Okay, I admit this is a trivia question from a wordsmith, but how did it come to pass that they use the word "truncate" in SQL to mean "nuke all the records from the table"? It seems a misuse of the English word. Maybe the person who invented SQL wasn't a skilled writer. "Truncate" means "to cut short" or "to remove a portion". It doesn't mean "to remove all". It seems something like "purge" might have been a better choice of verb.

Too late now, huh?

🙂