Creating Lifecycle Rules in VAST Web UI
On the Lifecycle Rules tab of the Element Store page, click Create Lifecycle Rule.
Enter a name for the new rule in the Rule name field.
Enter the name of a view in the View field. Every rule applies within a specified view.
Toggle Enabled on or off to specify whether you want this rule to be enabled immediately or at a later time:
If set to on, the rule will be effective immediately on all objects that currently meet the scope and age criteria that you defined for object expiration.
If set to off, the rule will be created, but not activated. You can enable the rule at a later stage.
Under Rule scope, use either or both of the following filters to select objects to which the rule applies:
In the Prefix filter field, enter a prefix that is common to all elements for which the rule applies.
Note
In S3 terms, this is a prefix that may be common to multiple object keys (names). Specifying a prefix defines a scope of objects to which the rule applies. For example, if you specify sales/jan, all objects in the view that have object keys that begin with sales/jan will fall into the scope.
In terms of file and directory nomenclature, a prefix is a file and/or directory path within the view that can include part of the file or directory name. It can be common to multiple items in order to catch them all within the scope.
For example, if you want to specify all files under a directory called sales that resides under the view, you can enter sales/. This prefix will exclude the directory itself from the scope. If you were to enter sales that would include the directory as well as all the files under the directory. If you were to enter sales/j that would include all files under the directory with names that begin with 'j'.
In the Minimum object size and/or Maximum object size fields, enter a minimum and/or a maximum size of elements to which the rule applies. You can select the size units from the dropdowns provided.
Under Expire and Delete Definitions, define expiration conditions for elements:
Expire current versions of object
Select this option if you want to set a number of days after which to expire elements.
In a view that is not a versioned S3 bucket view, expiration means that the element is permanently removed.
In a versioned S3 bucket view, where the objects are versioned:
If the current version is not a delete marker, a delete marker is created and that becomes the current version. The existing current version is retained as a non-current version. When the delete marker reaches this same number of days, it is deleted.
If there are one or more object versions and the delete marker is the current version, no action is taken.
If the current object version is the only object version and it is also a delete marker, it is removed. That is, all object versions were deleted and there is only a delete marker remaining. This is called an expired object delete marker and it is removed.
After selecting the option, configure the age criteria for element expiration:
From the Type of timestamp dropdown, select the time from which you want to start counting the expiration days:
Creation time. The time the element was created (or, if different, the time the element's metadata was last modified.)
Access time. The time the element content was last accessed.
Modification time. The time the element was last modified.
Enter a number of days in the Days field.
When the rule is created and enabled, all elements that match the defined scope will be expired when they are this number of days old (counting from the chosen type of timestamp).
Automatically delete expired objects and delete markers
Check this box to delete expired object delete markers as soon as they become expired S3 object delete markers. An expired S3 object delete marker is an object version that is the only version of an object and is also a delete marker.
This checkbox is mutually exclusive with Expire current versions of object, which deletes expired S3 object delete markers when they satisfy the specified age criteria. If you want to expire objects using Expire current versions of object and also clean up expired S3 object delete markers as soon as they are created as such, create two separate rules.
Under Delete incomplete multipart uploads, use the Days after the start of upload field to remove incomplete S3 multipart uploads, which are not removed through Days after object creation. Specify the number of days after multipart uploads are started when they should be aborted and removed if they are incomplete.
For versioned S3 buckets only:
Under Permanently delete noncurrent versions of objects, specify the number of days in the Days from becoming a Previous version field. If set, non-current versions of objects are deleted after the specified number of days, provided they are not the newest non-current versions up to the number set to be retained, if that number is set as Number of versions to retain.
Under Number of newer versions to retain, optionally specify a number of non-current versions of objects to retain in the Number of versions field. The newest non-current versions up to this number will not expire even if they exceed Days from becoming a Previous version.
Click Create.
The rule is created and its properties are displayed in the Lifecycle Rules list.