# Curator show/delete index problem

**URL:** <https://discuss.elastic.co/t/curator-show-delete-index-problem/38817>\
**Category:** Elasticsearch\
**Created:** [January 10, 2016, 5:48pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/curator-show-delete-index-problem/38817 "2016-01-10T17:48:19Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![dre7777](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/85f322/32.png) [@dre7777](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/dre7777)\
**Post date:** [January 10, 2016, 5:48pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/curator-show-delete-index-problem/38817/1 "2016-01-10T17:48:19Z")

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Hi there,

I'm trying to delete some old indexes with the curator plugin however it's always returning all my indexes. I'm on centos7 with ES v 2.0.0

I'm running this on a test server and managed to delete all my indexes because I was stupid and didn't do a show command first lol.  
I recovered a couple indexes that I took a snapshot of previously and found why It deleted them -

> [root@elk curator]# curator --host 192.168.1.91 show indices --older-than 100 --time-unit days --timestring $Y.%m.%d --prefix logstash-  
> 2016-01-10 17:37:26,203 INFO Job starting: show indices  
> 2016-01-10 17:37:26,218 INFO Action show will be performed on the following indices: [u'logstash-2015.11.01', u'logstash-2015.11.02', u'logstash-2015.11.03']  
> 2016-01-10 17:37:26,218 INFO Matching indices:  
> logstash-2015.11.01  
> logstash-2015.11.02  
> logstash-2015.11.03

no matter what number I put in the "older than days" it always returns ALL my indexes

Any ideas what I'm doing wrong ?

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**Author:** ![theuntergeek](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/theuntergeek/32/44961_2.png) [@theuntergeek](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/theuntergeek)\
**Post date:** [January 10, 2016, 7:50pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/curator-show-delete-index-problem/38817/2 "2016-01-10T19:50:56Z")

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> [@dre7777](#):
>
> $Y.%m.%d

Swap the `$` for a `%` and see what happens

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**Author:** ![dre7777](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/85f322/32.png) [@dre7777](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/dre7777)\
**Post date:** [January 10, 2016, 8:15pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/curator-show-delete-index-problem/38817/3 "2016-01-10T20:15:12Z")

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DERP... Damn my bad eyes!!

Thanks that sorted it 😀

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**Author:** ![system](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/original/3X/1/a/1ac57faf039f6b580b3f104ef42a2a89e41014de.png) [@system](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/system)\
**Post date:** [July 5, 2017, 11:25pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/curator-show-delete-index-problem/38817/4 "2017-07-05T23:25:39Z")

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