Mass database change strategy??

Jon Luers

What is the best way to apply mass changes to an RE NXT database? For instance, in a database with 400,000 constituents, if I want to delete all obsolete ratings, the Sky API doesn't seem like a good way to do it, since I'll quickly run out of quota just trying to get a list of all ratings for all constituents, to say nothing of deleting those that are hidden by the most_recent_only flag. Is there some way to do this in the Database View, or in the web view, or applying SQL to a backup copy??

David Springer

Hi Jon,


Globally deleting ratings is possible in database view through Admin > Globally Delete Records. More information is in https://kb.blackbaud.com/knowledgebase/articles/Article/69308, and feel free to reach out to our Support department if you have any questions or issues with the process (of course, I'd recommend testing in a backup first if you have the option).

Jon Luers

Thanks, but I don't want to just delete all ratings--I want to delete all obsolete ratings (those that have been superseded), leaving just the latest instance of each category/source.

David Springer

Thanks for clarifying, Jon. There's not a direct way within RE to narrow down the delete group in that way exactly.


You could still use Global Delete; it would just require a few extra steps. The approach I'd take is to first create an Import file for Ratings, including all of the fields for the file (https://kb.blackbaud.com/knowledgebase/articles/Article/37592). Then within Excel, you could use the Constituent ID, Date, Description, and Source to identify those ratings that should be deleted. Then you could create a new temporary category called Delete, and use the import file to change the category of those ratings to Delete.

Then when you go into Globally Delete Records, select to delete only those with the Delete category.


As with any mass change, I'd be sure to test in a backup first if possible, and perform a smaller proof of concept run on a specific query to ensure you don't delete anything unintentionally.