ResourceFilterStream: An Optimized Alternative to Query Builder in AEM

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ResourceFilterStream: An Optimized Alternative to Query Builder in AEM

 

by @MayurSatav 

 

Introduction

Efficiently querying content is a fundamental challenge in Adobe Experience Manager (AEM). While the Query Builder is a powerful and widely used tool, it can become a performance bottleneck when dealing with large result sets, potentially leading to high memory consumption and slow response times. The ResourceFilterStream offers a highly optimized, server-side alternative for filtering resources, providing a memory-efficient and often faster solution for specific use cases. Understanding when and how to leverage ResourceFilterStream can significantly improve the performance and stability of your AEM application.

Key points

For developers building scalable AEM solutions, optimizing content queries is crucial. ResourceFilterStream provides a powerful tool for filtering large resource trees without the memory overhead associated with traditional query methods.

• The Problem with Query Builder: While versatile, Query Builder can be inefficient for large-scale filtering operations. It tends to load a large number of nodes into memory, increasing heap usage and risking OutOfMemoryError exceptions, especially when the query is not highly selective.

• What is ResourceFilterStream? It is a Java 8 Stream-based utility that traverses a resource tree and applies a chain of filter conditions (Predicates) on the fly. It processes resources one by one, meaning it doesn't load the entire result set into memory.

• How It Works: You provide a starting resource path, and ResourceFilterStream iterates through its descendants. Each resource is passed through a series of Predicate<Resource> conditions. Only the resources that satisfy all predicates are collected in the final stream, making it highly efficient for filtering based on properties, resource types, or custom logic.

• Core Advantages:

  • Memory Efficiency: Its primary benefit is low memory consumption, as it streams results instead of pre-loading them.
  • Performance: For path-based traversals with property filters, it can be significantly faster than Query Builder by avoiding query parsing and indexing overhead.
  • Code Simplicity: Leverages modern Java features like Streams and Lambdas, resulting in clean, readable, and maintainable code.

• When to Use ResourceFilterStream:

  • When you need to find and filter resources under a known parent path (e.g., find all cq:PageContent nodes with a specific property under /content/mysite).
  • When dealing with potentially very large numbers of child resources where Query Builder might time out or run out of memory.

• When to Stick with Query Builder:

  • For repository-wide, full-text searches.
  • When you need to perform complex JCR queries involving joins, ordering by properties not ideal for traversal, or leveraging advanced index features.

Full Article

Read the full article on https://medium.com/@mayursatav/resourcefilterstream-optimized-alternative-to-query-builder-in-aem-07... to find out more.

Q&A

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