How does the 'Delete All Member's Posts...' work?

[bzk]

So I have a few members who have spammed the boards. A few of them had hundreds of posts. Literally. One had something like 683.

How do I get rid of all of those posts quickly? Here's what I'm doing:

ACP > Members Tab > Manage Spam Members > Click on member's name > Actions > Delete All Member's Posts... >

and this is where it gets confusing. I see, for example:

Delete ALL of this member's 5 POSTS?
If enabled: a topic started by this member that has no replies is deleted otherwise the topic is left.
Delete ALL of this member's 4 TOPICS?
If enabled: all topics started by this member will be deleted, regardless of other member's replies.

I've tried different options, but posts always seem to be left behind.

Furthermore, this part is confusing:

I check the second box (Delete ALL of this member's 4 TOPICS?) and see a Complete! confirmation.

Then I click the Tools link in the upper left, and I see this:

System Error
[#11363] This member has no posts to delete. Please select another member.

To get back to the page to recheck, I have to start from the beginning:

Members Tab > Manage Spam Members > Click on member's name > Actions > Delete All Member's Posts... >

Go back to the same member, and I see this:

Delete ALL of this member's 1 POSTS?
If enabled: a topic started by this member that has no replies is deleted otherwise the topic is left.
Delete ALL of this member's 0 TOPICS?
If enabled: all topics started by this member will be deleted, regardless of other member's replies.

Anyway, the point is that this is kind of time-consuming and not intuitive for me. Am I doing this the right way? Should I just run a SQL query? :)

[bfarber]

You should simply select both options when you submit the form.

As for the error message, sounds like a link doesn't get formatted properly when it sends you back to the page or something. It could be a bug.

[bzk]

Thank you, Brandon. The thing is, I've tried checking both boxes. But when I do that, most of the time, there are still posts remaining. Worse, the only way that I can see that posts are remaining is to start the process all over again (ACP > Members Tab > Manage Spam Members > Click on member's name > Actions > Delete All Member's Posts... > etc.) to see. Is this the way it is supposed to work? I'm just finding the process a bit confusing.

Also, I've tried simply deleting the member, but I've found that doing that leaves the member's posts, which is not what I want. What I want is to remove all the posts of aggressive spammers. (In case that wasn't clear.)

Thanks again.

[bfarber]

You should probably submit a ticket in that case. Anytime I've opted to delete all of a member's posts, it has deleted all of their posts.