I think you have over-simplified it just a bit here, though I may be wrong.
In order to get a tombstone on a TTL row or column, some kind of read has to occur. The tombstones don’t magically appear (remember, a tombstone is a special kind of insert). So, I think it takes at least two compactions to actually get rid of the data. One compaction to create tombstones, and a second one (after gc_grace_seconds) to rewrite the good data and leave out expired tombstones. And it has to happen on all replica nodes. (I suppose it is possible that other kinds of reads might create TTL-based tombstones as an optimization, but I don’t know that this exists.) Someone closer to the source code may correct me, but this is my understanding of how it works. Sean Durity – Cassandra Admin, Big Data Team To engage the team, create a request<https://portal.homedepot.com/sites/bigdata/SitePages/Big%20Data%20Engagement%20Request.aspx> From: Walsh, Stephen [mailto:stephen.wa...@aspect.com] Sent: Thursday, May 14, 2015 6:37 AM To: user@cassandra.apache.org Subject: RE: Insert Vs Updates - Both create tombstones Thanks ☺ I think you might have got your T’s and V’s mixed up ? So we insert V2 @ T2, then insert V1 @ T1 where T1 is earlier to T2 = V2 Should it not be the other way around? So we insert V1 @ T1, then insert V2 @ T2 where T2 is earlier to T2 = V2 So in a tombstone manor over 5 seconds we are looking like this Second 1 Insert <V1, T1> with TTL =5 Second 2 <V1, T1> (TTL 4) Insert <V1, T2> with TTL= 5 Second 3 <V1, T1> (TTL 3) <V1, T2> (TTL 4) Insert <V1, T3> with TTL= 5 Second 3 <V1, T1> (TTL 2) <V1, T2> (TTL 3) <V1, T3> (TTL 4) Insert <V1, T4> with TTL= 5 Second 4 <V1, T1> (TTL 1) <V1, T2> (TTL 2) <V1, T3> (TTL 3) <V1, T4> (TTL 4) Insert <V1, T5> with TTL= 5 Second 5 <V1, T1> (Tombstoned) <V1, T2> (TTL 1) <V1, T3> (TTL 2) <V1, T4> (TTL 3) <V1, T5> (TTL 4) Second 6 <V1, T1> (Tombstoned) <V1, T2> (Tombstoned) <V1, T3> (TTL 1) <V1, T4> (TTL 2) <V1, T5> (TTL 3) Second 7 <V1, T1> (Tombstoned) <V1, T2> (Tombstoned) <V1, T3> (Tombstoned) <V1, T4> (TTL 1) <V1, T5> (TTL 2) Second 8 <V1, T1> (Tombstoned) <V1, T2> (Tombstoned) <V1, T3> (Tombstoned) <V1, T4> (Tombstoned) <V1, T5> (TTL 1) Second 8 <V1, T1> (Tombstoned) <V1, T2> (Tombstoned) <V1, T3> (Tombstoned) <V1, T4> (Tombstoned) <V1, T5> (Tombstoned) Second 9 (Minor Compaction run to clean up tombstones) And if I did an “update“, the result would be the same. And like you mentioned, if I did a query at “second 4”, the query would be based of 5 versions of V1 to query against, and the highest T value would be returned. From: Peer, Oded [mailto:oded.p...@rsa.com] Sent: 14 May 2015 11:12 To: user@cassandra.apache.org<mailto:user@cassandra.apache.org> Subject: RE: Insert Vs Updates - Both create tombstones If this how you update then you are not creating tombstones. If you used UPDATE it’s the same behavior. You are simply inserting a new value for the cell which does not create a tombstone. When you modify data by using either the INSERT or the UPDATE command the value is stored along with a timestamp indicating the timestamp of the value. Assume timestamp T1 is before T2 (T1 < T2) and you stored value V2 with timestamp T2. Then you store V1 with timestamp T1. Now you have two values of V in the DB: <V2,T2>, <V1,T1> When you read the value of V from the DB you read both <V2,T2>, <V1,T1>, which may be in different sstables, Cassandra resolves the conflict by comparing the timestamp and returns V2. Compaction will later take care and remove <V1,T1> from the DB. From: Walsh, Stephen [mailto:stephen.wa...@aspect.com] Sent: Thursday, May 14, 2015 11:39 AM To: user@cassandra.apache.org<mailto:user@cassandra.apache.org> Subject: RE: Insert Vs Updates - Both create tombstones Thank you, We are updating the entire row (all columns) each second via the “insert” command. So if we did updates – no tombstones would be created? But because we are doing inserts- we are creating tombstones for each column each insert? From: Ali Akhtar [mailto:ali.rac...@gmail.com] Sent: 13 May 2015 12:10 To: user@cassandra.apache.org<mailto:user@cassandra.apache.org> Subject: Re: Insert Vs Updates - Both create tombstones Sorry, wrong thread. Disregard the above On Wed, May 13, 2015 at 4:08 PM, Ali Akhtar <ali.rac...@gmail.com<mailto:ali.rac...@gmail.com>> wrote: If specifying 'using' timestamp, the docs say to provide microseconds, but where are these microseconds obtained from? I have regular java.util.Date objects, I can get the time in milliseconds (i.e the unix timestamp), how would I convert that to microseconds? On Wed, May 13, 2015 at 3:45 PM, Peer, Oded <oded.p...@rsa.com<mailto:oded.p...@rsa.com>> wrote: Under the assumption that when you update the columns you also update the TTL for the columns then a tombstone won’t be created for those columns. Remember that TTL is set on columns (or “cells”), not on rows, so your description of updating a row is slightly misleading. If every query updates different columns then different columns might expire at different times. From: Walsh, Stephen [mailto:stephen.wa...@aspect.com<mailto:stephen.wa...@aspect.com>] Sent: Wednesday, May 13, 2015 1:35 PM To: user@cassandra.apache.org<mailto:user@cassandra.apache.org> Subject: Insert Vs Updates - Both create tombstones Quick Question, Our team is under much debate, we are trying to find out if an Update on a row with a TTL will create a tombstone. E.G We have one row with a TTL, if we keep “updating” that row before the TTL is hit, will a tombstone be created. I believe it will, but want to confirm. So if that’s is true, And if our TTL is 10 seconds and we “update” the row every second, will 10 tombstones be created after 10 seconds? Or just 1? (and does the same apply for “insert”) Regards Stephen Walsh This email (including any attachments) is proprietary to Aspect Software, Inc. and may contain information that is confidential. If you have received this message in error, please do not read, copy or forward this message. 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