Can I get the count of subdocuments that match a filter? - mongodb

Question

I have the following document
[
{
"_id": "624713340a3d2901f2f5a9c0",
"username": "fotis",
"exercises": [
{
"_id": "624713530a3d2901f2f5a9c3",
"description": "Sitting",
"duration": 60,
"date": "2022-03-24T00:00:00.000Z"
},
{
"_id": "6247136a0a3d2901f2f5a9c6",
"description": "Coding",
"duration": 999,
"date": "2022-03-31T00:00:00.000Z"
},
{
"_id": "624713a00a3d2901f2f5a9ca",
"description": "Sitting",
"duration": 999,
"date": "2022-03-30T00:00:00.000Z"
}
],
"__v": 3
}
]
And I am trying to get the count of exercises returned with the following aggregation (I know it is way easier to do it in my code, but I am trying to understand how to use mongodb queries)
db.collection.aggregate([
{
"$match": {
"_id": "624713340a3d2901f2f5a9c0"
}
},
{
"$project": {
"username": 1,
"exercises": {
"$slice": [
{
"$filter": {
"input": "$exercises",
"as": "exercise",
"cond": {
"$eq": [
"$$exercise.description",
"Sitting"
]
}
}
},
1
]
},
"count": {
"$size": "exercises"
}
}
}
])
When I try to access the exercises field using "$size": "exercises", I get an error query failed: (Location17124) Failed to optimize pipeline :: caused by :: The argument to $size must be an array, but was of type: string.
But when I access the subdocument exercises using "$size": "$exercises" I get the count of all the subdocuments contained in the document.
Note: I know that in this example I use $slice and I set the limit to 1, but in my code it is a variable.

Answer 1

You are actually on the right track. You don't really need the $slice. You can just use $reduce to perform the filtering. The reason that your count is not working is that the filtering and the $size are in the same stage. In such case, it will take the pre-filtered array to do the count. You can resolve this by adding a $addFields stage.
db.collection.aggregate([
{
"$match": {
"_id": "624713340a3d2901f2f5a9c0"
}
},
{
"$project": {
"username": 1,
"exercises": {
"$filter": {
"input": "$exercises",
"as": "exercise",
"cond": {
"$eq": [
"$$exercise.description",
"Sitting"
]
}
}
}
}
},
{
"$addFields": {
"count": {
$size: "$exercises"
}
}
}
])
Here is the Mongo playground for your reference.