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Soft deletion probably isn't worth it

brandur.org

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Re: Soft deletion probably isn't worth it

#331

Post by Gigachad »

Akronymus wrote: post #256
changoplatanero wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

User deleting an account is just one way that stuff gets deleted. There are other deletion scenarios where it is appropriate to keep the information after its deleted.

Yeah. Basically anything that an employee can mess up, should be reversible IMO. But actions such as deleting an account should have the option of "YES, DELETE IT PERMANENTLY, THIS CAN'T BE UNDONE"

You probably want to put the account on hold for a period where it can be undone. And then clean it up after.

Re: Soft deletion probably isn't worth it

#332

Post by simcop2387 »

psYchotic wrote: post #217
simcop2387 wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's the idea of temporal tables, https://pgxn.org/dist/temporal_tables/ It's not a standard (I think) but it'd let you do a cascading delete and then be able to go and look at the old objects as they were at time of deletion too. You'd need to do things very differently to show a list of deleted objects though.

It appears that there's been an attempt at standardizing temporal features in SQL in the SQL:2011 standard: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SQL:2011

Neat I didn't know that had happened. I can't say I follow SQL standards all that thoroughly.

Re: Soft deletion probably isn't worth it

#333

Post by tomschlick »

rjzzleep wrote: post #170
JohnBooty wrote: post #151

I've been a software dev since the 90s and at this point, I've learned to basically do things like audit trails and soft deletion by default, unless there's some reason not to. Somebody always wants to undelete something, or examine it to see why it was deleted, or see who changed something, or blah blah blah. It helps the business, it helps you as developer by giving you debug information as well as helping you to c…

In rails you get these things for free. What I don't get is why everyone rolls their own framework with node.js. It's basically 90s PHP all over again. EDIT: Soft delete is a trivial piece of code when the framework has a well defined transaction system for its ORM. It's not really related to Rails per se. Your statement is extremely disingenuous, while trying to look smart. Audit trails _can_ be(but don't have to be…

> It's basically 90s PHP all over again.

Which is funny because Laravel give you this for free as well through it's ORM. Soft deletes are an easily solved problem with $table->softDeletes() in your migration.

Re: Soft deletion probably isn't worth it

#334

Post by M2Ys4U »

he0001 wrote: post #313
astura wrote: post #278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>under the GDPR [soft delete] is illegal This is obviously not always true. Any European can't, for example, delete their online account with their mortgage company and demand that the mortgage company deletes the records saying that they owe them money so they can get their house for free. Nor can anyone call up their previous employer and require them to delete all the work they ever did from their company's comput…

> Nor can anyone call up previous employer and require them to delete all the work they ever did from their company’s computer systems. You can’t delete IP as this is not covered by GDPR, but you sure can ask them to delete your identification data from their records as GDPR also works for employees not just customers. It’s a problem with for example vcs. Unless there’s another law in ruling, GDPR is the baseline. It…

>You can’t delete IP as this is not covered by GDPR, but you sure can ask them to delete your identification data from their records as GDPR also works for employees not just customers.

You can ask, but the right to have data erased is not an absolute right. In fact there's an enumerated list of the circumstances in which the data must be deleted but data controllers are otherwise under no specific obligation to delete data, and there are even a series of criteria which dis-apply that obligation.

Re: Soft deletion probably isn't worth it

#335

Post by tomschlick »

cpursley wrote: post #310
JohnBooty wrote: post #151

I've been a software dev since the 90s and at this point, I've learned to basically do things like audit trails and soft deletion by default, unless there's some reason not to. Somebody always wants to undelete something, or examine it to see why it was deleted, or see who changed something, or blah blah blah. It helps the business, it helps you as developer by giving you debug information as well as helping you to c…

Can you recommend any best practices, design patterns, etc - for implementing soft delete in SQL systems?

The biggest one is to use a timestamp instead of a boolean. For instance Laravel used `deleted_at` as the field name with the type of TIMESTAMP (for mysql at least).

This allows you to do a `select * from users where deleted_at is null` to get the active records, but also know when the user was deleted if you need to audit / rollback.

Re: Soft deletion probably isn't worth it

#336

Post by amerine »

Brandur will know what I mean when I say, it’s always worked out in our favor at Heroku to soft-delete logicals, but hard-delete physicals. It’s not hard to remember to append a “where deleted_at is null” to some sql, or build into higher order UI’s.

However, GDPR/customer data demands across regimes makes me agree with him and would suggests folks listen. <3

Re: Soft deletion probably isn't worth it

#337

Post by dimgl »

dafelst wrote: post #20

Views are a simple solution to this problem. Pretty much all moderns RDBMSs support updatable views, so creating views over your tables with a simple WHERE deleted_at IS NULL solves the majority of the author's problems, including (IIRC) foreign key issues, assuming the deletes are done appropriately. I feel like a lot of developers underutilize the capabilities of the massively advanced database engines they code ag…

100% this. And yes, with inner joins it also solves the relationship issues.

Re: Soft deletion probably isn't worth it

#338

Post by abaldwin99 »

joshmanders wrote: post #231
rjzzleep wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In rails you get these things for free. What I don't get is why everyone rolls their own framework with node.js. It's basically 90s PHP all over again. EDIT: Soft delete is a trivial piece of code when the framework has a well defined transaction system for its ORM. It's not really related to Rails per se. Your statement is extremely disingenuous, while trying to look smart. Audit trails _can_ be(but don't have to be…

I don't know why you're ragging on Node.js users or even PHP for that matter as both ecosystems have this stuff covered too. Also you're comparing language/runtime with an actual framework and then dogging those users... If you want to compare Rails with Node/PHP then I'd suggest comparing with things like Laravel (PHP), Adonis (Node) and you'll find everything you can do in Rails is done in Node/PHP too.

I have to admit I'm getting a bit of fatigue reviewing frameworks in Node that are claimed to be batteries-included and similar to Rails/Django/Laravel. SailsJS, Redwood, NestJS, Remix, Prisma (ORM compared to Active Record). They all have an exciting landing page, clean looking documentation... but once you dig in further the feature set starts looking very Anyways I appreciate the name drop of Adonis. I'll have to give it a fair shake when I'm not feeling quite as cynical because I _really_ do want to find a solid Node framework in this area.

Re: Soft deletion probably isn't worth it

#339

Post by pmarreck »

alerighi wrote: post #216
gmiller123456 wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The author uses the "no one ever undeleted anything" as the primary justification. I think this is the part they miss. I've never undeleted a user either, but there have been many times I've gone back to look at something. Either a complaint finally gets around to me as to why the user wanted their account deleted (e.g. feature not working) and it helps to figure out why. Or they're returning and want things set up l…

It may be convenient, but under the GDPR is illegal. When an user deletes an account, all the personal data associated with that user must be deleted (or anonymize it in a way that it's no longer possible to associate it back to the particular user). You cannot just keep user information forever "just in case" they are useful again.

What if you anonymize it with a random key and then give the user that key in the event they want to undelete their deletion?

Re: Soft deletion probably isn't worth it

#340

Post by brigandish »

411111111111111 wrote: post #258
alerighi wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It may be convenient, but under the GDPR is illegal. When an user deletes an account, all the personal data associated with that user must be deleted (or anonymize it in a way that it's no longer possible to associate it back to the particular user). You cannot just keep user information forever "just in case" they are useful again.

Stop spreading misinformation. Nobody is required to hard delete the very second the [delete] button is pressed. You're following the law as long as that mentioned reaper job exists and runs at least once per month, to be safely within the allowed timeframe

I didn't see a claim that deletion had to be "the very second the [delete] button is pressed".

This is the actual text of the law[1]:

> The data subject shall have the right to obtain from the controller the erasure of personal data concerning him or her without undue delay

There is a one month limit of the right of access[2] and right to be informed[3], which flow into some of the articles of the law; and certain articles also mention a month's limit on being informed, e.g. from article 12 parts 3 and 4 [4]:

> The controller shall provide information on action taken on a request under Articles 15 to 22 to the data subject *without undue delay and in any event within one month* of receipt of the request. That period may be extended by two further months where necessary, taking into account the complexity and number of the requests. The controller shall inform the data subject of any such extension within one month of receipt of the request, together with the reasons for the delay. Where the data subject makes the request by electronic form means, the information shall be provided by electronic means where possible, unless otherwise requested by the data subject. If the controller does not take action on the request of the data subject, the controller shall inform the data subject without delay and at the latest within one month of receipt of the request of the reasons for not taking action and on the possibility of lodging a complaint with a supervisory authority and seeking a judicial remedy.

I've marked out those phrases because they show the language of the law that you will see again and again in the articles - without undue delay and within one month. The latter does not obviate the former.

Hence, and in fact, there is no part of the law that explicitly gives you a month to delete something. If you could delete something right now but you leave it hanging around because you have arbitrarily chosen a job to run once a month and there's a leak in that time, that would be undue delay.

[1] https://gdpr-info.eu/art-17-gdpr/

[2] https://gdpr-info.eu/issues/right-of-access/

[3] https://gdpr-info.eu/issues/right-to-be-informed/

[4] https://gdpr-info.eu/art-12-gdpr/

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