Bug: tceDeleteCommands Overwritten When Deleting Multiple Child Tables

[crookoo]

Description:

When importing records with multiple child relations (e.g., financing, leasing), the deletion commands for child records are not correctly accumulated. Only the last child table’s entries are retained in $tceDeleteCommands, because the variable is overwritten inside the loop.

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Current Behavior:

In Cobweb\ExternalImport\Step\StoreDataStep::run():

external_import/Classes/Step/StoreDataStep.php

Lines 407 to 417 in ce60fa7

	foreach ($this->childRecordsToDelete as $childTable => $childList) {
	$tceDeleteCommands = [
	$childTable => [],
	];
	foreach ($childList as $child) {
	$tceDeleteCommands[$childTable][$child] = [
	'delete' => 1,
	];
	$deletes++;
	}
	}

This reinitializes $tceDeleteCommands in every iteration, discarding previously collected delete commands.

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Expected Behavior:
Delete commands for all child tables should be collected and merged into $tceDeleteCommands.

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Proposed Fix:

Replace:

$tceDeleteCommands = [
    $childTable => [],
];

With:

if (!isset($tceDeleteCommands[$childTable])) {
    $tceDeleteCommands[$childTable] = [];
}

This ensures all child table deletions are accumulated properly.

---

Impact:

• Child records of earlier child tables (e.g., tx_cartvehicles_domain_model_product_financing) are not deleted when later ones (e.g., leasing) are processed.
• Leads to stale or orphaned data in the database.
• Issue only occurs when multiple child tables are involved in a single import.

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Environment:

• TYPO3 v11.5.41
• external_import 7.3.0 (but in current version still in place)
• Occurs when using multiple children configurations per parent record

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Steps to Reproduce:

1. Import a record with two child configurations: e.g., financing and leasing.
2. On the next import, remove the financing data but leave leasing.
3. Observe: financing entries remain in DB and are not deleted.
4. Only the leasing delete commands are sent to TCEmain.

---

Additional Context:

This bug is subtle and not immediately visible unless you debug the $tceDeleteCommands structure during import.

[fsuter]

Thanks for reporting in such a wonderfully detailed way. One reason the bug was not spotted is that having multiple children configuration per import configuration is not officially supported. The current code cannot guarantee a side-effect-free process.

Still, it's worth fixing what you found. I'm not sure when I will get around to it though. Also, I see that you are using version 7.3 and I will not produce a bugfix release for that old version. The fix would go into the 8.x branch.