Summarization OR Pruning?

There is an interesting question posted at the developworks forum asking if it is possible to run either the summarization agent or pruning but not both. This article explains how it could be done.

First of all, please understand that the summarization and pruning are handled by a single agent. So, if you turn off the agent, you'll in effect turn off both the functions. However, by configuring the S & P agent appropriately, you could turn off unnecessary functions.

Summarization without pruning

In other words, the data should be summarized but it has to be kept in the database forever. (i.e. no pruning of data). Before doing this, please fully understand the database storage requirements. Even with periodic pruning, it is possible to have gigabytes of data in few weeks time.

If you still want to disable pruning, you could achieve this functionality by specifying large time period (e.g. 99 years to keep the hourly data) in the Pruning interval settings in "Configure Summarization and Pruning Agent" Window. In this case, pruning is not disabled but it will run very rarely (once in 99 years!). But, make sure that you document these settings and let your next generation know when you retire :-)

Pruning without Summarization

You are not summarizing any data but what are you pruning then? The detailed data of course. This can be easily achieved by "unchecking" all the periods (yearly, quarterly, monthly, weekly, daily, hourly) in Summarization settings and by specifying the pruning interval ONLY for the "detailed data". This will in effect run only the pruning process without doing any summarization process.

Again, these are based on the Summarization and Pruning Concepts rather than any practical tests. Please do your testing in your environment before applying the configuration.