MySQL Replacing IN and EXISTS with joins in sub sub queries - mysql

Question

So, this query is currently used in a webshop to retrieve technical data about articles.
It has served its purpose fine except the amount of products shown have increased lately resulting in unacceptable long loading times for some categories.
For one of the worst pages this (and some other queries) get requested about 80 times.
I only recently learned that MySQL does not optimize sub-queries that don't have a depending parameter to only run once.
So if someone could help me with one of the queries and explain how you can replace the in's and exists's to joins, i will probably be able to change the other ones myself.
select distinct criteria.cri_id, des_texts.tex_text, article_criteria.acr_value, article_criteria.acr_kv_des_id
from article_criteria, designations, des_texts, criteria, articles
where article_criteria.acr_cri_id = criteria.cri_id
and article_criteria.acr_art_id = articles.art_id
and articles.art_deliverystatus = 1
and criteria.cri_des_id = designations.des_id
and designations.des_lng_id = 9
and designations.des_tex_id = des_texts.tex_id
and criteria.cri_id = 328
and article_criteria.acr_art_id IN (Select distinct link_art.la_art_id
from link_art, link_la_typ
where link_art.la_id = link_la_typ.lat_la_id
and link_la_typ.lat_typ_id = 17484
and link_art.la_ga_id IN (Select distinct link_ga_str.lgs_ga_id
from link_ga_str, search_tree
where link_ga_str.lgs_str_id = search_tree.str_id
and search_tree.str_type = 1
and search_tree.str_id = 10132
and EXISTS (Select *
from link_la_typ
where link_la_typ.lat_typ_id = 17484
and link_ga_str.lgs_ga_id = link_la_typ.lat_ga_id)))
order by article_criteria.acr_value
I think this one is the main badguy with sub-sub-sub-queries
I just noticed i can remove the last exist and still get the same results but with no increase in speed, not part of the question though ;) i'll figure out myself whether i still need that part.
Any help or pointers are appreciated, if i left out some useful information tell me as well.

Answer 1

I think this is equivalent:
SELECT DISTINCT c.cri_id, dt.tex_text, ac.acr_value, ac.acr_kv_des_id
FROM article_criteria AS ac
JOIN criteria AS c ON ac.acr_cri_id = c.cri_id
JOIN articles AS a ON ac.acr_art_id = a.art_id
JOIN designations AS d ON c.cri_des_id = d.des_id
JOIN des_texts AS dt ON dt.tex_id = d.des_tex_id
JOIN (SELECT distinct la.la_art_id
FROM link_art AS la
JOIN link_la_typ AS llt ON la.la_id = llt.lat_la_id
JOIN (SELECT DISTINCT lgs.lgs_ga_id
FROM link_ga_str AS lgs
JOIN search_tree AS st ON lgs.lgs_str_id = st.str_id
JOIN link_la_typ AS llt ON lgs.lgs_ga_id = llt.lat_ga_id
WHERE st.str_type = 1
AND st.str_id = 10132
AND llt.lat_typ_id = 17484) AS lgs
ON la.la_ga_id = lgs.lgs_ga_id
WHERE llt.lat_typ_id = 17484) AS la
ON ac.acr_art_id = la.la_art_id
WHERE a.art_deliverystatus = 1
AND d.des_lng_id = 9
AND c.cri_id = 328
ORDER BY ac.acr_value
All the IN <subquery> clauses can be replaced with JOIN <subquery>, where you then JOIN on the column being tested equaling the column returned by the subquery. And the EXISTS test is converted to a join with the table, moving the comparison in the subquery's WHERE clause into the ON clause of the JOIN.
It's probably possible to flatten the whole thing, instead of joining with subqueries. But I suspect performance will be poor, because this won't reduce the temporary tables using DISTINCT. So you'll get combinatorial explosion in the resulting cross product, which will then have to be reduced at the end with the DISTINCT at the top.
I've converted all the implicit joins to ANSI JOIN clauses, to make the structure clearer, and added table aliases to make things more readable.

Answer 2

In general, you can convert a FROM tab1 WHERE ... val IN (SELECT blah) to a join like this.
FROM tab1
JOIN (
SELECT tab1_id
FROM tab2
JOIN tab3 ON whatever = whatever
WHERE whatever
) AS sub1 ON tab1.id = sub1.tab1_id
The JOIN (an inner join) will drop the rows that don't match the ON condition from your query.
If your tab1_id values can come up duplicate from your inner query, use SELECT DISTINCT. But don't use SELECT DISTINCT unless you need to; it is costly to evaluate.