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Run a MongoDB Search Query

Overview

In this guide, you can learn how to use the Kotlin Sync driver to run MongoDB Search queries on a collection. MongoDB Search enables you to perform full-text searches on collections hosted on MongoDB Atlas. MongoDB Search indexes specify the behavior of the search and which fields to index.

Sample Data

The examples in this guide use the movies collection in the sample_mflix database from the Atlas sample datasets. To learn how to create a free MongoDB Atlas cluster and load the sample datasets, see the Get Started with Atlas guide. To learn more about aggregation operations and builders, see the Aggregation Operations guide.

Run a MongoDB Search Query

This section shows how to create an aggregation pipeline to run a MongoDB Search query on a collection. You can use the Aggregates.search() builder method to create a $search pipeline stage, which specifies the search criteria. Then, call the aggregate() method and pass your pipeline as a parameter.

Note

Only Available on Atlas for MongoDB v4.2 and later

This aggregation pipeline operator is only available for collections hosted on MongoDB Atlas clusters running v4.2 or later that are covered by a MongoDB Search index. Learn more about the required setup and the functionality of this operator from the MongoDB Search documentation.

Before running a MongoDB Search query, you must create a MongoDB Search index on your collection. To learn how to programmatically create a MongoDB Search index, see the Create a Search Index section in the Indexes guide.

MongoDB Search Example

This example runs a MongoDB Search query by performing the following actions:

Constructs a $search stage by using the Aggregates.search() builder method, instructing the driver to query for documents in which the title field contains the word "Alabama"
Constructs a $project stage by using the Aggregates.project() builder method, instructing the driver to include the title field in the query results
Passes the pipeline stages to the aggregate() method and prints the results

val pipeline: List<Bson> = listOf(
    search(SearchOperator.text(
        fieldPath("title"), "Alabama")),
    project(Projections.include("title"))
)
val results = collection.aggregate(pipeline)
results.forEach { doc ->
    println(doc.toJson())
}

{"_id": {"$oid": "..."}, "title": "Alabama Moon"}
{"_id": {"$oid": "..."}, "title": "Crazy in Alabama"}
{"_id": {"$oid": "..."}, "title": "Sweet Home Alabama"}

MongoDB Search Metadata

Use the searchMeta() method to create a $searchMeta pipeline stage, which returns only the metadata from the Atlas full-text search results.

Tip

Only Available on Atlas for MongoDB v4.4.11 and later

This aggregation pipeline operator is available only on MongoDB Atlas clusters running v4.4.11 and later.

The following example shows the near metadata for a MongoDB Search aggregation stage:

searchMeta(
    SearchOperator.near(2010, 1, fieldPath("year"))
)

Create Pipeline Search Stages

The Kotlin Sync driver provides helper methods for the following operators:

Operator	Description
autocomplete	Performs a search for a word or phrase that contains a sequence of characters from an incomplete input string.
compound	Combines two or more operators into a single query.
equals	Checks whether a field matches a value you specify. Maps to the `equals()` and `equalsNull()` methods.
exists	Tests if a path to a specified indexed field name exists in a document.
in	Performs a search for an array of BSON number, date, boolean, objectId, uuid, or string values at the given path and returns documents where the value of the field equals any value in the specified array.
moreLikeThis	Returns documents similar to input documents.
near	Supports querying and scoring numeric, date, and GeoJSON point values.
phrase	Performs a search for documents containing an ordered sequence of terms using the analyzer specified in the index configuration.
queryString	Supports querying a combination of indexed fields and values.
range	Supports querying and scoring numeric, date, and string values. Maps to the `numberRange()` and `dateRange()` methods.
regex	Interprets the query field as a regular expression.
text	Performs a full-text search using the analyzer that you specify in the index configuration.
wildcard	Enables queries which use special characters in the search string that can match any character.

Example Pipeline Search Stage

Note

Atlas Sample Dataset

This example uses the sample_mflix.movies collection from the Atlas sample datasets. To learn how to set up a free-tier Atlas cluster and load the sample dataset, see the Get Started with Atlas tutorial in the Atlas documentation.

Before you can run this example, you must create a MongoDB Search index on the movies collection that has the following definition:

{
  "mappings": {
    "dynamic": true,
    "fields": {
      "title": {
        "analyzer": "lucene.keyword",
        "type": "string"
      },
      "genres": {
        "normalizer": "lowercase",
        "type": "token"
      }
    }
  }
}

To learn more about creating MongoDB Search indexes, see the Create a Search Index section of the Indexes guide.

The following code creates a $search stage that has the following specifications:

Checks that the genres array includes "Comedy"
Searches the fullplot field for the phrase "new york"
Matches year values between 1950 and 2000, inclusive
Searches for title values that begins with the term "Love"

val searchStage = Aggregates.search(
    SearchOperator.compound()
        .filter(
            listOf(
                SearchOperator.`in`(fieldPath("genres"), listOf("Comedy")),
                SearchOperator.phrase(fieldPath("fullplot"), "new york"),
                SearchOperator.numberRange(fieldPath("year")).gtLt(1950, 2000),
                SearchOperator.wildcard(fieldPath("title"), "Love *")
            )
        )
)
val projectStage = Aggregates.project(
    Projections.include("title", "year", "genres"))
val pipeline = listOf(searchStage, projectStage)
val results = collection.aggregate(pipeline)
results.forEach { result -> println(result) }

{"_id": ..., "genres": ["Comedy", "Romance"], "title": "Love at First Bite", "year": 1979}
{"_id": ..., "genres": ["Comedy", "Drama"], "title": "Love Affair", "year": 1994}

To learn more about the MongoDB Search helper methods, see the SearchOperator interface reference in the Driver Core API documentation.

Additional Information

To learn more about MongoDB Search, see MongoDB Search in the Atlas documentation.

API Documentation

To learn more about the methods mentioned in this guide, see the following API documentation:

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