakt.

Uit de PostgreSQL-documentatie:http://www.postgresql.org/docs/9.4/static/queries-with.html

Note: Strictly speaking, this process is iteration not recursion, 
but RECURSIVE is the terminology chosen by the SQL standards committee.

Om deze zin te parafraseren:een WITH RECURSIVE kan worden bekeken als een eenvoudige WHILE lus.

WITH RECURSIVE t(n) AS (
  VALUES (1)
  UNION ALL
  SELECT n+1 FROM t WHERE n < 100
)
SELECT * FROM t;

Hier is wat op maat gemaakte pseudo-code om dit proces in detail uit te leggen

# Step 1: initialisation
LET cte_result = EMPTY
LET working_table = VALUES (1)
LET intermediate_table = EMPTY

# Step 2: result initialisation, merge initialisation into cte_result
cte_result = cte_result UNION working_table

# Step 3: iteration test
WHILE (working_table is not empty) DO
    # Step 4: iteration select, we substitute the self-reference with working_table
    intermediate_table = SELECT n+1 FROM working_table WHERE n < 100

    # Step 5: iteration merge, merge the iteration result into cte_result
    cte_result = cte_result UNION intermediate_table

    # Step 6: iteration end, prepare for next iteration
    working_table = intermediate_table
    intermediate_table = EMPTY
END WHILE

# Step 7: return
RETURN cte_result

En een voorbeeld gebruiken

# Step 1: initialisation
cte_result: EMPTY    | working_table: 1        | intermediate_table: EMPTY

# Step 2: result initialisation
cte_result: 1        | working_table: 1        | intermediate_table: EMPTY

# Step 3: iteration test
count(working_table) = 1 # OK
# Step 4: iteration select
cte_result: 1             | working_table: 1        | intermediate_table: 2
# Step 5: iteration merge
cte_result: 1, 2          | working_table: 1        | intermediate_table: 2
# Step 6: iteration end
cte_result: 1, 2          | working_table: 2        | intermediate_table: EMPTY

# Step 3: iteration test
count(working_table) = 1 # OK
# Step 4: iteration select
cte_result: 1, 2         | working_table: 2        | intermediate_table: 3
# Step 5: iteration merge
cte_result: 1, 2, 3      | working_table: 2        | intermediate_table: 3
# Step 6: iteration end
cte_result: 1, 2, 3      | working_table: 3        | intermediate_table: EMPTY

# … 97 more iterations and you get this state
cte_result: 1, 2, …, 100  | working_table: 100       | intermediate_table: EMPTY

# Step 3: iteration test
count(working_table) = 1 # OK
# Step 4: iteration select, the iteration query does not return any rows due to the WHERE clause
cte_result: 1, 2, …, 100  | working_table: 100       | intermediate_table: EMPTY
# Step 5: iteration merge, nothing is merged into the cte_result
cte_result: 1, 2, …, 100  | working_table: 100       | intermediate_table: EMPTY
# Step 6: iteration end
cte_result: 1, 2, …, 100  | working_table: EMPTY | intermediate_table: EMPTY

# Step 3: iteration test
count(working_table) = 0 # STOP

# Step 7: return
cte_result: 1, 2, …, 100

Het resultaat van de CTE is dus alle getallen van 1 tot 100.