PointVectorStrategy's distance value source gives a document without a point the distance 180 * multiplier even in a non-geo (Cartesian) SpatialContext, so an ascending distance sort lists it before real documents farther than 180 units and makeRecipDistanceValueSource scores it as if it were 180 units away (the other strategies that implement makeDistanceValueSource use Double.MAX_VALUE there; regression in 7.0.0 from LUCENE-7737)

Finding LFV-777Area: spatial-extras / PointVectorStrategy distance value source (vector/DistanceValueSource missing-document value; makeDistanceValueSource, makeRecipDistanceValueSource)Priority: lowImpact: silent wrong resultsNovelty: new

Finding page for LFV-777

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

What it shows

You index points with PointVectorStrategy in a non-geo SpatialContext (for example world bounds -1000..1000), add a document without a point, and sort a query by makeDistanceValueSource(point).getSortField(false), expecting the point-less document last, as BBoxStrategy, SerializedDVStrategy and the prefix-tree strategies do: in a non-geo context they give it Double.MAX_VALUE, the rule LUCENE-4208 set for all strategies ('180 if geo, Double.MAX_VALUE otherwise'). Instead it gets distance 180.0, so with a document at (500, 0) and the query point (0, 0) the ascending order is none,far instead of far,none, and makeRecipDistanceValueSource over the query box -1000..1000 scores it 0.440 against 0.220 for a real document 500 units away. The cause: vector/DistanceValueSource sets nullValue = 180 * multiplier with no isGeo() branch; the branch was dropped in the 7.0 port from ValueSource to DoubleValuesSource (LUCENE-7737).

The test shows that in a non-geo SpatialContext, PointVectorStrategy's distance sort gives a document without a point the distance 180, so it sorts before a real document 500 units away.

Expected vs actual

Expected doc 0 (point at (500, 0)) first in an ascending distance sort from (0, 0); actual doc 1, the one without a point (expected:<0> but was:<1>), with -ea and -da; passes with the isGeo() ? 180 : Double.MAX_VALUE rule restored.

Files

Run it

# 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=$CP:$LUCENE/lucene/spatial-extras/build/libs/lucene-spatial-extras-$V.jar
CP=$CP:$LUCENE/lucene/spatial3d/build/libs/lucene-spatial3d-$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 --add-modules jdk.incubator.vector --enable-native-access=ALL-UNNAMED -Dtests.seed=DEADBEEF \
     -cp "classes:$CP" org.junit.platform.console.ConsoleLauncher \
     execute --select-class org.apache.lucene.spatial.vector.TestPointVectorMissingDistanceNonGeo

The module(s) spatial-extras also need their third-party runtime jars; ./gradlew -p lucene/<module> dependencies lists them.

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

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Snapshot of 2026-11-03. AI-assisted; not yet triaged by a human Lucene committer. Feedback: open an issue in lucene-ai-bug-hunt.