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Azure Cosmos DB for Gremlin graph support and compatibility with TinkerPop features

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APPLIES TO: Gremlin

Azure Cosmos DB supports Apache Tinkerpop's graph traversal language, known as Gremlin. You can use the Gremlin language to create graph entities (vertices and edges), modify properties within those entities, perform queries and traversals, and delete entities.

Azure Cosmos DB Graph engine closely follows Apache TinkerPop traversal steps specification but there are differences in the implementation that are specific for Azure Cosmos DB. In this article, we provide a quick walkthrough of Gremlin and enumerate the Gremlin features that are supported by the API for Gremlin.

Compatible client libraries

The following table shows popular Gremlin drivers that you can use against Azure Cosmos DB:

Download Source Getting Started Supported/Recommended connector version
.NET Gremlin.NET on GitHub Create Graph using .NET 3.4.13
Java Gremlin JavaDoc Create Graph using Java 3.4.13
Python Gremlin-Python on GitHub Create Graph using Python 3.4.13
Gremlin console TinkerPop docs Create Graph using Gremlin Console 3.4.13
Node.js Gremlin-JavaScript on GitHub Create Graph using Node.js 3.4.13
PHP Gremlin-PHP on GitHub Create Graph using PHP 3.1.0
Go Lang Go Lang This library is built by external contributors. The Azure Cosmos DB team doesn't offer any support or maintain the library.

Note

Gremlin client driver versions for 3.5.*, 3.6.* have known compatibility issues, so we recommend using the latest supported 3.4.* driver versions listed above. This table will be updated when compatibility issues have been addressed for these newer driver versions.

Supported Graph Objects

TinkerPop is a standard that covers a wide range of graph technologies. Therefore, it has standard terminology to describe what features are provided by a graph provider. Azure Cosmos DB provides a persistent, high concurrency, writeable graph database that can be partitioned across multiple servers or clusters.

The following table lists the TinkerPop features that are implemented by Azure Cosmos DB:

Category Azure Cosmos DB implementation Notes
Graph features Provides Persistence and ConcurrentAccess. Designed to support Transactions Computer methods can be implemented via the Spark connector.
Variable features Supports Boolean, Integer, Byte, Double, Float, Long, String Supports primitive types, is compatible with complex types via data model
Vertex features Supports RemoveVertices, MetaProperties, AddVertices, MultiProperties, StringIds, UserSuppliedIds, AddProperty, RemoveProperty Supports creating, modifying, and deleting vertices
Vertex property features StringIds, UserSuppliedIds, AddProperty, RemoveProperty, BooleanValues, ByteValues, DoubleValues, FloatValues, IntegerValues, LongValues, StringValues Supports creating, modifying, and deleting vertex properties
Edge features AddEdges, RemoveEdges, StringIds, UserSuppliedIds, AddProperty, RemoveProperty Supports creating, modifying, and deleting edges
Edge property features Properties, BooleanValues, ByteValues, DoubleValues, FloatValues, IntegerValues, LongValues, StringValues Supports creating, modifying, and deleting edge properties

Gremlin wire format

Azure Cosmos DB uses the JSON format when returning results from Gremlin operations. Azure Cosmos DB currently supports the JSON format. For example, the following snippet shows a JSON representation of a vertex returned to the client from Azure Cosmos DB:

  {
    "id": "a7111ba7-0ea1-43c9-b6b2-efc5e3aea4c0",
    "label": "person",
    "type": "vertex",
    "outE": {
      "knows": [
        {
          "id": "3ee53a60-c561-4c5e-9a9f-9c7924bc9aef",
          "inV": "04779300-1c8e-489d-9493-50fd1325a658"
        },
        {
          "id": "21984248-ee9e-43a8-a7f6-30642bc14609",
          "inV": "a8e3e741-2ef7-4c01-b7c8-199f8e43e3bc"
        }
      ]
    },
    "properties": {
      "firstName": [
        {
          "value": "Thomas"
        }
      ],
      "lastName": [
        {
          "value": "Andersen"
        }
      ],
      "age": [
        {
          "value": 45
        }
      ]
    }
  }

The properties used by the JSON format for vertices are described below:

Property Description
id The ID for the vertex. Must be unique (in combination with the value of _partition if applicable). If no value is provided, it will be automatically supplied with a GUID
label The label of the vertex. This property is used to describe the entity type.
type Used to distinguish vertices from non-graph documents
properties Bag of user-defined properties associated with the vertex. Each property can have multiple values.
_partition The partition key of the vertex. Used for graph partitioning.
outE This property contains a list of out edges from a vertex. Storing the adjacency information with vertex allows for fast execution of traversals. Edges are grouped based on their labels.

Each property can store multiple values within an array.

Property Description
value The value of the property

And the edge contains the following information to help with navigation to other parts of the graph.

Property Description
id The ID for the edge. Must be unique (in combination with the value of _partition if applicable)
label The label of the edge. This property is optional, and used to describe the relationship type.
inV This property contains a list of in vertices for an edge. Storing the adjacency information with the edge allows for fast execution of traversals. Vertices are grouped based on their labels.
properties Bag of user-defined properties associated with the edge.

Gremlin steps

Now let's look at the Gremlin steps supported by Azure Cosmos DB. For a complete reference on Gremlin, see TinkerPop reference.

step Description TinkerPop 3.2 Documentation
addE Adds an edge between two vertices addE step
addV Adds a vertex to the graph addV step
and Ensures that all the traversals return a value and step
as A step modulator to assign a variable to the output of a step as step
by A step modulator used with group and order by step
coalesce Returns the first traversal that returns a result coalesce step
constant Returns a constant value. Used with coalesce constant step
count Returns the count from the traversal count step
dedup Returns the values with the duplicates removed dedup step
drop Drops the values (vertex/edge) drop step
executionProfile Creates a description of all operations generated by the executed Gremlin step executionProfile step
fold Acts as a barrier that computes the aggregate of results fold step
group Groups the values based on the labels specified group step
has Used to filter properties, vertices, and edges. Supports hasLabel, hasId, hasNot, and has variants. has step
inject Inject values into a stream inject step
is Used to perform a filter using a boolean expression is step
limit Used to limit number of items in the traversal limit step
local Local wraps a section of a traversal, similar to a subquery local step
not Used to produce the negation of a filter not step
optional Returns the result of the specified traversal if it yields a result else it returns the calling element optional step
or Ensures at least one of the traversals returns a value or step
order Returns results in the specified sort order order step
path Returns the full path of the traversal path step
project Projects the properties as a Map project step
properties Returns the properties for the specified labels properties step
range Filters to the specified range of values range step
repeat Repeats the step for the specified number of times. Used for looping repeat step
sample Used to sample results from the traversal sample step
select Used to project results from the traversal select step
store Used for non-blocking aggregates from the traversal store step
TextP.startingWith(string) String filtering function. This function is used as a predicate for the has() step to match a property with the beginning of a given string TextP predicates
TextP.endingWith(string) String filtering function. This function is used as a predicate for the has() step to match a property with the ending of a given string TextP predicates
TextP.containing(string) String filtering function. This function is used as a predicate for the has() step to match a property with the contents of a given string TextP predicates
TextP.notStartingWith(string) String filtering function. This function is used as a predicate for the has() step to match a property that doesn't start with a given string TextP predicates
TextP.notEndingWith(string) String filtering function. This function is used as a predicate for the has() step to match a property that doesn't end with a given string TextP predicates
TextP.notContaining(string) String filtering function. This function is used as a predicate for the has() step to match a property that doesn't contain a given string TextP predicates
tree Aggregate paths from a vertex into a tree tree step
unfold Unroll an iterator as a step unfold step
union Merge results from multiple traversals union step
V Includes the steps necessary for traversals between vertices and edges V, E, out, in, both, outE, inE, bothE, outV, inV, bothV, and otherV for vertex steps
where Used to filter results from the traversal. Supports eq, neq, lt, lte, gt, gte, and between operators where step

The write-optimized engine provided by Azure Cosmos DB supports automatic indexing of all properties within vertices and edges by default. Therefore, queries with filters, range queries, sorting, or aggregates on any property are processed from the index, and served efficiently. For more information on how indexing works in Azure Cosmos DB, see our paper on schema-agnostic indexing.

Behavior differences

  • Azure Cosmos DB Graph engine runs breadth-first traversal while TinkerPop Gremlin is depth-first. This behavior achieves better performance in horizontally scalable system like Azure Cosmos DB.

Unsupported features

  • Gremlin Bytecode is a programming language agnostic specification for graph traversals. Azure Cosmos DB Graph doesn't support it yet. Use GremlinClient.SubmitAsync() and pass traversal as a text string.

  • property(set, 'xyz', 1) set cardinality isn't supported today. Use property(list, 'xyz', 1) instead. To learn more, see Vertex properties with TinkerPop.

  • The match() step isn't currently available. This step provides declarative querying capabilities.

  • Objects as properties on vertices or edges aren't supported. Properties can only be primitive types or arrays.

  • Sorting by array properties order().by(<array property>) isn't supported. Sorting is supported only by primitive types.

  • Non-primitive JSON types aren't supported. Use string, number, or true/false types. null values aren't supported.

  • GraphSONv3 serializer isn't currently supported. Use GraphSONv2 Serializer, Reader, and Writer classes in the connection configuration. The results returned by the Azure Cosmos DB for Gremlin don't have the same format as the GraphSON format.

  • Lambda expressions and functions aren't currently supported. This includes the .map{<expression>}, the .by{<expression>}, and the .filter{<expression>} functions. To learn more, and to learn how to rewrite them using Gremlin steps, see A Note on Lambdas.

  • Transactions aren't supported because of distributed nature of the system. Configure appropriate consistency model on Gremlin account to "read your own writes" and use optimistic concurrency to resolve conflicting writes.

Known limitations

  • Index utilization for Gremlin queries with mid-traversal .V() steps: Currently, only the first .V() call of a traversal will make use of the index to resolve any filters or predicates attached to it. Subsequent calls will not consult the index, which might increase the latency and cost of the query.

Assuming default indexing, a typical read Gremlin query that starts with the .V() step would use parameters in its attached filtering steps, such as .has() or .where() to optimize the cost and performance of the query. For example:

g.V().has('category', 'A')

However, when more than one .V() step is included in the Gremlin query, the resolution of the data for the query might not be optimal. Take the following query as an example:

g.V().has('category', 'A').as('a').V().has('category', 'B').as('b').select('a', 'b')

This query will return two groups of vertices based on their property called category. In this case, only the first call, g.V().has('category', 'A') will make use of the index to resolve the vertices based on the values of their properties.

A workaround for this query is to use subtraversal steps such as .map() and union(). This is exemplified below:

// Query workaround using .map()
g.V().has('category', 'A').as('a').map(__.V().has('category', 'B')).as('b').select('a','b')

// Query workaround using .union()
g.V().has('category', 'A').fold().union(unfold(), __.V().has('category', 'B'))

You can review the performance of the queries by using the Gremlin executionProfile() step.

Next steps