Got it, thanks. Thanks for satisfying my curiosity. I am glad you were not going through backups for a troll. Thanks also for your work fighting trolls.

Your first assumption is correct. When I delete a thread it removes it from the database so it is essentially gone, not just hidden. Because we have nightly backups of the database, in theory the thread up to the time of the last backup could be restored, but that is a giant pain and I have never done that just for the sake of recovering a single thread.

The thread that I mentioned that I deleted was just deleted this morning. So, no backups were necessary. It was still live at the time I was writing that post.

Do you fully delete it from the current instance, meaning it only exists in your backups somewhere if at all, or do you just remove it from public view? I ask because in your summary below you describe a prior thread from a DCPS troll that you deleted in some detail:

https://www.dcurbanmom.com/weblog/update071823

Did you have to go to your backups to track down that troll? Was that a lot of work? Or do you keep deleted threads isolated somewhere else for awhile so you can easily find them?

You don’t have to answer, I’m just curious because I was admiring the apparent work you put into the troll investigation. It seems like a lot to track down.

Thanks as always.