Doc-values-rewritten multi-term queries are invisible to QueryVisitor, so they escape the nested clause limit and the query-cache RAM budget

Finding LFV-038Area: search / multi-term queriesPriority: highImpact: silent wrong resultsNovelty: known upstream

AI-assisted finding, confirmed by automated checks, not yet triaged by a human Lucene committer. This site files nothing upstream.

What it shows

You run a query tree whose leaves are multi-term queries rewritten with MultiTermQuery.DOC_VALUES_REWRITE (or SortedSetDocValuesField/SortedDocValuesField.newSlowSetQuery) under IndexSearcher's maxClauseCount. You expect IndexSearcher.rewrite to count each such leaf toward the nested clause limit, and an LRUQueryCache to account for the terms a cached query holds. Instead MultiTermQueryDocValuesWrapper.visit calls visitor.getSubVisitor(FILTER, query) and throws the result away, so each leaf counts as 0: with maxClauseCount=8 a query with 10 such leaves raises no TooManyNestedClauses, and a cached 50,000-term TermInSetQuery that holds 966,712 bytes is accounted as 200 bytes; search results stay correct.

Expected vs actual

Expected: You expect IndexSearcher.rewrite to count each such leaf toward the nested clause limit, and an LRUQueryCache to account for the terms a cached query holds.
Actual: MultiTermQueryDocValuesWrapper.visit calls visitor.getSubVisitor(FILTER, query) and throws the result away, so each leaf counts as 0: with maxClauseCount=8 a query with 10 such leaves raises no TooManyNestedClauses, and a cached 50,000-term TermInSetQuery that holds 966,712 bytes is accounted as 200 bytes; search results stay correct.

Files

src/sa1verify/TestVerifySA1.java (JUnit test)

Run it

Tested on Lucene main e1faeba08bde (2026-11-02): still reproduces.
Tested on Lucene main b83101cdd2 (2026-10-23): reproduced.
How to read the outcome: a failing test is the finding reproducing (the failure message states expected against actual).
Seeds: a rerun with the same seed replays the same random choices. Assertions off (-da -dsa -Dtests.asserts=false) is the production-like setting.

# Lucene checkout at the tested commit, built with: ./gradlew --no-daemon assemble   (JDK 25)
LUCENE=/path/to/lucene; V=12.0.0-SNAPSHOT
CP=$LUCENE/lucene/core/build/libs/lucene-core-$V.jar
CP=$CP:$LUCENE/lucene/codecs/build/libs/lucene-codecs-$V.jar
CP=$CP:$LUCENE/lucene/test-framework/build/libs/lucene-test-framework-$V.jar
CP=$CP:randomizedtesting-runner-2.9.2.jar:junit-4.13.2.jar:hamcrest-3.0.jar   # test-framework dependencies (Maven Central)
CP=$CP:junit-platform-console-standalone-6.1.3.jar   # JUnit Platform console launcher (Maven Central)

javac -d classes -cp "$CP" $(find src -name '*.java')

# run 1: assertions on, seed DEADBEEF
java -ea -esa -Xmx2g --add-modules jdk.incubator.vector --enable-native-access=ALL-UNNAMED -Dtests.seed=DEADBEEF \
     -cp "classes:$CP" org.junit.platform.console.ConsoleLauncher \
     execute --select-class sa1verify.TestVerifySA1

Gradle alternative: copy the test into the matching module's src/test/ tree of the checkout and run ./gradlew -p lucene/<module> test --tests <class> -Ptests.seed=<seed> (add -Ptests.asserts=false for a run without assertions).

Feedback

Open an issue in lucene-ai-bug-hunt. Please do not open issues or pull requests in apache/lucene about this finding unless a Lucene committer agrees it should be filed.

Snapshot of 2026-11-04. AI-assisted; not yet triaged by a human Lucene committer. Feedback: open an issue in lucene-ai-bug-hunt.