How to delete contact extended detail field

Question

Web8 comes with a nice new UI to add Audience Manager contact extended detail fields. This is great, however how can I delete a field created by mistake or obsolete?

I do not see a delete option, newly created fields cannot be changed either. For instance I chose the wrong data type (text instead of int) and would like to change it.

When removing the field from both tridion_cm_email and tridion_submgmt databases manually, it still appears in the new AM Settings UI. I guess it is stored somewhere in AppData, but is there a proper way to delete such field entry?

Answer 1

Operations that might result in data loss are not yet in the UI, due to the challenges and risks involved. That includes changing the type of a field.

So for that, you need to do what you did in the previous versions: edit the databases manually. There's a couple of new tables that you might not be aware of, so I'll try to outline all of the steps for deleting a field here:

1. Stop the Synchronization service.

Then, in the Audience Manager database (Tridion_cm_email):

2. Delete the relevant entries in EXTENDED_DETAILS_SYNC (only needed if the field was added recently and hasn't been synchronized to all targets yet). Matched by the "EXTENDED_DETAIL_NAME" column.
3. Look up the ID of the field in EXTENDED_DETAILS.
4. Delete the rows in EXTENDED_DETAILS_TRANSLATIONS that have said ID in the EXTENDED_DETAIL_ID column (should be 6 rows).
5. Delete the row for the field in EXTENDED_DETAILS.
6. Alter CONTACTS_EXTENDED_DETAILS and delete the column there.
7. Alter IMPORT_CONTACTS and delete the column there.

In the subscription database (if the field has been synchronized):

8. Delete the row for the field in EXTENDED_DETAILS.
9. Alter CONTACTS_EXTENDED_DETAILS and delete the column for the field.

Finally:

11. Recycle the application pool for the CME website, or restart IIS (CM-side)
12. Restart the Synchronization Endpoint service (CD-side).
13. Start the Synchronization service again (CM-side)

That should do it for deletion. If you just want to change the type of a field, you only need to alter the CONTACTS_EXTENDED_DETAILS tables and IMPORT_CONTACTS.