5.3 Understanding Activation and Deactivation Dates

All objectives have an optional activation and deactivation date. The activation date specifies when the objective is active (or started). The deactivation date specifies when the objective is inactive (or ended). In essence, the activation and deactivation dates are the effective start and end dates, respectively.

The activation/deactivation dates allow creating objectives to match the start and end dates specified in the contract for the SLA. It is possible to create objectives before you need to begin monitoring the SLA by setting the activation date.

A deactivation date, in essence, retires an objective. After retired, an objective no longer executes and real-time data is no longer generated. However, historical data related to the objective is retained and can be used in reports in the Operations Center dashboard. In contrast, when an objective is deleted, the historical data related to that objective is also deleted and is no longer available for reporting purposes.

By default, the activation and deactivation dates show the current date, but are not selected. These fields are not required. If the activation and deactivation dates are not set, then the current objective definition settings are always applied.

The activation date can be set in the past, as the present day, or in the future. If the activation date is set to a date in the past, Operations Center attempts to generate the objective status based on past data already collected. If the activation date is set in the future, then until that date occurs the objective does not fire in real time and reports for data related to the objective show NA (not applicable). If only an activation date is set, then the current objective definition settings are used until the objective definition is updated with a new activation date.

An activation date must be selected for a deactivation date to be selected. The deactivation date can be a past day, the present day, or a future day. If the deactivation date is set in the past, then the objective never fires in real time and reports for data related to the objective always show NA (not applicable).

If both the activation and deactivation dates are set, then the objective definition is applicable only between those two dates. The last version of the objective definition settings apply for the entire period specified.