Question

Do you know of any way to delete all of the entries stored in Core Data? My schema should stay the same; I just want to reset it to blank.


Edit

I'm looking to do this programmatically so that a user can essentially hit a reset button.

Was it helpful?

Solution

You can still delete the file programmatically, using the NSFileManager:removeItemAtPath:: method.

NSPersistentStore *store = ...;
NSError *error;
NSURL *storeURL = store.URL;
NSPersistentStoreCoordinator *storeCoordinator = ...;
[storeCoordinator removePersistentStore:store error:&error];
[[NSFileManager defaultManager] removeItemAtPath:storeURL.path error:&error];

Then, just add the persistent store back to ensure it is recreated properly.

The programmatic way for iterating through each entity is both slower and prone to error. The use for doing it that way is if you want to delete some entities and not others. However you still need to make sure you retain referential integrity or you won't be able to persist your changes.

Just removing the store and recreating it is both fast and safe, and can certainly be done programatically at runtime.

Update for iOS5+

With the introduction of external binary storage (allowsExternalBinaryDataStorage or Store in External Record File) in iOS 5 and OS X 10.7, simply deleting files pointed by storeURLs is not enough. You'll leave the external record files behind. Since the naming scheme of these external record files is not public, I don't have a universal solution yet. – an0 May 8 '12 at 23:00

OTHER TIPS

You can delete the SQLite file - but I choose to do it by purging the tables individually with a functions:

- (void) deleteAllObjects: (NSString *) entityDescription  {
    NSFetchRequest *fetchRequest = [[NSFetchRequest alloc] init];
    NSEntityDescription *entity = [NSEntityDescription entityForName:entityDescription inManagedObjectContext:_managedObjectContext];
    [fetchRequest setEntity:entity];

    NSError *error;
    NSArray *items = [_managedObjectContext executeFetchRequest:fetchRequest error:&error];
    [fetchRequest release];


    for (NSManagedObject *managedObject in items) {
        [_managedObjectContext deleteObject:managedObject];
        DLog(@"%@ object deleted",entityDescription);
    }
    if (![_managedObjectContext save:&error]) {
        DLog(@"Error deleting %@ - error:%@",entityDescription,error);
    }

}

The reason I chose to do it table by table is that it makes me confirm as I am doing the programming that deleting the contents of the table is sensible and there is not data that I would rather keep.

Doing it this will is much slower than just deleting the file and I will change to a file delete if I this method takes too long.

Updated Solution for iOS 10+

Use NSBatchDeleteRequest to delete all objects in the entity without having to load them into memory or iterate through them.

// create the delete request for the specified entity
let fetchRequest: NSFetchRequest<NSFetchRequestResult> = MyEntity.fetchRequest()
let deleteRequest = NSBatchDeleteRequest(fetchRequest: fetchRequest)

// get reference to the persistent container
let persistentContainer = (UIApplication.shared.delegate as! AppDelegate).persistentContainer

// perform the delete
do {
    try persistentContainer.viewContext.execute(deleteRequest)
} catch let error as NSError {
    print(error)
}

This code has been updated for iOS 10 and Swift 3. If you need to support iOS 9, see this question.

Sources:

I've written a clearStores method that goes through every store and delete it both from the coordinator and the filesystem (error handling left aside):

NSArray *stores = [persistentStoreCoordinator persistentStores];

for(NSPersistentStore *store in stores) {
    [persistentStoreCoordinator removePersistentStore:store error:nil];
    [[NSFileManager defaultManager] removeItemAtPath:store.URL.path error:nil];
}

[persistentStoreCoordinator release], persistentStoreCoordinator = nil;

This method is inside a coreDataHelper class that takes care of (among other things) creating the persistentStore when it's nil.

I remove all data from core data on a button Event in a HomeViewController class: This article helped me so much I figured I'd contribute.

-(IBAction)buttonReset:(id)sender
{
    NSLog(@"buttonReset Pressed");

    //Erase the persistent store from coordinator and also file manager.
    NSPersistentStore *store = [self.persistentStoreCoordinator.persistentStores lastObject];
    NSError *error = nil;
    NSURL *storeURL = store.URL;
    [self.persistentStoreCoordinator removePersistentStore:store error:&error];
    [[NSFileManager defaultManager] removeItemAtURL:storeURL error:&error];


    NSLog(@"Data Reset");

    //Make new persistent store for future saves   (Taken From Above Answer)
    if (![self.persistentStoreCoordinator addPersistentStoreWithType:NSSQLiteStoreType configuration:nil URL:storeURL options:nil error:&error]) {
        // do something with the error
    }

}

Note that in order to call self.persistentStoreCoordinator I declared a property in the Home View Controller. (Don't worry about the managedObjectContext that I use for saving and loading.)

@property (nonatomic, retain) NSManagedObjectContext        *   managedObjectContext;
@property (nonatomic, retain) NSPersistentStoreCoordinator  *   persistentStoreCoordinator;

Then in the AppDelegate ApplicationDidFinishLaunching right below creating a HomeViewController I have :

homeViewController = [[HomeViewController alloc] initWithNibName:@"HomeViewController" bundle:nil];
homeViewController.managedObjectContext = self.managedObjectContext;
homeViewController.persistentStoreCoordinator = self.persistentStoreCoordinator;

MagicalRecord makes this very easy.

[MyCoreDataObject MR_truncateAll];

iOS9+, Swift 2

Delete all objects in all entities

func clearCoreDataStore() {
    let entities = managedObjectModel.entities
    for entity in entities {
        let fetchRequest = NSFetchRequest(entityName: entity.name!)
        let deleteReqest = NSBatchDeleteRequest(fetchRequest: fetchRequest)
        do {
            try context.executeRequest(deleteReqest)
        } catch {
            print(error)
        }
    }
}

[Late answer in response to a bounty asking for newer responses]

Looking over earlier answers,

  • Fetching and deleting all items, as suggested by @Grouchal and others, is still an effective and useful solution. If you have very large data stores then it might be slow, but it still works very well.
  • Simply removing the data store is, as you and @groundhog note, no longer effective. It's obsolete even if you don't use external binary storage because iOS 7 uses WAL mode for SQLite journalling. With WAL mode there may be (potentially large) journal files sitting around for any Core Data persistent store.

But there's a different, similar approach to removing the persistent store that does work. The key is to put your persistent store file in its own sub-directory that doesn't contain anything else. Don't just stick it in the documents directory (or wherever), create a new sub-directory just for the persistent store. The contents of that directory will end up being the persistent store file, the journal files, and the external binary files. If you want to nuke the entire data store, delete that directory and they'll all disappear.

You'd do something like this when setting up your persistent store:

NSURL *storeDirectoryURL = [[self applicationDocumentsDirectory] URLByAppendingPathComponent:@"persistent-store"];
if ([[NSFileManager defaultManager] createDirectoryAtURL:storeDirectoryURL
        withIntermediateDirectories:NO
        attributes:nil
        error:nil]) {
    NSURL *storeURL = [storeDirectoryURL URLByAppendingPathComponent:@"MyApp.sqlite"];
    // continue with storeURL as usual...
}

Then when you wanted to remove the store,

[[NSFileManager defaultManager] removeItemAtURL:storeDirectoryURL error:nil];

That recursively removes both the custom sub-directory and all of the Core Data files in it.

This only works if you don't already have your persistent store in the same folder as other, important data. Like the documents directory, which probably has other useful stuff in it. If that's your situation, you could get the same effect by looking for files that you do want to keep and removing everything else. Something like:

NSString *docsDirectoryPath = [[self applicationDocumentsDirectory] path];
NSArray *docsDirectoryContents = [[NSFileManager defaultManager] contentsOfDirectoryAtPath:docsDirectoryPath error:nil];
for (NSString *docsDirectoryItem in docsDirectoryContents) {
    // Look at docsDirectoryItem. If it's something you want to keep, do nothing.
    // If it's something you don't recognize, remove it.
}

This approach may be error prone. You've got to be absolutely sure that you know every file you want to keep, because otherwise you might remove important data. On the other hand, you can remove the external binary files without actually knowing the file/directory name used to store them.

If you want to delete all objects and do not want to delete the backing files, you can use following methods:

- (void)deleteAllObjectsInContext:(NSManagedObjectContext *)context
                       usingModel:(NSManagedObjectModel *)model
{
    NSArray *entities = model.entities;
    for (NSEntityDescription *entityDescription in entities) {
        [self deleteAllObjectsWithEntityName:entityDescription.name
                                   inContext:context];
    }
}

- (void)deleteAllObjectsWithEntityName:(NSString *)entityName
                             inContext:(NSManagedObjectContext *)context
{
    NSFetchRequest *fetchRequest =
        [NSFetchRequest fetchRequestWithEntityName:entityName];
    fetchRequest.includesPropertyValues = NO;
    fetchRequest.includesSubentities = NO;

    NSError *error;
    NSArray *items = [context executeFetchRequest:fetchRequest error:&error];

    for (NSManagedObject *managedObject in items) {
        [context deleteObject:managedObject];
        NSLog(@"Deleted %@", entityName);
    }
}

Beware that it may be very slow (depends on how many objects are in your object graph).

Here is combined solution for purging Core Data.

- (void)deleteAllObjectsInCoreData
{
    NSArray *allEntities = self.managedObjectModel.entities;
    for (NSEntityDescription *entityDescription in allEntities)
    {
        NSFetchRequest *fetchRequest = [[NSFetchRequest alloc] init];
        [fetchRequest setEntity:entityDescription];

        fetchRequest.includesPropertyValues = NO;
        fetchRequest.includesSubentities = NO;

        NSError *error;
        NSArray *items = [self.managedObjectContext executeFetchRequest:fetchRequest error:&error];

        if (error) {
                NSLog(@"Error requesting items from Core Data: %@", [error localizedDescription]);
            }

        for (NSManagedObject *managedObject in items) {
            [self.managedObjectContext deleteObject:managedObject];
        }

        if (![self.managedObjectContext save:&error]) {
            NSLog(@"Error deleting %@ - error:%@", entityDescription, [error localizedDescription]);
        }
    }  
}

If you want to go the delete all objects route (which is much simpler than tearing down the Core Data stack, but less performant), than this is a better implementation:

- (void)deleteAllManagedObjectsInModel:(NSManagedObjectModel *)managedObjectModel context:(NSManagedObjectContext *)managedObjectContext
{
    NSBlockOperation *operation = [NSBlockOperation blockOperationWithBlock:^{
        [managedObjectContext performBlockAndWait:^{
            for (NSEntityDescription *entity in managedObjectModel) {
                NSFetchRequest *fetchRequest = [NSFetchRequest new];
                [fetchRequest setEntity:entity];
                [fetchRequest setIncludesSubentities:NO];
                NSArray *objects = [managedObjectContext executeFetchRequest:fetchRequest error:nil];
                for (NSManagedObject *managedObject in objects) {
                    [managedObjectContext deleteObject:managedObject];
                }            
            }

            [managedObjectContext save:nil];
        }];
    }];
    [operation setCompletionBlock:^{
        // Do stuff once the truncation is complete
    }];
    [operation start];
}

This implementation leverages NSOperation to perform the deletion off of the main thread and notify on completion. You may want to emit a notification or something within the completion block to bubble the status back to the main thread.

iOS 10 + Swift 3 solution:

func clearCoreDataStore() {
    let delegate = UIApplication.shared.delegate as! AppDelegate
    let context = delegate.persistentContainer.viewContext

    for i in 0...delegate.persistentContainer.managedObjectModel.entities.count-1 {
        let entity = delegate.persistentContainer.managedObjectModel.entities[i]

        do {
            let query = NSFetchRequest<NSFetchRequestResult>(entityName: entity.name!)
            let deleterequest = NSBatchDeleteRequest(fetchRequest: query)
            try context.execute(deleterequest)
            try context.save()

        } catch let error as NSError {
            print("Error: \(error.localizedDescription)")
            abort()
        }
    }
}

Iterates through all of the core data entities and clears them

Here is a somewhat simplified version with less calls to AppDelegate self and the last bit of code that was left out of the top rated answer. Also I was getting an error "Object's persistent store is not reachable from this NSManagedObjectContext's coordinator" so just needed to add that back.

NSPersistentStoreCoordinator *storeCoordinator = [self persistentStoreCoordinator];
NSPersistentStore *store = [[storeCoordinator persistentStores] lastObject];
NSURL *storeURL = [[self applicationDocumentsDirectory] URLByAppendingPathComponent:@"dataModel"];
NSError *error;

[storeCoordinator removePersistentStore:store error:&error];
[[NSFileManager defaultManager] removeItemAtPath:storeURL.path error:&error];

[_persistentStoreCoordinator addPersistentStoreWithType:NSSQLiteStoreType configuration:nil URL:storeURL options:nil error:&error];

if (storeCoordinator != nil) {
    _managedObjectContext = [[NSManagedObjectContext alloc] init];
    [_managedObjectContext setPersistentStoreCoordinator:storeCoordinator];
}

swift solution:

class func deleteAllManagedObjects() {

        let modelURL = NSBundle.mainBundle().URLForResource("some string", withExtension: "mom")
        let mom = NSManagedObjectModel(contentsOfURL: modelURL)

        for entityName in mom.entitiesByName.keys {
            let fr = NSFetchRequest(entityName: entityName as String)
            let a = Utility.managedObjectContext().executeFetchRequest(fr, error: nil) as [NSManagedObject]
            for mo in a {
                Utility.managedObjectContext().deleteObject(mo)
            }
        }

        Utility.managedObjectContext().save(nil)
    }

As a quick reference to save searching elsewhere - recreating the persistent store after deleting it can be done with:

if (![persistentStoreCoordinator addPersistentStoreWithType:NSSQLiteStoreType configuration:nil URL:storeURL options:nil error:&error]) {
// do something with the error
}

Thanks for the post. I followed it and it worked for me. But I had another issue that was not mentioned in any of the replies. So I am not sure if it was just me.

Anyway, thought I would post here the problem and my way that solved it.

I had a few records in the database, I wanted to purge everything clean before write new data to the db, so I did everything including

[[NSFileManager defaultManager] removeItemAtURL:storeURL error:&error]; 

and then used managedObjectContext to access the database (supposed to be empty by now), somehow the data was still there. After a while of troubleshooting, I found that I need to reset managedObjectContext, managedObject, managedObjectModel and persistentStoreCoordinator, before I use managedObjectContext to access the dabase. Now I have a clean database to write to.

Several good answers to this question. Here's a nice concise one. The first two lines delete the sqlite database. Then the for: loop deletes any objects in the managedObjectContext memory.

NSURL *storeURL = [[(FXYAppDelegate*)[[UIApplication sharedApplication] delegate] applicationDocumentsDirectory] URLByAppendingPathComponent:@"AppName.sqlite"];
[[NSFileManager defaultManager] removeItemAtURL:storeURL error:nil];
for (NSManagedObject *ct in [self.managedObjectContext registeredObjects]) {
    [self.managedObjectContext deleteObject:ct];
}

you can also find all the entity names, and delete them by name. Its a longer version but works well, that way you dont have to work with persistence store

 - (void)clearCoreData
{
NSError *error;
NSEntityDescription *des = [NSEntityDescription entityForName:@"Any_Entity_Name" inManagedObjectContext:_managedObjectContext];
NSManagedObjectModel *model = [des managedObjectModel];
NSArray *entityNames = [[model entities] valueForKey:@"name"];

for (NSString *entityName in entityNames){

    NSFetchRequest *deleteAll = [NSFetchRequest fetchRequestWithEntityName:entityName];
    NSArray *matches = [self.database.managedObjectContext executeFetchRequest:deleteAll error:&error];

}
    if (matches.count > 0){
        for (id obj in matches){

            [_managedObjectContext deleteObject:obj];
        }
       [self.database.managedObjectContext save:&error];
    }
}

for "Any_Entity_Name" just give any one of your entity's name, we only need to figure out the entity description your entities are within. ValueForKey@"name" will return all the entity names. Finally, dont forget to save.

The accepted answer is correct with removing URL by NSFileManager is correct, but as stated in iOS 5+ edit, the persistent store is not represented only by one file. For SQLite store it's *.sqlite, *.sqlite-shm and *.sqlite-wal ... fortunately since iOS 7+ we can use method

[NSPersistentStoreCoordinator +removeUbiquitousContentAndPersistentStoreAtURL:options:error:]

to take care of removal, so the code should be something like this:

NSPersistentStore *store = ...;
NSError *error;
NSURL *storeURL = store.URL;
NSString *storeName = ...;
NSPersistentStoreCoordinator *storeCoordinator = ...;
[storeCoordinator removePersistentStore:store error:&error];
[NSPersistentStoreCoordinator removeUbiquitousContentAndPersistentStoreAtURL:storeURL.path options:@{NSPersistentStoreUbiquitousContentNameKey: storeName} error:&error];

Works with all versions. Pass entity name and iterate through to delete all the entries and save the context.

func deleteData(entityToFetch: String, completion: @escaping(_ returned: Bool) ->()) {
    var context = NSManagedObjectContext()
    if #available(iOS 10.0, *) {
        context = self.persistentContainer.viewContext
    } else {
        context = self.managedObjectContext
    }

    let fetchRequest = NSFetchRequest<NSFetchRequestResult>()
    fetchRequest.entity = NSEntityDescription.entity(forEntityName: entityToFetch, in: context)
    fetchRequest.includesPropertyValues = false
    do {
        let results = try context.fetch(fetchRequest) as! [NSManagedObject]
        for result in results {
            context.delete(result)
        }
        try context.save()
        completion(true)
    } catch {
        completion(false)
        print("fetch error -\(error.localizedDescription)")
    }
}

Here's a version that deletes every record in every table you have.

Swift 4

static func resetDatabase() {
    do {
        try dataStore.persistentStoreCoordinator.managedObjectModel.entities.forEach { (entity) in
            if let name = entity.name {
                let fetch = NSFetchRequest<NSFetchRequestResult>(entityName: name)
                let request = NSBatchDeleteRequest(fetchRequest: fetch)
                try mainContext.execute(request)
            }
        }

        try mainContext.save()
    } catch {
        print("error resenting the database: \(error.localizedDescription)")
    }
}

Delete the persistent store file and setup a new persistent store coordinator?

Delete sqlite from your fileURLPath and then build.

Assuming you are using MagicalRecord and have a default persistence store:

I don't like all the solutions that assume certain files to exist and/or demand entering the entities names or classes. This is a Swift(2), safe way to delete all the data from all the entities. After deleting it will recreate a fresh stack too (I am actually not sure as to how neccessery this part is).

It's godo for "logout" style situations when you want to delete everything but have a working store and moc to get new data in (once the user logs in...)

extension NSManagedObject {

    class func dropAllData() {

        MagicalRecord.saveWithBlock({ context in

            for name in NSManagedObjectModel.MR_defaultManagedObjectModel().entitiesByName.keys {
                do { try self.deleteAll(name, context: context) }
                catch { print("⚠️ ✏️ Error when deleting \(name): \(error)") }
            }

            }) { done, err in
                MagicalRecord.cleanUp()
                MagicalRecord.setupCoreDataStackWithStoreNamed("myStoreName")
        }
    }

    private class func deleteAll(name: String, context ctx: NSManagedObjectContext) throws {
        let all = NSFetchRequest(entityName: name)
        all.includesPropertyValues = false

        let allObjs = try ctx.executeFetchRequest(all)
        for obj in allObjs {
            obj.MR_deleteEntityInContext(ctx)
        }

    }
}

Use this

+(NSArray *)fetchDataFromEntity:(NSString *)entityName context:(NSManagedObjectContext *)context
{
    NSFetchRequest * fetchRequest =[[NSFetchRequest alloc] init];
    NSEntityDescription * CategoriesEntity = [NSEntityDescription entityForName:entityName inManagedObjectContext:context];
    [fetchRequest setEntity:CategoriesEntity];

    NSError * error;
    NSInteger count = [context countForFetchRequest:fetchRequest error:&error];

    if (count && count>0) {

        NSArray * fetchedObjects = [context executeFetchRequest:fetchRequest error:&error];
        if (fetchedObjects && fetchedObjects.count>0) {

            return fetchedObjects;
        }else
            return nil;

    }
    else
        return nil;
}
+ (void)deleteObjectsOfArray:(NSMutableArray*)ary context:(NSManagedObjectContext *)context {
    for (NSManagedObject * obj in ary) {
        [context deleteObject:obj];
    }
    NSError *saveError = nil;
    [context save:&saveError];
}
+ (void)deleteEntity:(NSString *)entityName context:(NSManagedObjectContext *)context {
    NSArray *listArray = [self fetchDataFromEntity:entityName context:context];
    [self deleteObjectsOfArray:[NSMutableArray arrayWithArray:listArray] context:context];
}

I took Grouchal's code and to speed it up I used enumeration with concurrent mode (NSEnumerationConcurrent), it got a bit faster compared to for loop (in my app I added this feature for Testers so that they can clear data and do testcases rather than delete and install app)

- (void)resetObjects
{
    [self deleteAllObjectsInEntity:@"Entity1"];
    [self deleteAllObjectsInEntity:@"Entity2"];
    [self deleteAllObjectsInEntity:@"Entity3"];
    [self deleteAllObjectsInEntity:@"Entity4"];
}

-(void) deleteAllObjectsInEntity:(NSString*) entityName
{
    MainDataContext *coreDataContext = [MainDataContext sharedInstance];
    NSManagedObjectContext *currentContext = coreDataContext.managedObjectContext;
    NSFetchRequest *fetchRequest = [[NSFetchRequest alloc] init];
    NSEntityDescription *entity = [NSEntityDescription entityForName:entityName inManagedObjectContext:currentContext];
    [fetchRequest setEntity:entity];

    NSError *error;
    NSArray *items = [currentContext executeFetchRequest:fetchRequest error:&error];

    [items enumerateObjectsWithOptions:NSEnumerationConcurrent usingBlock:^(NSManagedObject * obj, NSUInteger idx, BOOL *stop) {
        [currentContext deleteObject:obj];
    }];


    if (![currentContext save:&error]) {
        NSLog(@"Error deleting %@ - error:%@",entityName,error);
    }
}

here my swift3 version for delete all records. 'Users' is entity name

@IBAction func btnDelAll_touchupinside(_ sender: Any) {

    let appDelegate = UIApplication.shared.delegate as! AppDelegate
    let managedObjectContext = appDelegate.persistentContainer.viewContext

    let fetchReq = NSFetchRequest<NSFetchRequestResult>(entityName: "Users")
    let req = NSBatchDeleteRequest(fetchRequest: fetchReq)

    do {
        try managedObjectContext.execute(req)

    } catch {
        // Error Handling
    }   
}

iOS 10 and Swift 3

Assuming that your entity name is "Photo", and that you create a CoreDataStack class...

 func clearData() {
        do {            
            let context = CoreDataStack.sharedInstance.persistentContainer.viewContext
            let fetchRequest = NSFetchRequest<NSFetchRequestResult>(entityName: "Photo")
            do {
                let objects  = try context.fetch(fetchRequest) as? [NSManagedObject]
                _ = objects.map{$0.map{context.delete($0)}}
                CoreDataStack.sharedInstance.saveContext()
            } catch let error {
                print("ERROR DELETING : \(error)")
            }
        }
    }

Here is a good tutorial of how to use CoreData and how to use this method. https://medium.com/compileswift/parsing-json-response-and-save-it-in-coredata-step-by-step-fb58fc6ce16f#.1tu6kt8qb

One other method (apart from a delete batch request) I often use (based on app requirement) is to reset the persistent store. The implementation looks like this for iOS 10+ and Swift (assuming you have a CoreDataManager class):

let persistentContainer: NSPersistentContainer = {
    let container = NSPersistentContainer(name: "<Data-Model-Name>“)
    container.loadPersistentStores(completionHandler: { (storeDescription, err) in
        if let err = err {
            fatalError("loading of store failed: \(err)")
        }
    })
    return container
}()

func resetPersistentStore() {

    if let persistentStore = persistentContainer.persistentStoreCoordinator.persistentStores.last {
        let storeURL = persistentContainer.persistentStoreCoordinator.url(for: persistentStore)

        do {
            try persistentContainer.persistentStoreCoordinator.destroyPersistentStore(at: storeURL, ofType: NSSQLiteStoreType, options: nil)
        } catch {
            print("failed to destroy persistent store:", error.localizedDescription)
        }

        do {
            try persistentContainer.persistentStoreCoordinator.addPersistentStore(ofType: NSSQLiteStoreType, configurationName: nil, at: storeURL, options: nil)
        } catch {
            print("failed to re-add persistent store:", error.localizedDescription)
        }
    }

}

One advantage of this method is that it’s more straightforward especially when you have loads of data record for numerous entities in your core data. In which case a delete batch request would be memory intensive.

you're all making this seem complicated. You can just send your NSManagedObjectContext the reset method

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