IStorage::DestroyElement method (objidl.h)

Article
10/13/2021

The DestroyElement method removes the specified storage or stream from this storage object.

Syntax

HRESULT DestroyElement(
  [in] const OLECHAR *pwcsName
);

Parameters

[in] pwcsName

A pointer to a wide character null-terminated Unicode string that contains the name of the storage or stream to be removed.

Return value

This method can return one of these values.

Return code	Description
S_OK	The element was successfully removed.
E_PENDING	Asynchronous Storage only: Part or all of the element data is currently unavailable.
STG_E_ACCESSDENIED	The caller does not have permissions to remove the element.
STG_E_FILENOTFOUND	The element with the specified name does not exist.
STG_E_INSUFFICIENTMEMORY	The element was not removed due to a lack of memory.
STG_E_INVALIDNAME	Invalid value for pwcsName.
STG_E_INVALIDPOINTER	The pointer specified for the element was not valid.
STG_E_INVALIDPARAMETER	One of the parameters was not valid.
STG_E_REVERTED	The storage object has been invalidated by a revert operation above it in the transaction tree.
STG_E_TOOMANYOPENFILES	The element was not removed because there are too many open files.

Remarks

The DestroyElement method deletes a substorage or stream from the current storage object. After a successful call to DestroyElement, any open instance of the destroyed element from the parent storage becomes invalid.

If a storage object is opened in the transacted mode, destruction of an element requires that the call to DestroyElement be followed by a call to IStorage::Commit.

Note The DestroyElement method does not shrink the directory stream. It only marks the deleted directory entry as invalid. Invalid entries are reused when creating a new storage or stream.

For content streams, the deleted stream sectors are marked as free. If the free sectors are at the end of the file, the document file should shrink. To compact a document file, call IStorage::CopyTo on the root storage object and copy to a new storage object.

Requirements

Requirement	Value
Minimum supported client	Windows 2000 Professional [desktop apps \| UWP apps]
Minimum supported server	Windows 2000 Server [desktop apps \| UWP apps]
Target Platform	Windows
Header	objidl.h
Library	Uuid.lib
DLL	Ole32.dll