Deleting records in a synced table

[Alan_Mclaverty]

I have set-up a sync.

In my original base, I have current customer data that I am working with.

In my synced table I want to have a historical record of the data for that customer. I have therefore set-up a sync so when the records are deleted or hidden in the source table I “leave the records in this table”.

Now everything works well. However in my synced table, I want to delete historical data after a certain period of time, but it doesn’t allow me to manually delete records I get the message “You can’t delete this record because this table is synced from an external source”

Does anyone have any suggestions/workarounds?

[ScottWorld]

When you’re syncing tables, you can only create/edit/delete records from the source table, not the destination table.

[Databaser]

@ScottWorld , isn’t that a bit of an issue? You could never get rid of those records in the synced table when that record has been deleted from the source table?

[ScottWorld]

Airtable gives 2 options on what you’d like to do with the records in the destination table when they are deleted from the source table — you can either keep the records or delete the records:

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Airtable Sync - Advanced options

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[Databaser]

Understood, but if you keep them in the destination table and remove them from the source table, you can never delete them later in the destination table because those are synced records?

[ScottWorld]

You can go into the sync settings (in the destination table) after-the-fact, and delete individual records or delete all records.

[ScottWorld]

@Databaser Oh, I see that that’s what @Alan_Mclaverty was asking.

He wanted to delete records AFTER they were already deleted from the source table.

Yes, that is possible from the sync settings/configuration.

[Databaser]

Ok, I did the exercise myself. @Alan_Mclaverty, if a record is deleted in the source base and you chose to keep the record in the destination base but later want to delete it, you can go to the sync config settings of the table in question, go to the “leave records when they are deleted or hidden in source” option, choose “change” and there you will see a “Delete unavailable records…” button. Click on that and it will give you a list of unavailable records, which you can select and delete.

It’s a nice solution, but i wouldn’t have known if it wasn’t for your question. A bit hidden I think :slightly_smiling_face:

[ScottWorld]

Yes, that’s exactly what I just said in my 2 posts above. :man_shrugging:t2:

But yes, very cool that these options are available.

[Databaser]

LOL, my bad @ScottWorld, apologies! :smiling_face_with_halo: