Why are related items not deleted in their respective collections, once removed from the editor?

[remihuigen]

Lets say I have a collection called buttons, which I have implemented as a relation block in the editor.

From the editor interface, I can only create new buttons (i.e. if I select the block, the drawer opens and I can populate the fields of the button collection). This effectively means that you cant reuse items from related collections; every item you create from the editor interface is single use (which is fine)

So why is that, when I delete the button I just created from the editors state, the item in de related button collection is not deleted? There is no need for it to exist anymore.

Or am I missing something here?

Thanks for the great extention 💪

[formfcw]

Thank you for your question!

For selecting/reusing existing items have a look at …
… #19 (comment)
… https://github.com/formfcw/directus-extension-flexible-editor?tab=readme-ov-file#tutorial-relation-node-with-existing-items (video)

For deleting unused M2A items have a look at https://github.com/formfcw/directus-hook-library?tab=readme-ov-file#deleteunusedm2aitems — this is a script you can use in a custom hook extension.

Let me know if you have more questions!

[remihuigen]

Thanks! The deleteUnusedM2AItems hook was what i was looking for