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18/3/2016 DifferencebetweenTRUNCATE,DELETEandDROPcommands|OracleFAQ

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Difference between TRUNCATE, DELETE and DROP commands
Submitted by admin on Sat, 20060211 02:07
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DELETE
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The DELETE command is used to remove rows from a table. A WHERE
clause can be used to only remove some rows. If no WHERE condition is
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[ Register ] [ Forgot specified, all rows will be removed. After performing a DELETE
password ] operation you need to COMMIT or ROLLBACK the transaction to make the
change permanent or to undo it. Note that this operation will cause all
DELETE triggers on the table to fire.
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SQL>SELECTCOUNT(*)FROMemp

COUNT(*)

10

TRUNCATE
TRUNCATE removes all rows from a table. The operation cannot be rolled back and no triggers will be fired. As such, TRUCATE
is faster and doesn't use as much undo space as a DELETE.

SQL>TRUNCATETABLEemp

Tabletruncated.

SQL>SELECTCOUNT(*)FROMemp

COUNT(*)

0

DROP
The DROP command removes a table from the database. All the tables' rows, indexes and privileges will also be removed. No
DML triggers will be fired. The operation cannot be rolled back.

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18/3/2016 DifferencebetweenTRUNCATE,DELETEandDROPcommands|OracleFAQ

SQL>DROPTABLEemp

Tabledropped.

SQL>SELECT*FROMemp
SELECT*FROMemp
*
ERRORatline1:
ORA00942:tableorviewdoesnotexist

DROP and TRUNCATE are DDL commands, whereas DELETE is a DML command. Therefore DELETE operations can be rolled back
(undone), while DROP and TRUNCATE operations cannot be rolled back.

From Oracle 10g a table can be "undropped". Example:

SQL>FLASHBACKTABLEempTOBEFOREDROP

Flashbackcomplete.

PS: DROP and TRUNCATE are DDL commands, whereas DELETE is a DML command. As such, DELETE operations can be rolled back
(undone), while DROP and TRUNCATE operations cannot be rolled back.

What are the difference between DDL, DML and up How does one escape special characters when
DCL commands? writing SQL queries?

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Difference between TRUNCATE and DELETE commands


Submitted by Dipal havsar (not verified) on Tue, 20060919 07:39.
1>TRUNCATE is a DDL command whereas DELETE is a DML command.

2>TRUNCATE is much faster than DELETE.

Reason:When you type DELETE.all the data get copied into the Rollback Tablespace first.then delete operation get
performed.Thatswhy when you type ROLLBACK after deleting a table ,you can get back the data(The system get it for you from the
Rollback Tablespace).All this process take time.But when you type TRUNCATE,it removes data directly without copying it into the
Rollback Tablespace.Thatswhy TRUNCATE is faster.Once you Truncate you cann't get back the data.

3>You cann't rollback in TRUNCATE but in DELETE you can rollback.TRUNCATE removes the record permanently.

4>In case of TRUNCATE ,Trigger doesn't get fired.But in DML commands like DELETE .Trigger get fired.

5>You cann't use conditions(WHERE clause) in TRUNCATE.But in DELETE you can write conditions using WHERE clause


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One more difference.


Submitted by Shreehari (not verified) on Tue, 20061107 21:25.
Thanks for this information.
There is one more difference that TRUNCATE command resets the High Water Mark for the table but DELETE does not. So after
TRUNCATE the operations on table are much faster.


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about truncate and drop


Submitted by rajakumari (not verified) on Sat, 20061118 08:34.
Drop command will delete the entire row also the structure.But truncate will delete the contenets only not the strucure, so no
need to give specifications for another table creation.


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DELETE,DROP,TRUNCATE
Submitted by shoaib on Thu, 20070118 00:04.
DELETE
Delete is the command that only remove the data from the table. It is DML statement. Deleted data can be rollback. By using this
we can delete whole data from the table(if use without where clause).If ew want to remove only selected data then we should
specify condition in the where clause
SQL>delete from employee;(this command will remove all the data from table)
SQL>delete from employee where employee_name='JOHN';(This command will remove only that row from employee table where
employee_name is JOHN');

DROP:
Drop command remove the table from data dictionary. This is the DDL statement. We can not recover the table before Oracle 10g.

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18/3/2016 DifferencebetweenTRUNCATE,DELETEandDROPcommands|OracleFAQ
But Oracle 10g provide the command to recover it by using the command (FLASHBACK)

TRUNCATE:
This is the DML command. This command delete the data from table. But there is one difference from ordinary delete command.
Truncate command drop the storage held by this table. Drop storage can be use by this table again or some other table. This is the
faster command because it directly drop the storage


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Truncate is DDL command


Submitted by srora on Wed, 20070620 03:23.
DML commands have a roll back option.But DDL commands do not have.So truncate is a ddl statement


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Diff between DML & DDL command


Submitted by jyotiranjan85 on Fri, 20120106 01:05.
Yes, DML command can be roll back but DDL can not.


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DELETE,DROP,TRUNCATE
Submitted by Sandip Mitra (not verified) on Fri, 20070119 01:36.
DROP command is a DDL command. It removes the information along with structure. It also removes all information about the table
from data dictionary.

TRUNCATE command is DDL command. It removes all the information of the table. Regarding performance if you have to delete all
the rows of a table you should perform TRUNCATE command with DROP STORAGE option.

DELETE is a DML command. It provides the facility of conditionalbased deletion. It also generates REDO information.


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Undo tablespace + Truncate and Constraints + Grants with drops


Submitted by huggyfee on Fri, 20100604 08:38.
If you're removing a large quantity of data (e.g. debug log table) then it makes sense to use truncate to clear the table if you're
not worried about needing to retrieve it as part of a transaction remember that you are stretching your undo tablespace to cover
the whole of the data you are looking to delete if you using the DELETE FROM... command, only to immediately wipe that out again
when you commit for what purpose? A lot more processing effort when all you want to do is clear a table of its contents.

On the minus side, if you have a foreign key constraint referring to the table you are trying to truncate, this won't work even if
the referring table has no data in it! This is because the foreign key checking is done with DDL rather than DML. This can be got
around by temporarily disabling the foreign key constraint(s) to the table.

With dropping a table, also bear in mind that you lose any associated grants / constraints etc. and if you want to recreate the
table, you would need to recreate these and it may be that the user dropping the table may not have the rights to regrant etc.
so dropping is always an extreme measure! If you're constantly dropping / recreating you should probably be using temporary
tables for oneoff jobs or global temporary tables for frequently running processes.


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truncate
Submitted by M123 on Sun, 20160313 19:49.
truncate table table_name;

rollback table_name;

can be rollback once truncated.


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