Device lifecycle management helps you track and manage your clients' devices by categorizing assets into two distinct states: Managed and Retired. Instead of deleting inactive devices and losing their historical records, you can retire them to preserve their tickets, alerts, and documentation for future reference.
Understanding lifecycle states
Device Lifecycle operates on a simple model with two states to help you track your assets accurately:
Managed: This is the default state for any asset recorded in SuperOps, including agent-based endpoints, network devices discovered via probe, and non-monitored or custom-class devices added via CSV.
Retired: This is a terminal state for assets that are no longer active in your environment. Retirement is permanent and irreversible. If you reinstall the SuperOps agent on a previously retired device, the platform will create a brand-new asset record rather than reactivating the original.
Before you begin
Keep the following requirements and scope details in mind before retiring an asset:
Permanence: Retiring an asset is permanent. A retired asset cannot be returned to the managed state.
Permissions: Any technician with delete permissions for assets can also retire an asset.
Supported devices: You can retire Windows, Mac, and Linux endpoints, network monitoring devices, and custom asset classes.
Unsupported devices: MDM-managed devices (including Mac devices with active MDM profiles) are not supported in the lifecycle and cannot be retired.
How to retire an asset
To retire an inactive asset, follow these steps:
1. Navigate to Modules > Assets and select the asset you wish to retire. On the asset details page, locate the tools icon next to the ticket options.
2. Click the tools icon and select Retire asset. A confirmation dialog will appear explaining the permanent nature of the action. Review the details and click Yes, Continue to proceed.
3. On the asset list page, use the Lifecycle column to track managed and retired assets.
Note : Retiring an asset will uninstall the SuperOps agent from the asset
What happens to a retired asset
When an asset is retired, several changes occur to its data visibility and billing status.
Within the asset details and summary page
The retired asset will display a Retired tag next to its name. A status banner will also indicate the exact date, time, and technician who performed the retirement.
Real-time and live monitoring widgets are removed from the asset details page. Specifically, the following sections are hidden across Windows, Mac, and Linux assets:
Event Log
Network Adapter
Open Ports
Historical graphs (such as CPU, memory, and other real-time performance widgets)
Patches associated with the asset will not be visible within the asset details page. Apart from this, all historical data is retained and remains visible within the asset, including existing alerts, existing tickets, and any documentation associated with the asset.
Existing alerts can be resolved or closed. New alerts are not generated for a retired asset.
Outside the asset details view
Sections within the product that are meant to work with active asset data will not show data relevant to retired assets by default. This includes:
Dashboards: The home screen and its widgets do not show retired asset data by default.
Alerts and Patch view: Retired assets do not appear in the alerts view or the patch view.
Reports and widgets: Default reports and default widgets do not include retired asset data, except for the asset inventory report, as explained below.
However, there are a few areas where retired assets are still shown, since you may want a complete, end-to-end view of your asset data:
Asset views : Retired assets appear in asset views by default. Use the Lifecycle column or a Lifecycle filter to separate managed and retired assets.
Navigate to Modules > Assets > All Assets.
Click the Configure Columns option on the right side of the asset table.
In the sidebar, check the box next to Lifecycle and click Done.
Custom widgets and custom data reports: You can view retired asset data by creating a custom widget or custom data exports under Reports with the asset as the subject, and applying the Lifecycle is Retired filter condition. This applies only to asset data; widgets or dashboards built on alerts, patches, or other modules will not include retired asset data.
To create your own widgets or data reports :
Navigate to Modules > Reports and click the Custom tab.
Create a new data report, and select Asset in the first dropdown, followed by All Assets (or another asset class) in the second dropdown.
Under Filter Conditions, set the condition to Lifecycle is Retired.
Click Preview data to view the list of retired assets matching your filter.
Asset inventory report ( Report->Data reports ): Since this report is meant to capture complete asset details, retired assets are included here as well.
Tickets: Existing tickets associated with a retired asset remain available in the ticket views. You can continue to edit, add notes to, assign, resolve, or close these tickets. However, new tickets cannot be created for a retired asset.
SuperOps Billing
Your SuperOps license count decreases and the asset is no longer billed. This will be reflected in your next billing cycle.
Client's contracts
If you bill your customers based on the number of devices or assets, and you have set up a recurring service contract with dynamic billing, you can use a dynamic group to control which assets are counted for billing. To bill only for managed devices and exclude retired assets:
Navigate to the client's Recurring service contract.
Under How should the billing happen?, select Dynamic Quantity.
Under Select the group for billing, choose Create group.
Set the group's parent to Assets, and set the condition to Lifecycle is Managed.
Click Save to create a group of only "Managed" assets for billing.
For further details on how to setup recurring contracts, refer to this link.