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H
HM_1223447010-Marble
10-Marble
February 19, 2026
Solved

Delete EPMDocuments wth Status NEW

  • February 19, 2026
  • 4 replies
  • 192 views

Version: Windchill 13.0

 

Use Case: I want to delete lakhs of EPMDocuments in bulk with status NEW and in users workspaces. Is there a utility to do so? If yes, please share the details related. Also, if we want to consider deleting the New objects from database, I want to understand what all tables contain this new object details and what tables need to be considered while cleanup.


Description:

I want to delete lakhs of EPMDocuments in bulk with status NEW and in users workspaces. Is there a utility to do so? If yes, please share the details related. Also, if we want to consider deleting the New objects from database, I want to understand what all tables contain this new object details and what tables need to be considered while cleanup.

Best answer by TDT

Hi @HM_12234470,

To my knowledge, there is no OOTB utility available to delete the new status EPMDocuments.

A custom utility would need to be developed to delete all the objects.

Directly deleting records from the database using SQL is not advisable, as it may result in data integrity issues or unintended system behavior.

4 replies

T
TDT16-PearlAnswer
16-Pearl
February 19, 2026

Hi @HM_12234470,

To my knowledge, there is no OOTB utility available to delete the new status EPMDocuments.

A custom utility would need to be developed to delete all the objects.

Directly deleting records from the database using SQL is not advisable, as it may result in data integrity issues or unintended system behavior.

    H
    HM_1223447010-MarbleAuthor
    10-Marble
    February 19, 2026

    Hi @TDT ,

     

    Thanks for your response. What API can be used to fetch / delete the New EPMDocuments? 

    T
    TDT16-Pearl
    16-Pearl
    February 19, 2026

    Hi @HM_12234470,

    Do you have a list of the objects that need to be deleted?

    M
    mmeadows-316-Pearl
    16-Pearl
    February 19, 2026

    Just to clarify the scenario.  Why are you trying to delete thousands of new EPMDocuments?  Are these disconnected/deleted user workspaces, active user workspaces, or a mix of both?  Is it just new or new and checked out?

     

    PTC produced a utility to do this per user account back in 9.1.

    https://www.ptc.com/en/support/article/CS40939

    It was developed for scheduled clean up of the publishing account's workspaces.  It also proved handy in cleaning up disconnected participants.

    Maybe you can get it from PTC Tech Supt?

    https://www.ptc.com/en/support/article/CS26108

    The utility undid checkout and deleted new objects.  It purged the workspaces and then deleted them.

    You can at least separate deleted from active user accounts and use this to cleanup all the deleted users in minutes.

     

    Another option is to define a search that returns your new objects of new object per user account.  Provide a list of semicolon separated usernames and it returns a list of new objects in all their workspaces.

    H
    HM_1223447010-MarbleAuthor
    10-Marble
    February 19, 2026

    Hi @mmeadows-3 ,

     

    Mix of both. We there are objects in NEW status from many years. This is only for New objects. 

     

    Manually deleting/purging from the UI is a tedious task. So, we are checking for a utility.

     

    The articles you shared might not be helpful because for one of the articles - Manually deleting/purging from the UI is a tedious task. So, we are checking for a utility.

     

    For another article - We are not mainly preferring to delete the whole workspace because the active users are still using the workspaces. Also, there might be a chance that the disconnected users might again come back because the access is provided on organization basis and the users might switch organizations internally and based on that users might be provided access again to Windchill and they might want to utilize the data again from their old workspaces

    avillanueva
    23-Emerald I
    avillanueva23-Emerald I
    23-Emerald I
    February 19, 2026

    If these are inactive users, delete the users and take the steps to delete their personal cabinets. This will whack the workspaces. For active users, they need to do better. I would immediately roll out training to them to clean up their workspaces. Workspaces should not be used for years on end. Best practice is to either delete workspaces when the task at hand is complete or empty it. They can always redownload current copies as needed. This keeps workspaces small and managable. You can create a report of users and their current workspaces. Give them a goal to delete any they are no longer using to get below 10.  Train them to keep workspaces temporary. They should not be used to store unfinished work for long periods of time. 

      H
      HM_1223447010-MarbleAuthor
      10-Marble
      February 24, 2026

      @TDT @mmeadows-3 @avillanueva @BenLoosli @Marco_Tosin ,

       

      Thanks everyone for your responses.

       

      As per the suggestions, I think I will try out deletion on EPMDocuments from workspaces instead of deleting from Database directly.

       

      Now, any suggestion on how this can be achieved for bulk items? As informed, there are hundreds of thousands of files which needs to be deleted from hundreds of workspaces.

       

      Thanks

      Hari

      avillanueva
      23-Emerald I
      avillanueva23-Emerald I
      23-Emerald I
      February 24, 2026

      Churn and burn. So long as your making forward progress, you can have a screen on a second monitor with the list of workspaces to delete, a QML Report preferrably. Do your normal daily work and every so often, pop over and delete a few workspaces. It will run in background but deleting a workspace will knock out hundreds and thousands of the EPMDocuments. You will eventually get this done. Note also since your are deleting so much data, you will want to retune the database and you should also run removal of unreferences files from the file vaults when complete. 

        V
        vnamboodheriCommunity Manager
        Community Manager
        March 2, 2026

        Hello @HM_12234470,

         

        It looks like you have some responses from some community members. If any of these replies helped you solve your question please mark the appropriate reply as the Accepted Solution. 
        Of course, if you have more to share on your issue, please let the Community know so other community members can continue to help you.

        Thanks,
        Vivek N.
        Community Moderation Team.

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