CA-L-Serv Commands › SQL Statements › DELETE FROM Statement

DELETE FROM Statement

The DELETE FROM statement deletes one or more rows that meet the specified criteria on a SELECT clause. When using a cursor, DELETE FROM deletes the row currently being processed.

Syntax

LSQL DELETE FROM tablename [WHERE criteria]

criteria

Search criteria. When using a cursor, the criteria on a WHERE clause must include CURRENT OF cursorname, which causes the function to be performed on the current row being processed in the cursorname operation. (See the example that follows.)

tablename

The name of the table from which you are deleting.

WARNING! If you use the DELETE FROM statement for a table and do not include a WHERE clause, all rows from the table are deleted. Use the DELETE FROM statement with extreme caution.

Notes:

• When the DELETE FROM statement is used with a cursor, it must be issued from a CLIST or from a REXX procedure.
• You can use a host variable for tablename.

Examples

• To delete rows from the APPLICATIONS table when those rows were last updated on 02/13/02, issue this LSQL command:

  LSQL DELETE FROM APPLICATIONS WHERE UPDATE=DATE '2002‑02‑13'
  

  Note that the data type definition precedes the literal date value.

• To delete the current row being processed by a cursor named STATDOWN, issue this LSQL command from a CLIST:

  LSQL DELETE FROM APPLICATIONS WHERE CURRENT OF STATDOWN