How do you debug your Nest queries?

Question

I\'m new to Nest, and I very likely am not creating my query like I think I am. My question is more along the lines of teach a man to fish rather than give me a fish. However,

Answer 1

I like to take it a step further than bsarkar suggests and eliminate the need for a roundtrip altogether:

var client = new ElasticClient();

var seriesSearch = new SearchDescriptor<Series>();
seriesSearch.Filter(f => f
    .Term<Role>(t => t.ReleasableTo.First(), Role.Visitor))
    .SortDescending(ser => ser.EndDate)
    .Size(1));

string searchJson = Encoding.UTF8.GetString(client.Serializer.Serialize(seriesSearch));

Note that your ElasticClient doesn't need any connection properties, so you have no dependency on an ES node.

Answer 2

NEST is Baroque of .NET APIs. For 2.1+ on call level:

IElasticClient client = new ElasticClient();
var searchDescriptor = new SearchDescriptor<Series>();
var query = Query<Series>.Term(...);
var pretty = query.ToPrettyString(query);
var json = client.ToRawRequest(searchDescriptor.Query(descriptor => query));

On configuration level:

    var settings = new ConnectionSettings()
                     .PrettyJson().DisableDirectStreaming()
                     .OnRequestCompleted(details=> Debug.WriteLine(Encoding.UTF8.GetString(details.RequestBodyInBytes)));

On response level look into CallDetails.RequestBodyInBytes.

Used extensions:

    /// <summary>
    /// Converts search to raw JSON request for debugging.
    /// </summary>
    /// <typeparam name="T">The type.</typeparam>
    /// <param name="self">The self.</param>
    /// <param name="searchDescriptor">The search descriptor.</param>
    /// <returns>The string.</returns>
    public static string ToRawRequest<T>(this IElasticClient self, SearchDescriptor<T> searchDescriptor) where T : class
    {
        using (var output = new MemoryStream())
        {
            self.Serializer.Serialize(searchDescriptor, output);
            output.Position = 0;
            var rawQuery = new StreamReader(output).ReadToEnd();
            return rawQuery;
        }
    }

    /// <summary>
    /// Prints query into string.
    /// </summary>
    /// <param name="self">The self.</param>
    /// <returns>The value.</returns>
    public static string ToPrettyString(this QueryContainer self)
    {
        using (var settings = new ConnectionSettings())
        {
            var visitor = new DslPrettyPrintVisitor(settings);
            self.Accept(visitor);
            return visitor.PrettyPrint.Replace(Environment.NewLine, string.Empty);
        }                                                                         
    }