What should not be done when designing queries?

When designing queries, it's essential to ensure they are efficient and performant. The choice regarding designing queries to be unbounded or slow stands out as a critical mistake. Queries that are unbounded or purposefully slow can lead to significant performance issues, such as long wait times for users, excessive load on the database, and overall inefficient resource usage. A good query should be constructed to retrieve results in a timely manner and with the minimal necessary resource consumption.

Efficiency in query design involves applying suitable limits, indexing strategies, and optimization techniques that ensure the database can process requests quickly and effectively. This includes avoiding unnecessary complexity and ensuring that all query components are focused on retrieving relevant results promptly.

In contrast, other options like using fewer operators, avoiding overly complex nested queries, and sorting by primary keys emphasize strategies that enhance performance and maintainability—highlighting a focus on efficiency rather than inefficiency.