jaegertracing/jaeger · error

cannot query for duration and tags simultaneously

Error message

cannot query for duration and tags simultaneously

What it means

ErrDurationAndTagQueryNotSupported is returned by validateQuery when the query sets a duration filter (DurationMin or DurationMax non-zero) and also supplies search attributes/tags. The Cassandra schema indexes tags separately from duration-derived rows, so combining both filters in one query is not supported by this storage backend and is rejected up front.

Source

Thrown at internal/storage/v1/cassandra/spanstore/reader.go:78

	// the number of responses from the index, so we can respect the user's limit value they provided.
	limitMultiple = 3
)

var (
	// ErrServiceNameNotSet occurs when attempting to query with an empty service name
	ErrServiceNameNotSet = errors.New("service Name must be set")

	// ErrStartTimeMinGreaterThanMax occurs when start time min is above start time max
	ErrStartTimeMinGreaterThanMax = errors.New("start Time Minimum is above Maximum")

	// ErrDurationMinGreaterThanMax occurs when duration min is above duration max
	ErrDurationMinGreaterThanMax = errors.New("duration Minimum is above Maximum")

	// ErrMalformedRequestObject occurs when a request object is nil
	ErrMalformedRequestObject = errors.New("malformed request object")

	// ErrDurationAndTagQueryNotSupported occurs when duration and tags are both set
	ErrDurationAndTagQueryNotSupported = errors.New("cannot query for duration and tags simultaneously")

	// ErrStartAndEndTimeNotSet occurs when start time and end time are not set
	ErrStartAndEndTimeNotSet = errors.New("start and End Time must be set")
)

type serviceNamesReader func() ([]string, error)

type operationNamesReader func(query tracestore.OperationQueryParams) ([]tracestore.Operation, error)

type spanReaderMetrics struct {
	readTraces                 *casmetrics.Table
	queryTrace                 *casmetrics.Table
	queryTagIndex              *casmetrics.Table
	queryDurationIndex         *casmetrics.Table
	queryServiceOperationIndex *casmetrics.Table
	queryServiceNameIndex      *casmetrics.Table
}

View on GitHub (pinned to 806f444784)

Solutions

1. Run the query in two passes: first filter by duration (or tags) via FindTraceIDs, then narrow results by the other criterion in application code.
2. Drop one of the two filters if the results of a single filter are sufficient.
3. If the combination is a hard requirement, use the Elasticsearch/OpenSearch storage backend, which supports duration+tag queries.

Example fix

// before
q := &tracestore.TraceQueryParams{DurationMin: time.Second, Attributes: tags}
reader.FindTraces(ctx, q) // rejected
// after: query duration first, filter tags client-side
ids, _ := reader.FindTraceIDs(ctx, &tracestore.TraceQueryParams{ServiceName: svc, DurationMin: time.Second, ...})
// then filter matching traces by tags

if (q.DurationMin != 0 || q.DurationMax != 0) && q.Attributes.Len() > 0 {
    return errors.New("cassandra backend: cannot combine duration and tag filters")
}

ids, err := reader.FindTraceIDs(ctx, q)
if errors.Is(err, spanstore.ErrDurationAndTagQueryNotSupported) {
    // degrade: run one filter, refine client-side, or inform user of backend limit
}

When it happens

Trigger: FindTraces/FindTraceIDs called with TraceQueryParams where (DurationMin != 0 || DurationMax != 0) and p.Attributes.Len() > 0 — e.g. a search request like 'duration>1s AND tag http.status_code=500'.

Common situations: UI/API clients composing arbitrary search filters that the storage layer cannot satisfy jointly; feature-parity assumptions between the ES backend (which supports the combination) and the Cassandra backend; plugin code forwarding user filter objects unmodified.

Related errors

• service Name must be set
• start Time Minimum is above Maximum
• duration Minimum is above Maximum
• malformed request object
• start and End Time must be set

AI-assisted analysis of jaegertracing/jaeger@806f444784 (2026-09-01). Data as JSON: /api/errors/2ad79825f8bf8085. Report an issue: GitHub.