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db.watch()

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  • Definition
  • Availability
  • Deployment
  • Storage Engine
  • Read Concern majority Support
  • Behavior
  • Resumability
  • Full Document Lookup of Update Operations
  • Access Control
  • Cursor Iteration
  • Example
db.watch( pipeline, options )

For replica sets and sharded clusters only

Opens a change stream cursor for a database to report on all its non-system collections.

Parameter
Type
Description
pipeline
array

Optional. An Aggregation Pipeline consisting of one or more of the following aggregation stages:

Specify a pipeline to filter/modify the change events output.

Starting in MongoDB 4.2, change streams will throw an exception if the change stream aggregation pipeline modifies an event's _id field.

options
document
Optional. Additional options that modify the behavior of db.watch().

The options document can contain the following fields and values:

Field
Type
Description
resumeAfter
document

Optional. Specifies a resume token as the logical starting point for the change stream. Cannot be used to resume the change stream after an invalidate event.

resumeAfter is mutually exclusive with startAfter and startAtOperationTime.

startAfter
document

Optional. Specifies a resume token as the logical starting point for the change stream. Unlike resumeAfter, startAfter can resume notifications after an invalidate event by creating a new change stream.

startAfter is mutually exclusive with resumeAfter and startAtOperationTime.

fullDocument
string

Optional. By default, db.watch() returns the delta of those fields modified by an update operation, instead of the entire updated document.

Set fullDocument to "updateLookup" to direct db.watch() to look up the most current majority-committed version of the updated document. db.watch() returns a fullDocument field with the document lookup in addition to the updateDescription delta.

Starting in MongoDB 6.0, you can set fullDocument to:

  • "whenAvailable" to output the document post-image, if available, after the document was inserted, replaced, or updated.

  • "required" to output the document post-image after the document was inserted, replaced, or updated. Raises an error if the post-image is not available.

fullDocumentBeforeChange
string

Optional. Default is "off".

Starting in MongoDB 6.0, you can use the new fullDocumentBeforeChange field and set it to:

  • "whenAvailable" to output the document pre-image, if available, before the document was replaced, updated, or deleted.

  • "required" to output the document pre-image before the document was replaced, updated, or deleted. Raises an error if the pre-image is not available.

  • "off" to suppress the document pre-image. "off" is the default.

batchSize
int

Optional. Specifies the maximum number of change events to return in each batch of the response from the MongoDB cluster.

Has the same functionality as cursor.batchSize().

maxAwaitTimeMS
int

Optional. The maximum amount of time in milliseconds the server waits for new data changes to report to the change stream cursor before returning an empty batch.

Defaults to 1000 milliseconds.

collation
document

Optional. Pass a collation document to specify a collation for the change stream cursor.

If omitted, defaults to simple binary comparison.

startAtOperationTime
Timestamp

Optional. The starting point for the change stream. If the specified starting point is in the past, it must be in the time range of the oplog. To check the time range of the oplog, see rs.printReplicationInfo().

startAtOperationTime is mutually exclusive with resumeAfter and startAfter.

Returns:A cursor over the change event documents. See Change Events for examples of change event documents.

Tip

See also:

db.watch() is available for replica sets and sharded clusters:

  • For a replica set, you can issue db.watch() on any data-bearing member.

  • For a sharded cluster, you must issue db.watch() on a mongos instance.

You can only use db.watch() with the Wired Tiger storage engine.

Starting in MongoDB 4.2, change streams are available regardless of the "majority" read concern support; that is, read concern majority support can be either enabled (default) or disabled to use change streams.

In MongoDB 4.0 and earlier, change streams are available only if "majority" read concern support is enabled (default).

  • You cannot run db.watch() on the admin, local, or config database.

  • db.watch() only notifies on data changes that have persisted to a majority of data-bearing members.

  • The change stream cursor remains open until one of the following occurs:

    • The cursor is explicitly closed.

    • An invalidate event occurs; for example, a collection drop or rename.

    • The connection to the MongoDB deployment closes or times out. See Cursor Behaviors for more information.

    • If the deployment is a sharded cluster, a shard removal may cause an open change stream cursor to close, and the closed change stream cursor may not be fully resumable.

  • You can run db.watch() for a database that does not exist. However, once the database is created and you drop the database, the change stream cursor closes.

Unlike the MongoDB Drivers, mongosh does not automatically attempt to resume a change stream cursor after an error. The MongoDB drivers make one attempt to automatically resume a change stream cursor after certain errors.

db.watch() uses information stored in the oplog to produce the change event description and generate a resume token associated to that operation. If the operation identified by the resume token passed to the resumeAfter or startAfter option has already dropped off the oplog, db.watch() cannot resume the change stream.

See Resume a Change Stream for more information on resuming a change stream.

Note

  • You cannot use resumeAfter to resume a change stream after an invalidate event (for example, a collection drop or rename) closes the stream. Instead, you can use startAfter to start a new change stream after an invalidate event.

  • If the deployment is a sharded cluster, a shard removal may cause an open change stream cursor to close, and the closed change stream cursor may not be fully resumable.

Note

You cannot use resumeAfter to resume a change stream after an invalidate event (for example, a collection drop or rename) closes the stream. Instead, you can use startAfter to start a new change stream after an invalidate event.

By default, the change stream cursor returns specific field changes/deltas for update operations. You can also configure the change stream to look up and return the current majority-committed version of the changed document. Depending on other write operations that may have occurred between the update and the lookup, the returned document may differ significantly from the document at the time of the update.

Depending on the number of changes applied during the update operation and the size of the full document, there is a risk that the size of the change event document for an update operation is greater than the 16MB BSON document limit. If this occurs, the server closes the change stream cursor and returns an error.

When running with access control, the user must have the find and changeStream privilege actions on the database resource. That is, a user must have a role that grants the following privilege:

{ resource: { db: <dbname>, collection: "" }, actions: [ "find", "changeStream"] }

The built-in read role provides the appropriate privileges.

MongoDB provides multiple ways to iterate on a cursor.

The cursor.hasNext() method blocks and waits for the next event. To monitor the watchCursor cursor and iterate over the events, use hasNext() like this:

while (!watchCursor.isClosed()) {
if (watchCursor.hasNext()) {
firstChange = watchCursor.next();
break;
}
}

The cursor.tryNext() method is non-blocking. To monitor the watchCursor cursor and iterate over the events, use tryNext() like this:

while (!watchCursor.isClosed()) {
let next = watchCursor.tryNext()
while (next !== null) {
printjson(next);
next = watchCursor.tryNext()
}
}

The following operation in mongosh opens a change stream cursor on the hr database. The returned cursor reports on data changes to all the non-system collections in that database.

watchCursor = db.getSiblingDB("hr").watch()

Iterate the cursor to check for new events. Use the cursor.isClosed() method with the cursor.tryNext() method to ensure the loop only exits if the change stream cursor is closed and there are no objects remaining in the latest batch:

while (!watchCursor.isClosed()) {
let next = watchCursor.tryNext()
while (next !== null) {
printjson(next);
next = watchCursor.tryNext()
}
}

For complete documentation on change stream output, see Change Events.

Note

You cannot use isExhausted() with change streams.

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