Getting world state by value

I'm new to blockchain and working with hyperledger fabric (v:0.6 for now) to create an application for learning perspective.

I'm keeping a ledger of financial transactions on blockchain, soon as a transaction takes place (A web based component notifies on transaction occurrence and calls the chaincode).

The structure of transactions looks something like this:

type Transactions struct { 
    ReferenceNumber string `json:"ReferenceNumber"`
    BillNumber string `json:"BillNumber"`
	BillingCompany string `json:"BillingCompany"`
    Amount string `json:"Amount"`
    Status string `json:"Status"`
}

I json marshal this and save it to state with ReferenceNumber as the key.

Now I can get the transaction from state on the basis of ReferenceNumber. But what if I want to get the transaction from state on the basis of let's say 'Status' like how many transactions on the ledger have status as 'reconciled'.

Is there any way to query state not on the basis of key but value?

Worldstate level storage works at the {key,value} level. And as obvious its only intended for a single value lookup for a specified key. I think what you are looking for calls for a next level higher level of Abstraction of WorldState - called Table constructs.
fabric/examples/chaincode/go/asset_management_interactive/asset_management.go has an example on how to create a table with the columns you want. While defining the primary keys of your data structure to hold the transaction, you include Status as one of the keys and you would be able to retrieve data on the basis of Status as well.

Some sample code to create the table is as below

func createTableTwo(stub shim.ChaincodeStubInterface) error {
var columnDefsTableTwo []*shim.ColumnDefinition
columnOneTableTwoDef := shim.ColumnDefinition{Name: "colOneTableTwo",
Type: shim.ColumnDefinition_STRING, Key: true}
columnTwoTableTwoDef := shim.ColumnDefinition{Name: "colTwoTableTwo",
Type: shim.ColumnDefinition_INT32, Key: false}
columnThreeTableTwoDef := shim.ColumnDefinition{Name: "colThreeTableThree",
Type: shim.ColumnDefinition_INT32, Key: true}
columnFourTableTwoDef := shim.ColumnDefinition{Name: "colFourTableFour",
Type: shim.ColumnDefinition_STRING, Key: true}
columnDefsTableTwo = append(columnDefsTableTwo, &columnOneTableTwoDef)
columnDefsTableTwo = append(columnDefsTableTwo, &columnTwoTableTwoDef)
columnDefsTableTwo = append(columnDefsTableTwo, &columnThreeTableTwoDef)
columnDefsTableTwo = append(columnDefsTableTwo, &columnFourTableTwoDef)
return stub.CreateTable("tableTwo", columnDefsTableTwo)
}

Now to insert data into this table, as shown

if len(args) < 4 {
return nil, errors.New("insertRowTableTwo failed. Must include 4 column values")
}
col1Val := args[0]
col2Int, err := strconv.ParseInt(args[1], 10, 32)
if err != nil {
return nil, errors.New("insertRowTableTwo failed. arg[1] must be convertable to int32")
}
col2Val := int32(col2Int)
col3Int, err := strconv.ParseInt(args[2], 10, 32)
if err != nil {
return nil, errors.New("insertRowTableTwo failed. arg[2] must be convertable to int32")
}
col3Val := int32(col3Int)
col4Val := args[3]
var columns []*shim.Column
col1 := shim.Column{Value: &shim.Column_String_{String_: col1Val}}
col2 := shim.Column{Value: &shim.Column_Int32{Int32: col2Val}}
col3 := shim.Column{Value: &shim.Column_Int32{Int32: col3Val}}
col4 := shim.Column{Value: &shim.Column_String_{String_: col4Val}}
columns = append(columns, &col1)
columns = append(columns, &col2)
columns = append(columns, &col3)
columns = append(columns, &col4)
row := shim.Row{Columns: columns}
ok, err := stub.InsertRow("tableTwo", row)
if err != nil {
return nil, fmt.Errorf("insertRowTableTwo operation failed. %s", err)
}
if !ok {
return nil, errors.New("insertRowTableTwo operation failed. Row with given key already exists")
}

Now to query this data by not specifying all the keys, do as below

if len(args) < 1 {
return nil, errors.New("getRowsTableTwo failed. Must include at least key values")
}
var columns []shim.Column
col1Val := args[0]
col1 := shim.Column{Value: &shim.Column_String_{String_: col1Val}}
columns = append(columns, col1)
if len(args) > 1 {
col2Int, err := strconv.ParseInt(args[1], 10, 32)
if err != nil {
return nil, errors.New("getRowsTableTwo failed. arg[1] must be convertable to int32")
}
col2Val := int32(col2Int)
col2 := shim.Column{Value: &shim.Column_Int32{Int32: col2Val}}
columns = append(columns, col2)
}
rowChannel, err := stub.GetRows("tableTwo", columns)
if err != nil {
return nil, fmt.Errorf("getRowsTableTwo operation failed. %s", err)
}
var rows []shim.Row
for {
select {
case row, ok := <-rowChannel:
if !ok {
rowChannel = nil
} else {
rows = append(rows, row)
}
}
if rowChannel == nil {
break
}
}
jsonRows, err := json.Marshal(rows)
if err != nil {
return nil, fmt.Errorf("getRowsTableTwo operation failed. Error marshaling JSON: %s", err)
}
return jsonRows, nil

Once you have inserted the data, the API stub.GetRows("tableTwo", columns) lets you retrieve it without specifying all the key columns.

Above code is quoted from a file which was present in the Fabric github repo earlier in the following path gerrit/src/github.com/hyperledger/fabric/bddtests/chaincode/go/table/table.go

Hope this helps.

In Hyperledger Fabric v1.0 you can model your data as JSON and utilize CouchDB as the state database. In this case you can directly query on any field of the JSON.

There is an example of such data patterns in the marbles02 chaincode.

There are various other ledger and state database options in v1.0.