How to delete AWS S3 versioning objects

Estimated time to read: 3 minutes

You have learned how to create objects using AWS S3 versioning. In this tutorial, you will learn how to (hard and soft) delete versioning objects in the Fuga S3 Object Store.

Prerequisites

• The steps from from previous tutorial create AWS S3 versioning objects.

Soft delete

With the command delete-object, it is possible to delete a file from a bucket, although it will stay in the versioning

$ aws --profile=ams2 --endpoint=https://core.fuga.cloud:8080 s3api delete-object --bucket versioned --key test.txt

The object with the 'Key' 'test.txt', is now deleted from your bucket.

Check the container with list-objects-v2 command what files are still there:

$ aws --profile=ams2 --endpoint=https://core.fuga.cloud:8080 s3api list-objects-v2 --bucket versioned

With the above command list-objects-v2, it is possible to see that there is nothing more in the versioned bucket. It looks like there is nothing left.

Check the container with the list-object-versions command:

$ aws --profile=ams2 --endpoint=https://core.fuga.cloud:8080 s3api list-object-versions --bucket versioned

{
    "Versions": [
        {
            "ETag": "\"566c3a260314fea8318ec46ed7efd4c5\"",
            "Size": 5,
            "StorageClass": "STANDARD",
            "Key": "test.txt",
            "VersionId": "iGhlB8vxX6vhehgrdyhgo4rkBY74jvo",
            "IsLatest": false,
            "LastModified": "2021-11-30T09:19:42.967Z",
            "Owner": {
                "DisplayName": "owner name",
                "ID": "owner ID"
            }
        },
        {
            "ETag": "\"f4aa19fc7ee46cce02bf1fb6fad054cf\"",
            "Size": 5,
            "StorageClass": "STANDARD",
            "Key": "test.txt",
            "VersionId": "EGlSkj1dR.OrtmmmZ0R4DsI5aVPHNcO",
            "IsLatest": false,
            "LastModified": "2021-11-30T09:19:02.669Z",
            "Owner": {
                "DisplayName": "owner name",
                "ID": "owner ID"
            }
        },
        {
            "ETag": "\"dbb126075a1d0b4ca64c3e2ae0159bc7\"",
            "Size": 4,
            "StorageClass": "STANDARD",
            "Key": "test.txt",
            "VersionId": "swwQLkp35P87WzjHQmoYkO1KDukcvq2",
            "IsLatest": false,
            "LastModified": "2021-11-30T09:18:48.423Z",
            "Owner": {
                "DisplayName": "owner name",
                "ID": "owner ID"
            }
        }
    ],
    "DeleteMarkers": [
        {
            "Owner": {
                "DisplayName": "owner name",
                "ID": "owner ID"
            },
            "Key": "test.txt",
            "VersionId": "UA9JuuW67Z6rXl2PHKkBumg6P7I1KQA",
            "IsLatest": true,
            "LastModified": "2021-11-30T10:30:51.109Z"
        }
    ]
}

The output shown above shows that there are still three objects in the bucket. They are still there because (in the previous tutorial) you created a bucket with versioning enabled. Although the list-objects-v2 command didn't show them, the three objects are behind a deletion marker. A delete-marker is created whenever you delete an object. This marker signals the bucket that a file has been deleted.

You can see there are three versions of the object "test.txt" left in the Object Store. Those objects are still accessible with the get-object command.

Hard Delete

In the above paragraph, you have discovered that deleting an object in a versioned Fuga S3 bucket will not delete the object in reality. To delete the object entirely from the bucket, you have to specify the "VersionId" when deleting the object.

With the same command delete-object and the key VersionId added, it is possible to delete the object entirely. In line with the previous tutorials about versioning, you will now delete the object with the text "animals" in it. This file was the last created one, so find the VersionId of the newest LastModified object.

$ aws --profile=ams2 --endpoint=https://core.fuga.cloud:8080 s3api delete-object --bucket versioned --key test.txt --version-id <newest LastModified>

This results in the following data:

$ aws --profile=ams2 --endpoint=https://core.fuga.cloud:8080 s3api list-object-versions  --bucket versioned

{
    "Versions": [
        {
            "ETag": "\"f4aa19fc7ee46cce02bf1fb6fad054cf\"",
            "Size": 5,
            "StorageClass": "STANDARD",
            "Key": "test.txt",
            "VersionId": "EGlSkj1dR.OrtmmmZ0R4DsI5aVPHNcO",
            "IsLatest": false,
            "LastModified": "2021-11-30T09:19:02.669Z",
            "Owner": {
                "DisplayName": "owner name",
                "ID": "owner ID"
            }
        },
        {
            "ETag": "\"dbb126075a1d0b4ca64c3e2ae0159bc7\"",
            "Size": 4,
            "StorageClass": "STANDARD",
            "Key": "test.txt",
            "VersionId": "swwQLkp35P87WzjHQmoYkO1KDukcvq2",
            "IsLatest": false,
            "LastModified": "2021-11-30T09:18:48.423Z",
            "Owner": {
                "DisplayName": "owner name",
                "ID": "owner ID"
            }
        }
    ],
    "DeleteMarkers": [
        {
            "Owner": {
                "DisplayName": "owner name",
                "ID": "owner ID"
            },
            "Key": "test.txt",
            "VersionId": "UA9JuuW67Z6rXl2PHKkBumg6P7I1KQA",
            "IsLatest": true,
            "LastModified": "2021-11-30T10:30:51.109Z"
        }
    ]
}

The output above tells you, the latest created file was deleted. The deletion marker is still there, and thus the file will not show up with the command list-objects-v2.

Conclusion

In this tutorial, you have learned the differences between a soft and a hard delete, within a Fuga S3 bucket. Also, you learned about the delete-Markers. If you want to know how you can undo those delete markers, check the next step in the versioning series: How to recover a deleted AWS3 versioning object.