Deleting a member from a group roster deletes all their attendance history.

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Deleting a member from a group roster deletes all their attendance history.

Greg Leininger posted 9 Years Ago

I am just now realizing a problem. Let's say I have a member attend my group for several weeks, then they leave the group, so I delete them from the roster. Well, when I do that, it deletes all the attendance history that person had in the group. I would have expected it to simply remove the person from the attendance sheet for future group meetings and group communication. The natural behavior of our group leaders is to delete a member from the roster when they stop coming. I'm sure they don't realize they are deleting all the attendance history for that person in that group. Does anyone else see this as a problem? Can this be changed?

David Leigh · Accepted Answer · 2016-02-02T12:37-07:00

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David Leigh replied 9 Years Ago

Greg,

I agree, this is unexpected behavior. Data loss is never a good thing!

In my opinion, it would make more sense if a UI "delete" command actually translated to a "mark as deleted" command in the database so that the data itself is never lost.
Actual deletion of data (for purposes of trimming the database size) could be performed as a separate maintenance job if necessary.

The only thing I can suggest as a workaround is to try and disable the "Delete" function for most users via security so that they are forced to mark people as Inactive instead?

Hope this helps.

Edit Answer

<p>Greg,</p>

<p>I agree, this is unexpected behavior. Data loss is never a good thing!<br />
<br />
In my opinion,&nbsp;it would make more sense if a UI "delete" command actually translated to a "mark as deleted" command in the database so that the data itself is never lost.<br />
Actual deletion of data (for purposes of trimming the database size) could be performed as a separate maintenance job if necessary.<br />
<br />
The only thing I can suggest as a workaround is to try and disable the "Delete" function for most users via security so that they are forced to mark people as Inactive instead?</p>

<p>Hope this helps.</p>

<p>Greg,</p>

<p>I agree, this is unexpected behavior. Data loss is never a good thing!<br />
<br />
In my opinion,&nbsp;it would make more sense if a UI "delete" command actually translated to a "mark as deleted" command in the database so that the data itself is never lost.<br />
Actual deletion of data (for purposes of trimming the database size) could be performed as a separate maintenance job if necessary.<br />
<br />
The only thing I can suggest as a workaround is to try and disable the "Delete" function for most users via security so that they are forced to mark people as Inactive instead?</p>

<p>Hope this helps.</p>

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Greg Leininger

9 years ago

David, I like your workaround and I'll implement that, but I am hoping this issue gets addressed in a near future update. Thanks.
David Leigh

9 years ago

You're welcome Greg. Perhaps you might want to add your suggestion to the Black Book so that it gets some traction for the next release?
http://www.rockrms.com/Rock/Ideas
Greg Leininger

9 years ago

Done! Thanks again. I didn't know about that.
Jon Edmiston

9 years ago

Hiding this question as after further digging there is no loss of data. Everything is working as intended and described in the original question.
David Leigh

9 years ago

Sorry Jon, perhaps I should have chosen my words more carefully. In speaking of "data loss", I didn't mean to imply there was any data corruption - simply that by allowing users to delete data, the information is permanently lost. While I understand that this is intended functionality, I think it is fair to say that from a user perspective this behavior is somewhat unexpected - just like the OP, it caught me by surprise - and perhaps it's worth considering a design change in this area. My apologies if this sounded like a negative comment.

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Deleting a member from a group roster deletes all their attendance history.

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