Client Download Cache

How long are downloads kept on an endpoint (server/workstation)? I’m seeing files that are several months old and in total they are consuming over 5GB. I’m thinking about including the “Clear BES Local Download Caches” at the end of my baseline and am wondering if anyone sees an issue with this approach?

thanks!

I would be careful in doing something like that. You may have cases where you want to retry a failing installation or have preloaded the cache. And you’ll force the agent to download the payloads again.

If the size of the cache is what you care about, did you consider setting it to a lower limit ? The Agent will automatically clear older entries in the cache to make space for more recent ones when needed automatically.

Rosario.

Thanks Rosario, what you recommended is what i ended up doing. Do you know if the endpoint caches all fixlets/patches in the baseline or only the relevant ones?

It depends on how the action script is written. The agent downloads the payload when you take the action, not when the fixlet is relevant. Unless you specify the download via prefetch.

Rosario.

i typically prefetch. What happens in that scenario?

Prefetches may download before the action begins executing (but still only happen if the action is Relevant).

If you remove the payload from the cache the agent will download it again when you’ll take the action. So nothing catastrophic but I think you do prefetch for a reason, e.g. the download takes some time and you have a limited window to perform the action.

Rosario.

Thanks for the help guys