Quarantine management in Snow License Manager identifies computers, mobile devices, and users that stop reporting inventory data and manages their status based on configured inactivity periods. This article explains the quarantine lifecycle, available settings, database behavior, and how to exclude specific computers or users from automatic quarantine management.

Quarantine management is enabled by default for computers and mobile devices and must be actively enabled for users and devices in Snow Management and Configuration Center. For computers and mobile devices, you can configure whether an item is deleted, archived, or set to inactive after the quarantine period; the default action is deletion.

Quarantine lifecycle

The available quarantine management actions are:

1. Quarantined: By default, when a computer has had no contact for 30 days, its status changes to Quarantined. You can change this period in Snow Management and Configuration Center.

   The Quarantined status identifies computers that are out of contact. Software on the computer continues to be used against your compliance position. If the computer later reports inventory again, its status automatically resets to Active.

2. Inactive: After an additional 60 days by default, the status can be changed to Inactive, or the computer can be automatically Deleted.

   When a computer is set to Inactive, the software on that computer is not used to calculate compliance, but the computer still consumes a Snow License Manager license.

   Inactive computers that later start reporting again appear in a standard Alert on the default Snowboard and in the Computer Overview. You must then manually change the computer back to Active, delete it, or archive it.

3. Delete: Instead of using the Inactive option, you can automatically delete a computer from the system after 60 days by default in quarantine, for a total of 90 days.

   If the computer starts reporting again after it has been deleted, it appears in Snow as a new computer.

4. Archive: Archiving takes a snapshot of the computer, places it in a separate table, and then deletes it.

   You can report on archived computers through the archived computers report. Archived computers and deleted computers do not affect your compliance or Snow License count.

Quarantine settings

All settings for quarantine management are listed under Basic Settings in Snow Management and Configuration Center.

The quarantine settings include:

• QUARANTINE_ACTIVE: When selected, quarantine management is active and changes the status of the computer during the Daily Update Job according to the quarantine values you set.

• QUARANTINE_DAYS: Specifies the number of days a computer can go without scanning in before its status is set to Quarantined. For example, if the value is 30, a computer that does not scan in for 30 days is quarantined.

• QUARANTINE_DELETE: Specifies the number of days after the computer is quarantined, based on the quarantined date rather than the current date, before the computer moves to inactive or is deleted. In the example, this value is 60 days.

  If a computer is quarantined, you can see the projected Inactive or Deleted date on the information tab of the computer.

• QUARANTINE_DELETE_ACTION: Works with the previous setting. After the number of days specified by QUARANTINE_DELETE, the computer can be set to inactive, archived, or deleted completely. In this case, it is set to inactive.

• QUARANTINE_DELETE_ACTIVE: Enables the selected action from the previous step. During the Daily Update Job, the computer can be deleted, archived, or set to inactive. Select this setting to enable the second step of the lifecycle.

How quarantine management works in SQL

Settings from the SMACC Console are saved in the tblSystemSettings table. These settings are used as flags in the database to indicate when a machine has not been reporting for the configured number of days.

The flags are used as criteria in stored procedures that run as part of the Data Update Job, which runs nightly. These stored procedures change the status of devices, computers, or users and move them accordingly to quarantine or inactive status, or process them for deletion.

Quarantine status explained

It is possible to set computers to archive as part of the automatic lifecycle process, as well as delete them or set them to inactive.

Exceptions

You can exclude computers and users from automatic quarantine management. Edit the computer or user and, in the general pane, manually select the status and then disable automatic quarantine management. The manually selected setting remains in place and automatic lifecycle management is not applied.

For computers, consider adding a note to indicate that the automatic settings have been changed. Information in the Notes field can make these exception computers easier to find.

Computers

Users