Query and Write Operation Commands

MongoDB Insert command

It inserts one or multiple documents in the collection and also returns a document containing the status of all inputs. The insert method uses the insert command internally, which is provided by MongoDB.

Syntax:

snippet

{
   insert: <collection>,
   documents: [ <document>, <document>, <document>, ... ],
   ordered: <boolean>,
   writeConcern: { <write concern> },
   bypassDocumentValidation: <boolean>
}

Argument Fields

Field	Type	Description
insert	string	It is the name of the collection where we want to insert the element.
documents	array	It is an array of files that we want to insert into the collection
ordered	boolean	If it sets to true then it returns the result without inserting any remaining documents listed in the insert array when an insert operation fails, and vice versa
writeConcern	document	It is a document that defines the write concern of insert command.
bypass Document Validation	boolean	We can insert the document that does not meet the validation requirement using this field.

Example:

Let's insert a document into the books collection:

snippet

db.runCommand(
   {
      insert: "books",
      documents: [ { _id: 1, bookname: "MongoDB", status: "sold" } ]
   }
)

MongoDB Delete Command

We can remove any document from the collection using the delete command. There is multiple delete specification in a single delete command. We cannot use it on the capped collection. The delete command is internally used by the removal method, which is provided by the MongoDB.

Syntax:

snippet

{
   delete: <collection>,
   deletes: [
      { q : <query>, limit : <integer>, collation: <document> },
      { q : <query>, limit : <integer>, collation: <document> },
      { q : <query>, limit : <integer>, collation: <document> },
      ...
   ],
   ordered: <boolean>,
   writeConcern: { <write concern> }
}

Argument Fields

Field	Type	Description
delete	string	It is the name of the target collection where we want to delete the element.
deletes	array	It is an array of delete statements on which we want to perform the delete operation.
ordered	boolean	If it sets to true then it returns the result without inserting any remaining documents listed in the insert array when an insert operation fails, and vice versa
writeConcern	document	It is a document that defines the write concern of the delete command.
q	document	It is the query that matches to delete.
limit	integer	We can limit the matching document to delete using this field. Specify 0 to delete all matching documents and vice versa.
collation	document	It is an optional field and used to define the collation used for the operation. Syntax: collation: { locale: <string>, caseLevel: <boolean>, caseFirst: <string>, strength: <int>, numericOrdering: <boolean>, alternate: <string>, maxVariable: <string>, backwards: <boolean> }

Examples:

The following example deletes a document from the book collection that has the status equal to A by specifying the limit 2.

snippet

db.runCommand(
   {
      delete: "books",
      deletes: [ { q: { status: "A" }, limit: 1 } ]
   }
)

MongoDB Update command

The update command makes changes to the document in a collection. It contains multiple update statements. It is used by the update method provided by the MongoDB drivers.

Syntax:

snippet

db.runCommand(
   {
      update: <collection>,
      updates: [
         {
           q: <query>,
           u: <document or pipeline>,      // Changed in MongoDB 4.2,
           upsert: <boolean>,
           multi: <boolean>,
           collation: <document>,
           arrayFilters: <array>,
           hint: <document|string>        // Available starting in MongoDB 4.2
         },
         ...
      ],
      ordered: <boolean>,
      writeConcern: { <write concern> },
      bypassDocumentValidation: <boolean>
   }
)

Command fields:

Field	Type	Description
update	string	It is the name of the target collection where we want to update the array.
updates	array	It is the array of update statements to perform the update operation on the given collection.
ordered	boolean	It is an optional field if it is set to true. It will return the result without performing the remaining update operation and vice versa.
writeConcern	document	It is a document that expresses the write concern of the update command. It describes the level of acknowledgment requested from MongoDB for write operations to a standalone MongoDB.
bypass Document Validation	boolean It enables the update operation to bypass document validation.
q	document	It is the query that matches the documents we want to update.
u	document	It is the document where the update operator expressions are stored.
upsert	boolean	If this field is set to true, then it performs an insert operation if no document matches the query.
multi	boolean	It this field is set to true; it will update all the documents that meet the query criteria.
collation	document	It specifies language-specific rules for string comparison. Syntax: collation: { locale: <string>, caseLevel: <boolean>, caseFirst: <string>, strength: <int>, numericOrdering: <boolean>, alternate: <string>, maxVariable: <string>, backwards: <boolean> }
arrayfilters	array	It is an array of documents that describe which array elements we want to modify.
hint	string/ document	It is a document that specifies the index to use to support the query predicate.

Example:

Let's create a student's collection

snippet

Db.students.insertMany([
   { _id: 1, student: "john", status: "Pending", points: 0, misc1: "note to self: confirm status", misc2: "Need to activate" },
   { _id: 2, student: "Michael", status: "D", points: 59, misc1: "reminder: ping me at 100pts", misc2: "Some random comment" },
])

The run command uses the $set and $inc operators to update the status of a document where the member equals "john."

snippet

db.runCommand(
   {
      update: "students",
      updates: [
         {
           q: { student: "john" }, u: { $set: { status: "A" }, $inc: { points: 1 } }
         }
      ],
      ordered: false,
      writeConcern: { w: "majority", wtimeout: 5000 }
   }
)

MongoDB find command

The find command is used to execute a query and returns the first group of results and the id of the cursor from which we can construct a cursor.

Syntax:

snippet

db.runCommand(

   {
      "find": <string>,
      "filter": <document>,
      "sort": <document>,
      "projection": <document>,
      "hint": <document or string>,
      "skip": <int>,
      "limit": <int>,
      "batchSize": <int>,
      "singleBatch": <bool>,
      "comment": <string>,
      "maxTimeMS": <int>,
      "readConcern": <document>,
      "max": <document>,
      "min": <document>,
      "returnKey": <bool>,
      "showRecordId": <bool>,
      "tailable": <bool>,
      "oplogReplay": <bool>,
      "noCursorTimeout": <bool>,
      "awaitData": <bool>,
      "allowPartialResults": <bool>,
      "collation": <document>
   }
)

Command Fields:

Field	Type	Description
find	string	In this field, we can define the name of the collection.
filter	document	It filters the query.
sort	document	It is a document that contains the sorting details of the query.
projection	document	It is the document that contains the projection specification to determine which fields to include in the returned documents.
hint	string	It is a document that specifies the index name as the string or the index key pattern.
skip	positive integer	This filed contains the number of documents to be skipped.
limit	Non-negative integer	We can set the maximum number of documents we want to return.
batchSize	Non-negative integer	It contains the number of documents we want to return in the first batch.
singleBatch	boolean	It contains the details of whether to close the cursor after the first batch of the result.
maxTimeMS	+ve integer	We can set the time limit for the processing operation on the cursor.
readConcern	document	It specifies the read concern level. ReadConcern: { level: <value> }
max	document	It contains the upper bound for the given index.
min	boolean	It contains the lower bound for the given index.
returnKey	boolean	If it is true, return only the index keys in the resulting documents.
showRecordID	boolean	It is used to return the record identifier for each document.
tailable	boolean	It returns a tailable cursor for a capped collection.
awaitData	boolean	It is used to temporarily block the getMore command on the cursor.
oplogReplay	boolean	It is a command used for replaying a replica set's oplog. For example - { find: "data", oplogReplay: true, filter: { ts: { $gte: new Timestamp(1514764800, 0) } } }
noCursorTimeout	boolean	This filed to prevent the server from timing out idle cursors.
allowPartialResults	boolean	This field prevents throwing an error if some shards are unavailable.
collation	document	It specifies the collation for the operations Syntax: collation: { locale: <string>, caseLevel: <boolean>, caseFirst: <string>, strength: <int>, numericOrdering: <boolean>, alternate: <string>, maxVariable: <string>, backwards: <boolean> }

Example:

In the example below, the command sorts the documents in the result set by the name field and limit the result set by six documents.

snippet

db.runCommand(
   {
     find: "restaurants",
     filter: { rating: { $gte: 9 }, cuisine: "American" },
     projection: { name: 1, rating: 1, address: 1 },
     sort: { name: 1 },
     limit: 6
   }
)

MongoDB findAndModify command

It modifies and returns a single document at a time. The returned document does not include the modification made on the update by default. We need to use the new option to return the modified document.

Syntax:

snippet

{
  findAndModify: <collection-name>,
  query: <document>,
  sort: <document>,
  remove: <boolean>,
  update: <document or aggregation pipeline>, // Changed in MongoDB 4.2
  new: <boolean>,
  fields: <document>,
  upsert: <boolean>,
  bypassDocumentValidation: <boolean>,
  writeConcern: <document>,
  collation: <document>,
  arrayFilters: <array>
}

Command Fields

document

Field	Type	Description
query	document	The query field contains the same query selectors as used in the db.collection.find() method.
sort	document	It defines the sort order of the document.
remove	boolean	This field removes the document specified in the query field.
update	document/ array	It will update the specified document.
new	boolean	If it sets to true, it will return the modified document rather than the original one.
fields	document	It is a subset of the fields to return. It specifies an inclusion of field with value 1. fields: { <field1>: 1, <field2>: 1, ... }
upsert	boolean	It is used with the updated field. If it is true, it creates a new document and updates a single document that matches the query. The default value of this filed is false.
bypass Document Validation	boolean	It enables findAndModify to bypass document validation during the process.
writeConcern	document	It is a document that expresses the write concern for the command.
maxTimeMS	integer	It declares the time limit for the operation.
FindAndModify	String	This field contains the collection against which we have to run the command.
collation	The collation field allows users to specify language-specific rules for string comparison. Syntax: collation: { locale: <string>, caseLevel: <boolean>, caseFirst: <string>, strength: <int>, numericOrdering: <boolean>, alternate: <string>, maxVariable: <string>, backwards: <boolean> }
arrayFilters	array	It is the array of filter documents that determine that defines which array elements will be modified for the update operation.

Example:

snippet

db.runCommand(
   {
     findAndModify: "book",
     query: { name: "MongoDB" },
     sort: { rating: 4 },
     update: { $inc: { price: 1 } },
     upsert: true
   }
 )