Deleting documents

Delete by an object reference

Once a valid reference to a document has been retrieved, the document can be deleted with a call to Delete in the following manner:

session.Delete(existingBlogPost);
session.SaveChanges();

This results in an HTTP communication as shown below:

POST /bulk_docs HTTP/1.1
Accept-Encoding: deflate,gzip
Content-Type: application/json; charset=utf-8
Host: 127.0.0.1:8081
Content-Length: 49
Expect: 100-continue

[
  {
    "Key": "blogs/1",
    "Etag": null,
    "Method": "DELETE"
  }
]

Delete by ID

If you have the document's ID, and you don't want to load it just for the sake of delete it, you can either defer deleting it using the Defer command or doing a direct delete using the DatabaseCommands.

Delete by ID using the Defer command

Using the Defer command in the Advanced section of the session API, you can pass a DeleteCommandData instance which will instruct the session to delete the document upon the call to the SaveChanges method. This will ensure that the delete will be transactional because of its participation in the Unit Of Work of the session.

Here is an example how to use it:

session.Advanced.Defer(new DeleteCommandData {Key = "posts/1234"});

Delete by ID using the DatabaseCommands

You can perform a direct delete using the DatabaseCommands property available in the Advanced section of the session API.

session.Advanced.DatabaseCommands.Delete("posts/1234", null);

This results in an HTTP communication as shown below:

DELETE /docs/posts/1234 HTTP/1.1
Host: 127.0.0.1:8081

Unlike session operations, DatabaseCommands operations execute immediately, and do not wait for SaveChanges to be called.