Questions around deleting items from journal archives

[goatboy]

Hi,

Environment is EV 9.0.2 with Centera storage.

I need to delete all the items from a specific journal archive (~500K).

For internal reasons we have disabled the ability for end users to delete items via Site Properties > Archive Settings > Users can delete items from their archives.

I assume this is the reason why I get a "you are not allowed to delete items from this vault" (the associated rentention categories are NOT set to prevent deletion of archived items) when I do a search for all items in this archive via the EV search page.

Is the easiest way to simply delete the archive? Will this also delete the associated content on the Centera? What about items on Legal Hold?

Even if I had "Users can delete items from their archives" enabled, it will take a long time to delete 500K items manually via EV search as I can only display max of 900(?) items at a time.

thanks

[Jeff_Shotton · Accepted solution]

Yes, the reason why you are getting the message is because deletion is disabled at the site level, however, you could easily be blocked by the Centera when attempting to delete the items because you are still in the retention period(as opposed to being blocked by EV, which is where you are currently) due to the mode that Centera is in, and the vault store partition options for:

From the help files:

Vault Store Partition Properties: Retention

Enterprise Vault can set a Centera™ Retention Period for each item that is archived on the Centera device. The Centera Retention Period specifies the length of time for which the Centera does not allow it to be deleted.

If you change this setting, the new setting applies only to items archived after the change.

Choose the retention period behavior you require.

Only for a Centera Compliance Plus model. Select this to make Enterprise Vault set a Retention Period on Centera Compliance Plus models that corresponds to the Enterprise Vault retention period (defined in each item's retention category). On other Centera models, Enterprise Vault sets a Retention Period of zero, which means that the items can be deleted immediately.

Note:

If you use this option and then upgrade to a Centera Compliance Plus model, Enterprise Vault begins setting the Centera Retention Period for all newly-archived items from the Enterprise Vault retention period.

For all Centera models. Select this to make Enterprise Vault set a Retention Period on all Centera models that corresponds to the Enterprise Vault retention period (defined in each item's retention category).

Never. Select this to make Enterprise Vault set a Retention Period of zero on all Centera models (items can be deleted immediately).

If you are using Centera retention classes then you could be able to shorten the retention period to get round any retention period (if applicable) in order to delete the archive before retention expired.

Even if the items WERE eligible to expire, if you have collections, then the data is not necessarily going to actually be removed from the Centera unless all the items in the clip are expired. This is quite likely if you are only archiving to one archive, but if multiple are sharing the same journal vault store then you may find no CLIPs are actually deleted. If you are trying to create more space therefore you may be disappointed.

Also, items on legal hold cannot be deleted - period. That is the whole point of legal hold. You will need to remove legal hold before deleting the archive.

If you manage to get past all this and want to delete more than a few hundred items in a chunk you could try increasing the number of search results:

http://www.symantec.com/docs/TECH71561  - why there is a limit

http://www.symantec.com/docs/TECH57524  - raising the value of AspMaxRequestEntityAllowed

http://www.symantec.com/docs/HOWTO56777  - customizing the search page to increase the limit.

BUT, if you are trying to delete ALL the items in a specific journal archive, why not just delete the archive...? (if you are still journaling to it, create a new journal archive first)

Regards,

Jeff

[JesusWept3]

Quick question
If you are deleting *all* items from a specific archive, why not just delete the entire archive through the VAC?

[goatboy]

Thanks for the detailed answer. I am fine to delete the entire archive through the VAC (there is nothing currently journaling to it), I was more concerned whether the associated items in the Centera would be deleted.

All of our vault store partitions are set to Retention = Never.

So the assumption is, if I re-enable ability to delete in Site Properties, and confirm nothing in this archive is on legal hold, I can either delete items manually or the entire archive.

I'll use Script 4 from http://www.symantec.com/business/support/index?page=content&id=TECH72381 to determine if there are any Legal Holds in that specific archive.

[Jeff_Shotton]

You don't need to re-enable the ability to delete in site properties in order to be able to delete an archive - that only controls the user deletes. You can still delete archives from the vault admin console (legal hold issues withstanding)

Regards,

Jeff