Like I said earlier, the only way I know to check is something like this:


IF EXISTS (SELECT * FROM DELETED) -- a DELETE was done

IF EXISTS (SELECT * FROM INSERTED) -- an INSERT was done.


If your INSTEAD OF trigger is checking either for an INSERT or a DELETE, only one of the two conditions will be true, but not both.. (Obviously, in an UPDATE, both will be true, but I don't think you're asking about that one.


I'd be curious if there's another way - though not sure it would be any less lines of code than above.