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CouchDB - Deleting a Document
Deleting a Document using cURL Utility
You can delete a document in CouchDB by sending an HTTP request to the server using
DELETE method through cURL utility. Following is the syntax to delete a document.
curl -X DELETE http : // 127.0.0.1:5984 / database name/database id?_rev id
Using −X, we can specify a custom request method of HTTP we are using, while
communicating with the HTTP server. In this case, we are using Delete method. To delete a
database /database_name/database_id/ is not enough. You have to pass the recent
revision id through the url. To mention attributes of any data structure "?" is used.
Example
Suppose there is a document in database named my_database with document id 001. To
delete this document, you have to get the rev id of the document. Get the document data
as shown below.
$ curl -X GET http://127.0.0.1:5984/my_database/001
{
" _id " : " 001 ",
" _rev " : " 2-04d8eac1680d237ca25b68b36b8899d3 " ,
" age " : " 23 "
}
Now specify the revision id of the document to be deleted, id of the document, and
database name the document belongs to, as shown below −
$ curl -X DELETE http://127.0.0.1:5984/my_database/001?rev=1-
3fcc78daac7a90803f0a5e383f4f1e1e
{"ok":true,"id":"001","rev":"2-3a561d56de1ce3305d693bd15630bf96"}
Verification
To verify whether the document is deleted, try to fetch the document by using the GET
method. Since you are fetching a deleted document, this will give you an error message as
shown below −
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$ curl -X GET http://127.0.0.1:5984/my_database/001
{"error":"not_found","reason":"deleted"}
Deleting a Document using Futon
First of all, verify the documents in the database. Following is the snapshot of the database
named tutorials_point.
Here you can observe, the database consists of three documents. To delete any of the
documents say 003, do the following −
Click on the document, you will get a page showing the contents of selected
document in the form of field-value pairs.
This page also contains four options namely Save Document, Add Field, Upload
Attachment, Delete Document.
Click on Delete Document option.
You will get a dialog box saying "Are you sure you want to delete this
document?" Click on delete, to delete the document.
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