Have a look at this topic: http://our.umbraco.org/forum/developers/extending-umbraco/32558-Ghost-nodes-in-Content-Tree

Jeroen

I don't know if it's of any help, but if you inspect the sort window (in Firebug, Chrome Developer Tools, "View frame source" etc), where you can see your nodes, you can find the id's of the nodes on the table-tr-tags. Now you have the id's and names of your nodes when venturing into the database.

Hi Jan,

I've gotten this exact problem before. I ran these queries. I took this script from another post, I hate not to be able to give credit, but I completely forgot where. These are based on a more general query to empty the recycle bin. I'll include that one also after these.

-- ############################
-- ### Clear all their kids ###
-- ############################

DECLARE @nodeId1 int

DECLARE node_cursor CURSOR FOR 
SELECT Id
FROM umbracoNode
WHERE parentID = 1329 OR parentID = 1337 OR parentID = 1321

OPEN node_cursor;

FETCH NEXT FROM node_cursor 
INTO @nodeId1;

WHILE @@FETCH_STATUS = 0
BEGIN
    delete from [dbo].cmsDocument where nodeId = @nodeId1
    delete from [dbo].cmsContentXml where nodeId = @nodeId1
    delete from [dbo].cmsPreviewXml where nodeId = @nodeId1
    delete from [dbo].cmsPropertyData where contentNodeId = @nodeId1
    delete from [dbo].cmsContentVersion where ContentId = @nodeId1
    delete from [dbo].cmsContent where nodeId = @nodeId1
    delete from [dbo].umbracoNode where id = @nodeId1

     FETCH NEXT FROM node_cursor 
    INTO @nodeId1
END
CLOSE node_cursor;
DEALLOCATE node_cursor;

-- #######################
-- ### Now delete them ###
-- #######################

DECLARE @nodeId int

DECLARE node_cursor CURSOR FOR 
SELECT Id
FROM umbracoNode
where id = 1321 or id = 1329 or id = 1337

OPEN node_cursor;

FETCH NEXT FROM node_cursor 
INTO @nodeId;

WHILE @@FETCH_STATUS = 0
BEGIN
    delete from [dbo].cmsDocument where nodeId = @nodeId
    delete from [dbo].cmsContentXml where nodeId = @nodeId
    delete from [dbo].cmsPreviewXml where nodeId = @nodeId
    delete from [dbo].cmsPropertyData where contentNodeId = @nodeId
    delete from [dbo].cmsContentVersion where ContentId = @nodeId
    delete from [dbo].cmsContent where nodeId = @nodeId
    delete from [dbo].umbracoNode where id = @nodeId

     FETCH NEXT FROM node_cursor 
    INTO @nodeId
END
CLOSE node_cursor;
DEALLOCATE node_cursor;

I had this project with a gigantic recycle bin that was impossible to empty through the UI so I used this.

DECLARE @nodeId int

DECLARE node_cursor CURSOR FOR 
SELECT Id
FROM umbracoNode
WHERE ParentId = -20

OPEN node_cursor;

FETCH NEXT FROM node_cursor 
INTO @nodeId;

WHILE @@FETCH_STATUS = 0
BEGIN
    delete from [dbo].cmsDocument where nodeId = @nodeId
    delete from [dbo].cmsContentXml where nodeId = @nodeId
    delete from [dbo].cmsPreviewXml where nodeId = @nodeId
    delete from [dbo].cmsPropertyData where contentNodeId = @nodeId
    delete from [dbo].cmsContentVersion where ContentId = @nodeId
    delete from [dbo].cmsContent where nodeId = @nodeId
    delete from [dbo].umbracoNode where id = @nodeId

     FETCH NEXT FROM node_cursor 
    INTO @nodeId
END
CLOSE node_cursor;
DEALLOCATE node_cursor;

Hope this helps.

When I was digging around this issue I noticed that the problem was that one of these tables had no records for the ghosts nodes. Don'T remember which ones, but a safe bet would be to say that it's those the tree uses to display (cmdDocument I think). Of course this caused loss of data, but this was fine for me.

Seb

Hi guys

Thanks for the suggestions.

@Sébastian - When I'm trying to run the above script in WebMatrix I get this error: ---------------------------

Database Manager

---------------------------

There was an error parsing the query. [ Token line number = 5,Token line offset = 1,Token in error = DECLARE ]

---------------------------

OK

---------------------------

---------------------------

System.Data.SqlServerCe.SqlCeException (0x80004005): There was an error parsing the query. [ Token line number = 5,Token line offset = 1,Token in error = DECLARE ]

   at System.Data.SqlServerCe.SqlCeCommand.ProcessResults(Int32 hr)

   at System.Data.SqlServerCe.SqlCeCommand.CompileQueryPlan()

   at System.Data.SqlServerCe.SqlCeCommand.ExecuteCommand(CommandBehavior behavior, String method, ResultSetOptions options)

   at System.Data.SqlServerCe.SqlCeCommand.ExecuteDbDataReader(CommandBehavior behavior)

   at System.Data.Common.DbCommand.ExecuteReader()

   at Microsoft.WebMatrix.DatabaseManager.SqlCeDatabase.SqlCeDatabaseProvider.ExecuteQuery(String connectionString, Query query)

   at Microsoft.WebMatrix.DatabaseManager.IisDbManagerModuleService.ExecuteQuery(Object databaseConnectionObject, Object query, String configPathState)

---------------------------

Any idea how I can fix that?

The TSQL script won't run properly as SQL CE dialect simply doesn't support it (declaring variables for example).

Instead of using a cursor, you can rewrite the SQL queries using subqueries though, like:

delete from cmsContentVersion where ContentId in (select id from umbracoNode where path like '%-20%' and id!=-20)

Grtz

L

Lennart is right, sorry I missed it was SQLCE! Jeroen's link has an example to basically the same scripts, just not in a cursor loop.

Seb

Hi guys

Thanks a lot for all your comments and solution suggestions. I chose to use the solution in the post Jeroen linked to. All works like a charm now.

/Jan

I used Jeroen's solution as well.

I used this SQL to find the node id's to delete - just replace the parent id of the node that you cant sort childs for:

SELECT id from umbracoNode
WHERE parentID = 1170
AND id NOT IN (
SELECT DISTINCT doc.nodeId
FROM cmsDocument AS doc
LEFT OUTER JOIN umbracoNode AS node ON doc.nodeId = node.id
WHERE node.parentID = 1170)

is working on a reply...