Replace elide_data_returned with count timeout

optimade/server/config.py

@@ -157,9 +157,10 @@ class ServerConfig(BaseSettings):
         None, description="Host settings to pass through to the `Elasticsearch` class."
     )
 
-    elide_data_returned: bool = Field(
-        False,
-        description="Whether to skip counting all the results for every query (to set the `data_returned` field), as this may be too strenuous for large databases. Currently only supports MongoDB.",
+    mongo_count_timeout: int = Field(
+        5,
+        description="""Number of seconds to allow MongoDB to perform a full database count before falling back to `null`.
+This operation can require a full COLLSCAN for empty queries which can be prohibitively slow if the database does not fit into the active set, hence a timeout can drastically speed-up response times.""",
     )
 
     mongo_database: str = Field(

optimade/server/entry_collections/entry_collections.py

@@ -126,7 +126,7 @@ def insert(self, data: List[EntryResource]) -> None:
         """
 
     @abstractmethod
-    def count(self, **kwargs: Any) -> int:
+    def count(self, **kwargs: Any) -> Union[int, None]:
         """Returns the number of entries matching the query specified
         by the keyword arguments.
 

optimade/server/entry_collections/mongo.py

@@ -10,6 +10,7 @@
 
 if CONFIG.database_backend.value == "mongodb":
     from pymongo import MongoClient, version_tuple
+    from pymongo.errors import ExecutionTimeout
 
     if version_tuple[0] < 4:
         LOGGER.warning(
@@ -67,9 +68,9 @@ def __len__(self) -> int:
         """Returns the total number of entries in the collection."""
         return self.collection.estimated_document_count()
 
-    def count(self, **kwargs: Any) -> int:
+    def count(self, **kwargs: Any) -> Union[int, None]:
         """Returns the number of entries matching the query specified
-        by the keyword arguments.
+        by the keyword arguments, or `None` if the count timed out.
 
         Parameters:
             **kwargs: Query parameters as keyword arguments. The keys
@@ -80,11 +81,15 @@ def count(self, **kwargs: Any) -> int:
         for k in list(kwargs.keys()):
             if k not in ("filter", "skip", "limit", "hint", "maxTimeMS"):
                 del kwargs[k]
-        if "filter" not in kwargs:  # "filter" is needed for count_documents()
-            kwargs["filter"] = {}
+        if "filter" not in kwargs:
             return self.collection.estimated_document_count()
         else:
-            return self.collection.count_documents(**kwargs)
+            if "maxTimeMS" not in kwargs:
+                kwargs["maxTimeMS"] = 1000 * CONFIG.mongo_count_timeout
+            try:
+                return self.collection.count_documents(**kwargs)
+            except ExecutionTimeout:
+                return None
 
     def insert(self, data: List[EntryResource]) -> None:
         """Add the given entries to the underlying database.
@@ -164,13 +169,12 @@ def _run_db_query(
             criteria_nolimit = criteria.copy()
             criteria_nolimit.pop("limit", None)
             skip = criteria_nolimit.pop("skip", 0)
-            if CONFIG.elide_data_returned:
-                data_returned = None
-                # Only correct most of the time: if the total number of remaining results is exactly the page limit
-                # then this will incorrectly say there is more_data_available
+            data_returned = self.count(**criteria_nolimit)
+            # Only correct most of the time: if the total number of remaining results is exactly the page limit
+            # then this will incorrectly say there is more_data_available
+            if data_returned is None:
                 more_data_available = nresults_now == criteria.get("limit", 0)
             else:
-                data_returned = self.count(**criteria_nolimit)
                 more_data_available = nresults_now + skip < data_returned
         else:
             # SingleEntryQueryParams, e.g., /structures/{entry_id}