Using temporary, using filesort a bad idea in mysql?

Question

I am trying to optimize my mysql queries to avoid 'using temporary, using filesort'. I could use some help. First; here is the explain

Here is the Query

select pf.*,m.login,m.avatar 
from profile_friends pf, members m  
where pf.friend_id = m.id and pf.member_id = 16586 
order by m.lastLogin desc 
limit 0,24;


mysql> EXPLAIN select pf.*,m.login,m.avatar from profile_friends pf, members m  where pf.friend_id = m.id and pf.member_id = 16586 order by m.lastLogin desc limit 0,24;
+----+-------------+-------+--------+-----------------------------------------------------+-----------------+---------+--------------------------+------+----------------------------------------------+
| id | select_type | table | type   | possible_keys                                       | key             | key_len | ref                      | rows | Extra                                        |
+----+-------------+-------+--------+-----------------------------------------------------+-----------------+---------+--------------------------+------+----------------------------------------------+
|  1 | SIMPLE      | pf    | ref    | member_id_index,friend_id_index                     | member_id_index |       4 | const                    |  160 | Using where; Using temporary; Using filesort |
|  1 | SIMPLE      | m     | eq_ref | PRIMARY,member_id_privacy_index,id_last_login_index | PRIMARY         |       4 | mydb.pf.friend_id        |    1 | Using where                                  |

There are 2 tables involved. ProfileFriends (pf), and Members (m). This query is just trying to find the 'recent' 24 friends for this particular member id. Recent means sort by LastLogin date.

Thanks

Answer 1

It is a problem? Yeah.

Is it a problem when you're dealing with 160 rows? Nope.

"Filesort" is a method, not the actual creation of a file and sorting it. If we were talking about 160,000 rows instead of 160 rows, then there'd probably be reason to consider further optimizations.

Edit: Also, you omitted the actual query running time. You're hitting indexes and only working with a handful of rows. If this query is taking more than a fraction of a fraction of a second, it's probably not worth even looking at for optimization.

Answer 2

I think you should be able to avoid the temporary/filesort with an index on members (id,lastLogin) —in that order— but for that type of queries it's overkill and judging by your EXPLAIN it seems you've already tried that?

You might complement it with a PRIMARY/UNIQUE KEY on profile_friends (member_id,friend_id) and see how it works.

In last resort, if that query is executed so often and with so many record that you must have the fastest SELECT possible, you could denormalize your table and add a copy of your members.lastLogin column to profile_friends with an index on (member_id,lastLogin) . With that, you'd have no join, no filesort, no nothing. On the other hand, you'd have big UPDATE queries everytime anyone with many friends logs in. Again, this seems completely overkill for the kind of numbers you're talking about.

I almost forgot to address the original question:

Using temporary, using filesort a bad idea in mysql?

No it's not. If you can optimize it away easily then you should always seek "filesort-free" queries, but otherwise unless they pose a real performance problem you shouldn't worry about it. Filesort is part of the normal execution of a query.

Answer 3

That's the most efficient way to write that query.

Make sure that pf.friend_id , pf.member_id , and m.id have indices on them. Then it will use the indices to join the tables and filter the results.

That sort is going to come up, anyway, because of your order by .