From df366966b4f16d22330f1a3783a6e4bee8aa22a7 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Erik Johnston <erikj@matrix.org>
Date: Wed, 29 Nov 2023 11:54:42 +0000
Subject: [PATCH] Speed up pruning of `user_ips` table (#16667)

Silly query planner
---
 changelog.d/16667.misc                       |  1 +
 synapse/storage/databases/main/client_ips.py | 17 +++++++----------
 2 files changed, 8 insertions(+), 10 deletions(-)
 create mode 100644 changelog.d/16667.misc

diff --git a/changelog.d/16667.misc b/changelog.d/16667.misc
new file mode 100644
index 000000000..51aeca924
--- /dev/null
+++ b/changelog.d/16667.misc
@@ -0,0 +1 @@
+Reduce database load of pruning old `user_ips`.
diff --git a/synapse/storage/databases/main/client_ips.py b/synapse/storage/databases/main/client_ips.py
index d4b14aaeb..1df773105 100644
--- a/synapse/storage/databases/main/client_ips.py
+++ b/synapse/storage/databases/main/client_ips.py
@@ -465,18 +465,15 @@ class ClientIpWorkerStore(ClientIpBackgroundUpdateStore, MonthlyActiveUsersWorke
         #
         # This works by finding the max last_seen that is less than the given
         # time, but has no more than N rows before it, deleting all rows with
-        # a lesser last_seen time. (We COALESCE so that the sub-SELECT always
-        # returns exactly one row).
+        # a lesser last_seen time. (We use an `IN` clause to force postgres to
+        # use the index, otherwise it tends to do a seq scan).
         sql = """
             DELETE FROM user_ips
-            WHERE last_seen <= (
-                SELECT COALESCE(MAX(last_seen), -1)
-                FROM (
-                    SELECT last_seen FROM user_ips
-                    WHERE last_seen <= ?
-                    ORDER BY last_seen ASC
-                    LIMIT 5000
-                ) AS u
+            WHERE last_seen IN (
+                SELECT last_seen FROM user_ips
+                WHERE last_seen <= ?
+                ORDER BY last_seen ASC
+                LIMIT 5000
             )
         """