Operations
Deletion And Cleanup
How EBA stages recovery-point deletion through a reversible queue and grace period, then reclaims storage with guarded cleanup.
Automated Deletion
Deletion is normally automated according to repository state and policy eligibility. Cleanup is handled as a governed EBA lifecycle workflow rather than a manual storage operation.
Recovery point deletion lifecycle
Under retention
Retained
The recovery point is held according to its retention tier, for example base, daily, weekly, monthly, or yearly.
Grace period
Soft-Deleted
The recovery point enters the Recovery Point Deletion Queue and can still be recovered while the grace period lasts.
After the grace period
Final Deletion
Deletion becomes permanent and the recovery point leaves the deletion queue.
Cleanup
Space Reclaimed
Garbage collection reclaims storage that is no longer referenced by any retained recovery point.
Immutability and legal hold win
Recovery points protected by repository immutability (before their retain-until time) or by legal hold are not deleted by retention, cleanup, or manual deletion until that protection ends.
Deletion Queue
The Recovery Point Deletion Queue lists recovery points that are marked for deletion but not necessarily reclaimed yet. The GUI can group queue items by VM and recovery point, and can show total queued points, overdue points, failed points, and known size.
Bulk actions can run as dry runs before starting asynchronous jobs, with job progress and failure detail available in the GUI.
Deletion Grace Period
The deletion grace period is the reversible window after soft delete. Soft-deleted recovery points can be recovered during the grace period; once it expires, recovery through the deletion queue is no longer available.
The grace period is a repository setting. A 72-hour default may appear in the GUI, but the effective value is the one configured on the repository.
Recover And Delete Actions
Permanent delete is irreversible
Once permanent deletion completes, the recovery point cannot be recovered from the deletion queue.
Cleanup And Garbage Collection
Cleanup never deletes retained backups. It reclaims data only when EBA has determined the data is unreferenced and eligible, so the reclaimable estimate is not a guarantee that the exact amount of space returns immediately.
GUI Cleanup Controls
Where the SHA GUI exposes EBA controls, cleanup controls can show repository cleanup status, ready items, estimated reclaimable space, items still in grace period, and the last run. Administrators can run an estimate, a dry run, or the cleanup itself.
When hard-delete-first cleanup is selected, the GUI requires explicit destructive confirmation, an operator reason, and re-authentication.
Access control
Cleanup actions in the SHA GUI depend on operator permissions, product edition, repository state, and provider access.
Safety Gates
EBA re-checks safety gates before final deletion, because a recovery point can become held or blocked after it first entered the deletion queue. Final deletion respects:
- Active legal hold.
- Active immutability.
- Chain or dependency relationships.
- Repository scope.
- Grace period state.
- Running operation conflicts.
- Operator permissions and destructive-action confirmation.
Repository Deletion Readiness
Deleting or retiring an EBA repository is separate from cleaning up recovery-point data inside it. Repository deletion can be blocked while any of the following remain:
- Restore points still visible to operators.
- Recovery points still moving through the deletion queue.
- Active jobs.
- Active protection patterns using the repository.
- Governance or cleanup state that still needs operator attention.
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