Removing things from the database

PHILOSOPHY NOTE: These delete functions are not included in the GUI because they are considered destructive. A simple misplaced click could destroy hours of work. Razor's philosophy is, if you really want to delete something you should have to work a little harder.

NOTE: If the name of the object being removed from the database contains spaces (in either the file or folder names), you MUST enclose it in quotes.

NOTE: ALL before scripts will be executed prior to removing files/folders. If any before script fails, the operation will be terminated and no files/folders will be removed.

Deleting files

It's possible to completely remove files from the version control aspect of Razor.

# razor -c rm -f <file> -g <group> \
[-i <issue[<:issue group>]>]

NOTE: Deleting files does not destroy existing threads that reference those files.

Deleting folders

It's also possible to remove folders (including all files contained in the specified folder) from Razor using the following:

# razor -c rm_folder -f <folder> -g <group> \
[-i <issue[<:issue group>]>]

A list of the files contained in the folder will be listed for confirmation.

Deleting threads

Since a "thread" is a text file under control of a specially named group, we are able to delete it from the database with only a slight variation of the command used for deleting files. For example, if we wish to delete the `Beta' thread from the `apple' group, we could use the following command...

# razor -c rm -f Beta -g apple##Threads

NOTE: The named files/threads are not actually being deleted from the file system. They are instead simply being hidden. This is done as a safety measure, and allows your Razor administrator to actually retrieve it later if need be.

Deleting issues

Issues are ASCII files under version control, just as any other file. They are merely members of a special razor group ++ISSUES++[.<issue group>]. Knowing this, it is possible to remove them from the database using the same command line syntax as removing a file (above). A more comfortable alternative however is to use the following command...

# razor -c rm_issue -f \
<issue[<:issue group>]> [-g <issue group>]

Note that the <issue> can be specified in its fully annotated form (I..1-234) or simply as a normal integer value (1234). Use the -g option to specify an issues group other than the default.

TIP: Rather than delete issues outright, some sites prefer to keep them around for quite some time. To prevent old ones from cluttering up their displays, they add an `Obsolete' check box to the issue form and then just filter out the ones they don't have a pressing need to see. This also makes future deletion more orderly; they can filter to see only the Obsolete ones, sort them by the date of last modification, and draw up their hit list.