MySQL - automatically update all references to specific table to use on delete cascade?

Question

I have a specific table for one of my software packages on a MySQL 5.1 box which I need to drop a few hundred entries. These are user names with names in uppercase, the application is case specific and expects lower. This table is referenced by a ton of other tables however, some of which may have references back to these users.

Is there a ready way to adjust the foreign keys for all tables in my database which reference a given column 'username' in table 'logins' to have the on delete cascade attribute set? I don't see a ready way of doing so.

What I need is to change all the other tables with foreign keys depending on this table to utilize an on delete cascade. I'm hoping to do so without manually changing a hundred tables.

The select I'm utilizing is

delete from user where user_name REGEXP '^.*[A-Z].+$';

The issue is that the application has created duplicate user IDs in the user_id field. I only want to retain the ID number for properly created usernames.

The select above targets exactly what I want to get rid of. I don't have access to the application source which created these entries.

Answer 1

WARNING !!!

Before you do anything, mysqldump the entire database or tarball /var/lib/mysql

If you are concerned about case sensitivity, you need to hunt down the usernames in a special way

I tried this little experiment

use test
DROP TABLE rolando;
CREATE TABLE rolando
(id int not null auto_increment,
name varchar(20),primary key (id));
INSERT INTO rolando (name) VALUES
('rolando'),('Rolando'),
('ROLANDO'),('ROLANDO'),
('rolando'),('rolando');

I loaded the sample data

mysql> use test
Database changed
mysql> DROP TABLE rolando;
Query OK, 0 rows affected (0.03 sec)

mysql> CREATE TABLE rolando
    -> (id int not null auto_increment,
    -> name varchar(20),primary key (id));
Query OK, 0 rows affected (0.07 sec)

mysql> INSERT INTO rolando (name) VALUES
    -> ('rolando'),('Rolando'),
    -> ('ROLANDO'),('ROLANDO'),
    -> ('rolando'),('rolando');
Query OK, 6 rows affected (0.08 sec)
Records: 6  Duplicates: 0  Warnings: 0

I ran these queries (please note subtle differences)

mysql> SELECT name,COUNT(1) FROM rolando GROUP BY name;
+---------+----------+
| name    | COUNT(1) |
+---------+----------+
| rolando |        6 |
+---------+----------+
1 row in set (0.00 sec)

mysql> SELECT name,MD5(name),COUNT(1) FROM rolando GROUP BY name,MD5(name);
+---------+----------------------------------+----------+
| name    | MD5(name)                        | COUNT(1) |
+---------+----------------------------------+----------+
| ROLANDO | b3f7ba680fe83ab0b5174737e8d536a2 |        2 |
| Rolando | e0732d78dc135b8fcc33ec79bfa89d1f |        1 |
| rolando | e80d4ab77eb18a4ca350157fd487d7e2 |        3 |
+---------+----------------------------------+----------+
3 rows in set (0.00 sec)

mysql> SELECT name,MD5(name)=MD5(LOWER(name)) from rolando;
+---------+----------------------------+
| name    | MD5(name)=MD5(LOWER(name)) |
+---------+----------------------------+
| rolando |                          1 |
| Rolando |                          0 |
| ROLANDO |                          0 |
| ROLANDO |                          0 |
| rolando |                          1 |
| rolando |                          1 |
+---------+----------------------------+
6 rows in set (0.00 sec)

mysql> SELECT name,COUNT(1) FROM rolando GROUP BY name;
+---------+----------+
| name    | COUNT(1) |
+---------+----------+
| rolando |        6 |
+---------+----------+
1 row in set (0.00 sec)

mysql> SELECT name,(name LIKE lower(name)) like1,
    -> (name = binary LOWER(name)) like2 FROM rolando;
+---------+-------+-------+
| name    | like1 | like2 |
+---------+-------+-------+
| rolando |     1 |     1 |
| Rolando |     1 |     0 |
| ROLANDO |     1 |     0 |
| ROLANDO |     1 |     0 |
| rolando |     1 |     1 |
| rolando |     1 |     1 |
+---------+-------+-------+
6 rows in set (0.00 sec)

mysql>

Give this view of my experiment, a username with all uppercase or mixed case can be equal to an all lowercase UNLESS YOU USE BINARY operator with the comparison

I do not think BINARY can be applied to ON DELETE CASCADE.

However, you could something like this: To delete all usernames that are lowercase only, try running one of the following:

DELETE FROM logins WHERE username = BINARY LOWER(username);

or

DELETE FROM logins WHERE MD5(username) = MD5(LOWER(username));

If you run this now, you might nix all usernames in the other tables. Run this instead

SET FOREIGN_KEY_CHECKS=0;
DELETE FROM logins WHERE username = BINARY LOWER(username);

or

SET FOREIGN_KEY_CHECKS=0;
DELETE FROM logins WHERE MD5(username) = MD5(LOWER(username));

You will have to go to all tables that have a username in it and execute

SET FOREIGN_KEY_CHECKS=0;
DELETE FROM <whatevertable1> WHERE user_name = BINARY LOWER(user_name) AND user_name REGEXP '^.*[A-Z].+$';
DELETE FROM <whatevertable2> WHERE user_name = BINARY LOWER(user_name) AND user_name REGEXP '^.*[A-Z].+$';
DELETE FROM <whatevertable3> WHERE user_name = BINARY LOWER(user_name) AND user_name REGEXP '^.*[A-Z].+$';
.
.
.
DELETE FROM <whatevertableN> WHERE user_name = BINARY LOWER(user_name) AND user_name REGEXP '^.*[A-Z].+$';

Since you have a ton of other tables, use the INFORMATION_SCHEMA to script it for you:

DELETE_SQLFILE=/root/SensitiveDelete.sql
MYSQL_CONN="-uroot -ppassword"
echo "SET FOREIGN_KEY_CHECKS=0;" > ${DELETE_SQLFILE}
mysql ${MYSQL_CONN} -ANe"SELECT CONCAT('DELETE FROM ',table_schema,'.',table_name,' WHERE user_name = BINARY LOWER(user_name) AND user_name REGEXP ''\^.*[A-Z].+$''\) FROM information_schema.columns WHERE column_name='user_name'" >> ${DELETE_SQLFILE}
cat ${DELETE_SQLFILE}

If the file is correct to you, run it in the mysql client like this

mysql ${MYSQL_CONN} -A < ${DELETE_SQLFILE}

Give it a Try !!!

Answer 2

If you really must create new rows, you're going to have to run UPDATE on each dependent row on each table and set the foreign key on the dependent row to the ID of the new row in the logins table.

---

I'm not sure why it's necessary to delete these rows that have data referencing them.

Why not?

• Instead of directly referencing data in that "logins" table, your application could call a stored procedure that will transform the username using the UPPER() function and/or provide a deeper authentication routine.
• ...or the transform could happen inline with the raw SELECT the application is already running.
• ...or transform on the application side.

I think there's other options here other than destroying data.

If, in the off-chance, the only use of this table is logins AND the username is not the FK in the dependent table, you could run:

CREATE TABLE logins_backup SELECT * FROM logins;    
UPDATE logins SET username = LOWER(username);

This will bring the contents into compliance with the app, yet leave the PK ID intact