What is the difference between the drop and truncate table commands?
Talebzadeh: The drop table command drops the table, including the table definition and the associated objects (rules, indexes, constraints, triggers, primary key and so on). Obviously, once a table is dropped all the data rows contained in the table are also removed. A truncate table command removes all rows from a table. The table structure and all the indexes continue to exist until you issue a drop table command (as discussed above). The rules, defaults and constraints that are bound to the columns remain bound, and triggers remain in effect. The truncate table command also de-allocates the distribution pages for all indexes. The truncate table is equivalent to, but faster than, a delete command without a where clause. Delete removes rows one at a time and logs each deleted row as a transaction; truncate table de-allocates whole data pages and makes fewer log entries. Both delete and truncate table reclaim the space occupied by the data and its associated indexes. Only the table own
