Creating a retention rule update maintenance task

Create a retention rule update maintenance task to globally modify the number of report output versions, document content versions, and report history that are currently kept in the content store.

About this task

Administrators use the retention rule update task to specify the number of reports, queries, analyses, and document objects to keep in the content store. You can specify how long to keep the history and output versions in the content store. Anything that is older than the date you specify is deleted from the content store. This update task marks output versions to be deleted from the content store if the output versions do not follow the defined retention rule. A background task in content manager deletes the marked objects from the content store. To reduce the content in the content store, consider keeping a maximum of two versions in the content store and archiving older versions in your external repository.

Important: Run this task only after creating and running the content archival task. If you run it before, content that was not marked for archival is permanently deleted from the content store.

Procedure

Launch IBM® Cognos® Administration.
On the Configuration tab, click Content Administration.
On the toolbar, click the new content maintenance icon, and then click Retention Rule Update.
Type a name for the retention rule update task and, optionally, a description and screen tip. Click Next.
Select the folders and packages that you want to include.
For Run history retention settings, do one of the following:
- To keep the run history for a specific number of occurrences, click Number of occurrences and type the number. To save an unlimited number of report outputs, set this value to 0.
- To keep run history for a specific length of time, click Duration and click either Days or Months. Type the appropriate value in the box.
For Output versions retention settings, do one of the following:
- To keep report output for a specific number of occurrences, click Number of occurrences and type the number. To save an unlimited number of report outputs, set this value to 0.
- To keep report output for a specific length of time, click Duration and click either Days or Months. Type the appropriate value in the box.
Select the recording level, and click OK.
Choose one of the following:
- To run once now or later, click Save and run once. Click Finish, specify the time and date for the run, then click Run. Review the run time and click OK.
- To schedule at a recurring time, click Save and schedule. Click Finish, and then select frequency and start and end dates. Click OK.
- To save without scheduling or running, click Save only and click Finish.