Auto archiving entities

Cortex can auto archive entities when they are no longer detected in your integrations or whose corresponding YAML files are deleted. For example, if you use AWS to auto-hydrate your catalogs, enabling this feature will automatically archive entities that are deleted in AWS.

We recommend enabling this feature to keep your data up-to-date without manual effort.

It is also possible to manually archive entities. See Archiving entities for more information on manually archiving entities and how archived entities are handled in Cortex.

Cortex checks every day at 7 a.m. UTC for any affected entities, and skips archiving if any errors are detected.

Enable default entity auto-archival settings

To configure the default auto-archival settings for new entity types:

1. In Cortex, navigate to Settings > Entities > General.

2. Under "Auto-archiving entities by type," enable the toggle for the setting you want to enable:

   • Enable integration-based auto-archiving for new entity types by default

     • Enable this setting if you want to enable the feature for integration-based archiving. Cortex will automatically archive and un-archive entities based on their existence in a third-party integration.

     • Cortex checks for a deleted or archived repo in your integration. To prevent an entity from being un-archived, make sure you have deleted the associated repo. The entity will be removed the next time the archival sync runs.

     • This option is recommended if you use microservices that all live in different repos.

   • Enable GitOps based auto-archiving for new entity types by default

     • Enable this setting if you want to enable the feature for GitOps-based archiving. Cortex will automatically archive entities if their corresponding YAML file is deleted.

     • If the file is moved rather than deleted, it will not be archived from Cortex. Cortex checks for files that have been deleted.

     • This option is recommended if you use a monorepo.

An entity's x-cortex-tag cannot be overwritten; attempting to update the x-cortex-tag value via GitOps will create a new entity. The entity will only automatically archive if its original YAML file no longer exists in your Git environment.

To change an entity's x-cortex-tag, you must archive or delete the entity then create a new entity with the desired tag.

Enable auto archival per entity type

Below the option to enable auto archival, all of the entity types (default and custom) are listed alongside a toggle setting. You can enable the toggles individually for each entity type based on your preferred archival option.

Enable auto archive per entity type

Trigger an entity sync

Deleted entities will continue to appear until the next time the auto-archival sync runs. You can also manually trigger the sync:

1. Navigate to Catalogs > All entities.
2. In the upper right corner, click Import entities, then choose Import discovered entities.

3. Choose an integration.

   • Entities will automatically sync on the next page.

FAQ and Troubleshooting

Why is an entity unexpectedly re-appearing after it has been archived?

If you are using the integration-based auto-archiving, Cortex is checking whether the entity exists in your third-party integration. When Cortex runs the background sync for entity discovery, if the repo connected to that entity still exists, Cortex will un-archive the entity. To prevent un-archival, you can either delete the associated repo, or you can use the GitOps-based auto-archiving instead.

Why is an entity still appearing after I deleted the YAML file for it or deleted the associated repo?

The auto-archival feature runs once a day, at 7 a.m. UTC. The entity will continue to appear until the next time the auto-archival sync runs or until you manually trigger the sync.