> > Well, of course the whole *point* of LIMIT is that it stops short of
> > scanning the whole query result. So I'm afraid you're kind of stuck
> > as far as the performance goes: you can't get a count() answer without
> > scanning the whole query.
Right, that's what I thought.
> > I'm a little curious though: what is the typical count() result from
> > your queries? The EXPLAIN outputs you show indicate that the planner
> > is only expecting about one row out now, but I have no idea how close
> > that is to the mark. If it were really right, then there'd be no
> > difference in the performance of LIMIT and full queries, so I guess
> > it's not right; but how far off is it?
Well, count does always return 1 row, though what's in that one row is as
varying as 0 to the number of records in the applicants database (about
11,000)..
Anyway, I thank you and appreciate your input..
-Mitch
