Implementing Soft Deletes with Entity Framework Core

[@BaldBeardedBuilder]

Have you ever implemented soft deletes in a production app? I've only had to do it a few times, but I really like the pattern and REALLY like the ability to have an "undo" built into the app.

[@wayne_taylor]

I have once in my own MVC app, I did a bool flag . The method used in the current work DB is a number which represents it's deleted 🙂

[@BaldBeardedBuilder]

@@wayne_taylor How is the number used? Like a bool? So 1 = true? Or is it some kind of state. Like 2 = something, 3 = deleted?

[@taconaut8276]

I also had a few projects with soft delete. In the current one, we use temporal tables to track changes.

[@BaldBeardedBuilder]

@taconaut8276 that makes sense. I've got a video in the works now that discusses using interceptors for audit tracking you might be interested in.

[@taconaut8276]

Sweet, keep it up

[@SpiderJack]

I like the new code view, seeing you type as it shows on the screen is "chef's kiss."

[@wobuntu]

Saw a few of your videos now and I have to say; pure gold. Immediately subscribed after the first one I watched.

[@BaldBeardedBuilder]

@wobuntu thanks for your kind words! I’m glad you’re enjoying them.

[@markohy9samy565]

I am really learning new stuff from you man thanks ♥

[@BaldBeardedBuilder]

Thanks for watching!

[@Zeblab42]

Nice, short, useful video. You have my attention mr bearded developer man.

[@BaldBeardedBuilder]

Thanks for the comment! Glad you liked it.

[@Zeblab42]

All jokes aside. I really like your videos. They cover useful topics and in just the right amount of detail. I have consumed a lot of C# material from docs to books to videos, and you still provided great insights and ideas. How did I not come across such a neat soft delete solution in 3 years of research? Perhaps I have too much hair and not enough beard.

[@BaldBeardedBuilder]

@@Zeblab42 Keep coding. The hair will leave. 😁

[@SandzakBob]

What about situation when we use soft delete on a table that has unique constraint on some attribute, etc. email. If we soft delete a record and try to add that record with same email, it would violate the constraint, since this deleted record is not really deleted. Is there some best practice for these kind of scenarios?

[@BaldBeardedBuilder]

That's a REALLY good question. I don't know if there's a "best practice," but I can tell you what I've seen done in the past. If you have a field like that, you could modify the interceptor to also add some unique value after the actual value. Then in your "undo" functionality, remove it. Like "[e-mail]-2048210482" where the number is random or a datetimestamp. Then you could just use a regex to remove that ending on "undo." There are probably even better ways, but that's a simple one.

[@BaldBeardedBuilder]

Another option would be to leave the "email" field unchanged and on create, if that record exists, just "undelete" it.

[@Eneong]

​@@BaldBeardedBuilder At first I used that way but encountered performance issues when inserting because of record exist check. In the end I found better way to deal with it. For the solution I used postgresql's partial index. In EF core it can be implemented using b.HasIndex(field name).HasFilter("DeletedAt is null") in model config. So deleted entities just were not included in the index. But not sure If every db provider support that feature. I think that case is quite important to be covered somewhere in description or in pinned comment.

[@l.b76]

You can create a unique constraint for the email by also including the deleted_at column. With this setup you can create a new user that has the same email as a softDeleted user. Now, this may have other drawbacks, like for example, your requirements change and you need to restore these softDeleted users.

[@rankarat]

Really useful, thanks

[@BaldBeardedBuilder]

Glad it was helpful and thanks a ton for the comment!

[@gerb1419]

@Bald. Bearded. Builder. Can you tell me how to design an EF scheme if I need to save large files (blobs) in the MS SQL database? Like 20-50 megabyte files. As far as I understand, FILESTREAM is not supported by EF ?

[@BaldBeardedBuilder]

Hi @gerb1419. Great question for our Discord server. Join us to chat software development and lots more. bbb.dev/discord

[@banzooiebooie]

Cool, great idea. Learned something even if I am a Java developer!

[@BaldBeardedBuilder]

Come to the dark side! 😁

[@RikinPatel13]

Que.: You are using DateTimeOffset datatype and you are setting UTC time so it required to use DateTimeOffset to use here?

[@BaldBeardedBuilder]

@RikinPatel13, nope not required. I just prefer DateTimeOffset versus DateTime. It was probably just habit to type that rather than DateTime. Cheers!

[@Kimo.Codess]

I usually just override save changes within the data context. how is that different from the interceptor? what advantage does the interceptor bring?

[@BaldBeardedBuilder]

@kimfom I'm doing a deep-dive video on interceptors this week. For one, there's a lot more of those "hooks" than just SaveChanges. Also, a huge benefit to me, is that I can inject interceptors with DI. (maybe that was a spoiler for next week. 😁)

[@Kimo.Codess]

@@BaldBeardedBuilder yeah thank you I sure am looking forward to that 😊

[@williamliu8985]

Never seen this EF technique before, I feel like I've become stronger! 😁

[@BaldBeardedBuilder]

@williamliu8985, just wait until next week's deep-dive video on EF Core interceptors. You're going to feel like a superhero. And thanks for the comment!

[@saleem.shaikh]

Subscribed

[@BaldBeardedBuilder]

Welcome aboard @saleem.shaikh!

[@JtendraShahani]

Is this an extension you use to create new files. Sorry, I always drop and extension, font, or theme question.😊

[@BaldBeardedBuilder]

Don't apologize, I love talking about setups, extensions, shortcuts, etc.! Ask away! To answer your question, VS Code has a CTRL + N shortcut to create a new editor window. Then, CTRL + S will open a save dialog where I can name the file and specify its location. For me, it's faster than using the New File dialog in Visual Studio and keeps my hands on the keyboard.

[@BaldBeardedBuilder]

@JtendraShahani I answered here. 😁

[@one.pouria786]

Is there any way to apply this query filter to all of my entities?

[@michaelholloway3547]

I've done something like apply this logic to all entities that implement an interface... (like the ISoftDelete used in this video) but I haven't implemented it with EntityFramework.

[@BaldBeardedBuilder]

I've seen ways to do it, but all of them felt "icky" compared to just adding it to the entities long-form. Some used reflection 🤮, others iterated through the entities and added them. Either way seems like it adds more overhead than I'd want at runtime versus the mental load for a developer to just write them out once.

[@one.pouria786]

@@BaldBeardedBuilder I think we can rewrite reflector version with code generator

[@sanglin9387]

soft delete okay but you need a snapshot before and after for auditing purposes

[@BaldBeardedBuilder]

@sanglin9387 maybe. It depends on the requirements. No need to build something that isn't in the requirements. Arbitrarily deciding to add before/after auditing is going to add overhead that may not be needed. Totally a good idea to ask & get clarity before just doing it.

[@sanglin9387]

@@BaldBeardedBuilder for accounting system we do before no need because lot of screen just for adjust for mistake user 🤣. new developer think must be prefect but reality end user very ... unthinkable

[@SpiderJack]

Maybe it's just a "bullion" - you mean like soup? The captioning got confused on boolean. 🤣

[@BaldBeardedBuilder]

It's flavorful solution to preserving data.

[@PankajNikam]

I think it's just the gold we are talking about to pay EF not to delete the value 😉😉

[@iteospace]

IgnoreQueryFilters if you use many query filters. Its problem

[@Krauttrooper]

Don't forget GDPR you have to delete pii.

[@casperhansen826]

In that case you could have a routine to actually delete records that are marked as deleted once in a while