[SPARK-15062][SQL] fix list type infer serializer issue

## What changes were proposed in this pull request?

Make serializer correctly inferred if the input type is `List[_]`, since `List[_]` is type of `Seq[_]`, before it was matched to different case (`case t if definedByConstructorParams(t)`).

## How was this patch tested?

New test case was added.

Author: bomeng <bmeng@us.ibm.com>

Closes #12849 from bomeng/SPARK-15062.

2 files changed, 21 insertions, 5 deletions

diff --git a/sql/catalyst/src/main/scala/org/apache/spark/sql/catalyst/ScalaReflection.scala b/sql/catalyst/src/main/scala/org/apache/spark/sql/catalyst/ScalaReflection.scala
index be0d75a830..d158a64a85 100644
--- a/sql/catalyst/src/main/scala/org/apache/spark/sql/catalyst/ScalaReflection.scala
+++ b/sql/catalyst/src/main/scala/org/apache/spark/sql/catalyst/ScalaReflection.scala
@@ -509,6 +509,13 @@ object ScalaReflection extends ScalaReflection {
                 serializerFor(unwrapped, optType, newPath))
           }
 
+        // Since List[_] also belongs to localTypeOf[Product], we put this case before
+        // "case t if definedByConstructorParams(t)" to make sure it will match to the
+        // case "localTypeOf[Seq[_]]"
+        case t if t <:< localTypeOf[Seq[_]] =>
+          val TypeRef(_, _, Seq(elementType)) = t
+          toCatalystArray(inputObject, elementType)
+
         case t if definedByConstructorParams(t) =>
           val params = getConstructorParameters(t)
           val nonNullOutput = CreateNamedStruct(params.flatMap { case (fieldName, fieldType) =>
@@ -524,10 +531,6 @@ object ScalaReflection extends ScalaReflection {
           val TypeRef(_, _, Seq(elementType)) = t
           toCatalystArray(inputObject, elementType)
 
-        case t if t <:< localTypeOf[Seq[_]] =>
-          val TypeRef(_, _, Seq(elementType)) = t
-          toCatalystArray(inputObject, elementType)
-
         case t if t <:< localTypeOf[Map[_, _]] =>
           val TypeRef(_, _, Seq(keyType, valueType)) = t
 
diff --git a/sql/catalyst/src/test/scala/org/apache/spark/sql/catalyst/ScalaReflectionSuite.scala b/sql/catalyst/src/test/scala/org/apache/spark/sql/catalyst/ScalaReflectionSuite.scala
index 0672551b29..c00e9c7e39 100644
--- a/sql/catalyst/src/test/scala/org/apache/spark/sql/catalyst/ScalaReflectionSuite.scala
+++ b/sql/catalyst/src/test/scala/org/apache/spark/sql/catalyst/ScalaReflectionSuite.scala
@@ -23,8 +23,9 @@ import java.sql.{Date, Timestamp}
 import scala.reflect.runtime.universe.typeOf
 
 import org.apache.spark.SparkFunSuite
-import org.apache.spark.sql.catalyst.expressions.{BoundReference, SpecificMutableRow}
+import org.apache.spark.sql.catalyst.expressions.{BoundReference, Literal, NewInstance, SpecificMutableRow}
 import org.apache.spark.sql.types._
+import org.apache.spark.unsafe.types.UTF8String
 import org.apache.spark.util.Utils
 
 case class PrimitiveData(
@@ -277,6 +278,18 @@ class ScalaReflectionSuite extends SparkFunSuite {
     assert(anyTypes === Seq(classOf[java.lang.Object], classOf[java.lang.Object]))
   }
 
+  test("SPARK-15062: Get correct serializer for List[_]") {
+    val list = List(1, 2, 3)
+    val serializer = serializerFor[List[Int]](BoundReference(
+      0, ObjectType(list.getClass), nullable = false))
+    assert(serializer.children.size == 2)
+    assert(serializer.children.head.isInstanceOf[Literal])
+    assert(serializer.children.head.asInstanceOf[Literal].value === UTF8String.fromString("value"))
+    assert(serializer.children.last.isInstanceOf[NewInstance])
+    assert(serializer.children.last.asInstanceOf[NewInstance]
+      .cls.isInstanceOf[Class[org.apache.spark.sql.catalyst.util.GenericArrayData]])
+  }
+
   private val dataTypeForComplexData = dataTypeFor[ComplexData]
   private val typeOfComplexData = typeOf[ComplexData]