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From: Darren Duncan <[email protected]>
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: Naming Object commands "Delete" is a source of user errors
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2025 05:50:14 -0700
Message-ID: <[email protected]> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <[email protected]>
References: <[email protected]>
	<01020198122b4fa8-37d1f889-e6c1-4bb9-87a4-1b3ca0ffc8c3-000000@eu-west-1.amazonses.com>
	<[email protected]>

As a follow-up...

Thank you very much to Akshay Joshi for quickly claiming the GitHub issue I 
filed and implementing the fix, and to Anil Sahoo for testing it, seemingly all 
in time for the very next pgAdmin 9.6 release, and within about 48 hours of my 
request on GitHub.

Darren Duncan

On 2025-07-16 12:48 a.m., Darren Duncan wrote:
> On 2025-07-16 12:38 a.m., Ray O'Donnell wrote:
>> On 16 July 2025 08:19:09 Darren Duncan wrote:
>>
>>> I am finding that it is a recurring and damaging source of user error that
>>> Object/Explorer commands named "Delete" actually correspond to SQL DROP rather
>>> than SQL DELETE or TRUNCATE. Multiple times I have accidentally dropped tables
>>> when I meant to just truncate them.
>>
>> In fairness, you don't (SQL) DELTE tables - you delete their rows, hence the 
>> command is DELETE FROM. And it is intuitive that when you right-click on an 
>> object and click "Delete", it is the object itself which gets zapped. Also, 
>> TRUNCATE is there in the menu too.
> 
> Yes, (SQL) DELETE does not remove the table objects themselves, just the rows in 
> them, hence the problem that users would see "Delete" in the pgAdmin menus and 
> choose it instinctively thinking that removing just records is what would happen.
> 
> While Truncate is also in the menus, it is further down and often missed when 
> one sees Delete and thinks that's what I want and stops reading further.
> 
>> Having said that, I recall that the menu used to say "Drop" rather than 
>> "Delete", which IMHO is clearer to SQL-savvy people.... it got changed at some 
>> point.
> 
> And SQL-savvy people are the primary user base of pgAdmin I would assume.
> 
> Best for this command to line up to avoid confusion of the same term being used 
> for 2 very different meanings.
> 
> Following a renaming to Drop it should be very easy and quick for people to 
> adapt to.
> 
> Those that don't have the cognitive dissonance would still recognize what the 
> command does.
> 
> IMPORTANT: Alphabetically, Drop and Delete are about in the same positions in 
> each menu, so those wondering where Delete went would see the similar-appearance 
> Drop in the same place and should infer through English if not SQL that it does 
> the same thing.
> 
> Darren Duncan
> 
> 
> 

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