Deleting SharePoint field causing “Column *** does not exist” exception when loading ListItemAllFields

Question

I have a customized functionality to delete a SharePoint field in my SharePoint online site. I'm deleting the said field from content types, associated lists and finally deleting the site column itself through code.

But when I try to load a custom view of a content type, the below exception occurs.

Column '' does not exist. It may have been deleted by another user

I'm loading a document "File" and try to get "ListItemAllFields" to render some information on the view. The exception occurs on the below lines of code.

var templatedocument = ctx.Web.GetFileByServerRelativeUrl(contentType.DocumentTemplateUrl);
ctx.Load(templatedocument.ListItemAllFields);
ctx.ExecuteQuery();                    

I'm trying to figure out where the reference is coming from, as I have deleted the field from SharePoint.

Note: Surprisingly, the the issue does not occur after about 5 minutes.

The code to delete the field is as follows.

                    //// delete the field from Content type
                foreach (var contentTypeName in contentTypeColection)
                {
                    ContentType contentType = ctx.Web.GetContentTypeByName(contentTypeName);
                    FieldLink selectedField = contentType.FieldLinks.GetById(field.Id);
                    selectedField.DeleteObject();
                    contentType.Update(true);
                    ctx.Load(contentType);
                    ctx.ExecuteQuery();

                    //// Add Audit entry- delete field from content type
                    var audit = this.SaveAuditForDeleteFields(tenant, contentType.Id.ToString(), field.Title);
                    if (audit != null)
                    {
                        auditEntries.Add(audit);
                    }
                }

                //// delete the field from list content type
                var listField = list.Fields.GetByInternalNameOrTitle(field.InternalName);
                if (listField != null)
                {
                    listField.DeleteObject();
                    ctx.ExecuteQuery();
                }

                //// delete the field from template library
                var templateListField = templateList.Fields.GetByInternalNameOrTitle(field.InternalName);

                if (templateListField != null)
                {
                    templateListField.DeleteObject();
                    ctx.ExecuteQuery();
                }

            //// delete the field from site columns
            field.DeleteObject();
            ctx.ExecuteQuery();

Any idea on what's happening would be really helpful.

Answer 1

You've deleted the field but the list object remains the same, meaning its representation in memory has not changed. So it's in a stale state.

Re-instantiate the list object and you should be back in business. Optionally a list.Update() might also do the trick.