nav[aria-label="Primary Navigation"] { padding: 0; & ul { list-style: none; width: 100%; display: flex; flex-direction: row; justify-content: start; align-items: start; gap: 30px; padding: 0; & li { margin: 0; } & ul li { list-style: none; } } }

Delete all table records with special character, # , '

2Quiker

I have a feature class table that i need to delete the rows with special characters of # , ' or other certain special characters. I have tried the following but nothing happens so I am not coding it correctly, I am in need of some help please.

A2 = "ArcSDE Personal Server/featureclass"

# sql SubName LIKE '%#'
with arcpy.da.UpdateCursor(A2 , ["OBJECTID","Field"]) as cursor:  
    for row in cursor:      
        if row[1] in ["'", "#"]:
            print ("Deleting record: 'OBJECTID' = {}".format(row[0])) 
            cursor.deleteRow()

<SPAN class="line-numbers-rows"><SPAN>‍</SPAN><SPAN>‍</SPAN><SPAN>‍</SPAN><SPAN>‍</SPAN><SPAN>‍</SPAN><SPAN>‍</SPAN><SPAN>‍</SPAN><SPAN>‍</SPAN><SPAN>‍</SPAN></SPAN>

Find more posts tagged with

Accepted answers

JoshuaBixby

Joe, that won't work. It would have to be written

<SPAN class="keyword token">if</SPAN> <SPAN class="string token">"'"</SPAN> <SPAN class="keyword token">in</SPAN> row<SPAN class="punctuation token">[</SPAN><SPAN class="number token">1</SPAN><SPAN class="punctuation token">]</SPAN> <SPAN class="operator token">or</SPAN> "<SPAN class="comment token">#" in row[1]:‍‍</SPAN><SPAN class="line-numbers-rows"><SPAN>‍</SPAN></SPAN>

All comments

blake.terhune

I know your question has already been answered but I couldn't resist sharing a couple little tricks I use. First, consider using the @ field name token options to access Esri fields more reliably.

<SPAN class="keyword token">with</SPAN> arcpy<SPAN class="punctuation token">.</SPAN>da<SPAN class="punctuation token">.</SPAN>UpdateCursor<SPAN class="punctuation token">(</SPAN>A2 <SPAN class="punctuation token">,</SPAN> <SPAN class="punctuation token">[</SPAN><SPAN class="string token">"OID@"</SPAN><SPAN class="punctuation token">,</SPAN> <SPAN class="string token">"Field"</SPAN><SPAN class="punctuation token">]</SPAN><SPAN class="punctuation token">)</SPAN> <SPAN class="keyword token">as</SPAN> cursor<SPAN class="punctuation token">:</SPAN>
    <SPAN class="keyword token">for</SPAN> oid<SPAN class="punctuation token">,</SPAN> field <SPAN class="keyword token">in</SPAN> cursor<SPAN class="punctuation token">:</SPAN>
        <SPAN class="keyword token">if</SPAN> <SPAN class="string token">"'"</SPAN> <SPAN class="keyword token">in</SPAN> field <SPAN class="operator token">or</SPAN> "<SPAN class="comment token">#" in field:</SPAN>
            <SPAN class="keyword token">print</SPAN> <SPAN class="punctuation token">(</SPAN><SPAN class="string token">"Deleting record: 'OBJECTID' = {}"</SPAN><SPAN class="punctuation token">.</SPAN>format<SPAN class="punctuation token">(</SPAN>oid<SPAN class="punctuation token">)</SPAN><SPAN class="punctuation token">)</SPAN><SPAN class="line-numbers-rows"><SPAN>‍</SPAN><SPAN>‍</SPAN><SPAN>‍</SPAN><SPAN>‍</SPAN></SPAN>

Also used in the sample above is a method called sequence unpacking to easily assign variable names to your cursor row indexes (field values). This works best with only a few fields.

If you have many fields in your cursor, you can use this helper function to make a dictionary of the values so it's cleaner to access them instead of using the row index like row[1].

<SPAN class="keyword token">with</SPAN> arcpy<SPAN class="punctuation token">.</SPAN>da<SPAN class="punctuation token">.</SPAN>UpdateCursor<SPAN class="punctuation token">(</SPAN>A2 <SPAN class="punctuation token">,</SPAN> <SPAN class="punctuation token">[</SPAN><SPAN class="string token">"aField"</SPAN><SPAN class="punctuation token">,</SPAN> <SPAN class="string token">"anotherField"</SPAN><SPAN class="punctuation token">,</SPAN> <SPAN class="string token">"moreField"</SPAN><SPAN class="punctuation token">]</SPAN><SPAN class="punctuation token">)</SPAN> <SPAN class="keyword token">as</SPAN> cursor<SPAN class="punctuation token">:</SPAN>
    <SPAN class="keyword token">for</SPAN> row <SPAN class="keyword token">in</SPAN> row_as_dict<SPAN class="punctuation token">(</SPAN>cursor<SPAN class="punctuation token">,</SPAN> cursor<SPAN class="punctuation token">.</SPAN>fields<SPAN class="punctuation token">)</SPAN><SPAN class="punctuation token">:</SPAN>
        <SPAN class="keyword token">if</SPAN> <SPAN class="string token">"'"</SPAN> <SPAN class="keyword token">in</SPAN> row<SPAN class="punctuation token">[</SPAN><SPAN class="string token">"aField"</SPAN><SPAN class="punctuation token">]</SPAN> <SPAN class="operator token">or</SPAN> "<SPAN class="comment token">#" in row["anotherField"]:</SPAN>
            <SPAN class="keyword token">print</SPAN> <SPAN class="punctuation token">(</SPAN><SPAN class="string token">"Deleting record: 'moreField' = {}"</SPAN><SPAN class="punctuation token">.</SPAN>format<SPAN class="punctuation token">(</SPAN>row<SPAN class="punctuation token">[</SPAN><SPAN class="string token">"moreField"</SPAN><SPAN class="punctuation token">]</SPAN><SPAN class="punctuation token">)</SPAN><SPAN class="punctuation token">)</SPAN>

<SPAN class="keyword token">def</SPAN> <SPAN class="token function">row_as_dict</SPAN><SPAN class="punctuation token">(</SPAN>data<SPAN class="punctuation token">,</SPAN> fields<SPAN class="punctuation token">)</SPAN><SPAN class="punctuation token">:</SPAN>
    <SPAN class="keyword token">for</SPAN> row <SPAN class="keyword token">in</SPAN> data<SPAN class="punctuation token">:</SPAN>
        <SPAN class="keyword token">yield</SPAN> OrderedDict<SPAN class="punctuation token">(</SPAN>zip<SPAN class="punctuation token">(</SPAN>fields<SPAN class="punctuation token">,</SPAN> row<SPAN class="punctuation token">)</SPAN><SPAN class="punctuation token">)</SPAN>‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍<SPAN class="line-numbers-rows"><SPAN>‍</SPAN><SPAN>‍</SPAN><SPAN>‍</SPAN><SPAN>‍</SPAN><SPAN>‍</SPAN><SPAN>‍</SPAN><SPAN>‍</SPAN><SPAN>‍</SPAN></SPAN>

JoshuaBixby

A different approach would be to use a SQL WHERE clause on your update cursor so that all records already meet the criteria, then you can just delete them without having to check them in Python.

sql = "FIELD LIKE '%'%' or FIELD LIKE '%#%'"

JoshuaBixby

Joe, that won't work. It would have to be written

<SPAN class="keyword token">if</SPAN> <SPAN class="string token">"'"</SPAN> <SPAN class="keyword token">in</SPAN> row<SPAN class="punctuation token">[</SPAN><SPAN class="number token">1</SPAN><SPAN class="punctuation token">]</SPAN> <SPAN class="operator token">or</SPAN> "<SPAN class="comment token">#" in row[1]:‍‍</SPAN><SPAN class="line-numbers-rows"><SPAN>‍</SPAN></SPAN>

JoeBorgione

Then your line 6 is backwards. See if this works:

if "'" or "#" in row[1]:
   do something<SPAN class="line-numbers-rows"><SPAN>‍</SPAN><SPAN>‍</SPAN></SPAN>

2Quiker

It does but I am looking to delete rows with just hash tag and apostrophe.

JoeBorgione

Does Field only contain a special character or are there other characters there as well? Your line #6 is defined such that the contents of the field is only a single quote or a hash tag. If you have other characters in that field you may want to consider some regular expression searching. Take a look here: Program to check if a string contains any special character - GeeksforGeeks

Join the Conversation

Signed in members can post, follow updates, and more. New here? Register a free account.

Quick Links

Community Help
Find useful guides, FAQs, and documents to help you navigate and make the most of Esri Community.