System Maintenance and Policies
      Back to home
      1. Knowledge Base
      2. System Maintenance and Policies

      Data Retention and Archiving

      This article covers data retention and archiving and will help users and administrators understand and manage their data to keep it relevant in Intterra and accessible, once archived

      Intterra  users can add and edit incident, preplan, and assessment map features.  Some of the features are incident related and are intended to be removed from Intterra when an incident is no longer active, while preplan and assessment features are intended to be available for ongoing use and remain until removed by a user.  This article covers data retention and archiving and will help users and administrators understand and manage their data to keep it relevant in Intterra and accessible, once archived.  See  Layer Export Tool for more information about how users can export GIS data for areas of interest at will.

      Overview

      In regards to data retention and archiving in Intterra, editable mapped features fall into three general categories: 
      1. Incident features that are relevant and useful only for the period of time the incident is active.
        • These include: Incidents, Wildfire, HazMat, USAR, and Hazard Events.
        • Important considerations:
          • The features are archived on the Intterra server when 'Edited' or 'Deleted' by a user.
          • All incident features that have been associated with an incident name will be deleted when that incident is deleted.  This provides a quick and easy way to clean up old incident data.  See Managing Incidents in  Incidents Tool and  Incident Mapping Workflow for additional information.  Features can also be deleted and archived individually.  Features that have been accidentally deleted can be restored by contacting support@intterragroup.com.
          • Annually, Intterra will remove these features and make a copy available to the client administrator.
      2. Incident-related features that are relevant and useful only for the period of time the incident is active or serve a pre- or post-incident function.
        • These can include: Triage, Damage Assessments, and Field Observations (FOBS).
        • Important considerations:
          • Triage and Damage Assessment features are archived on the Intterra server when 'Edited' or 'Deleted' by a user.  Features that have been accidentally deleted can be restored by contacting support@intterragroup.com.
          • Field Observations (FOBS) features are NOT archived when edited or deleted by a user.  They cannot be recovered.
          • These features can only be deleted one at a time by users.
          • Annually, Intterra will remove these features and make a copy available to the client administrator.
      3. Preplan and Assessment features that are intended to persist.
        • These can include: Structure Risk Assessments, Inspections, Preplans (Wildfire and Structure), Hydrants, Fuel Treatments, and Special Events.
        • Important considerations:
          • Inspections, Preplans (Wildfire and Structure), Hydrants, Fuel Treatments, and Special Events features are all archived on the Intterra server when 'Edited' or 'Deleted' by a user.  Features that have been accidentally deleted can be restored by contacting support@intterragroup.com.
          • Structure Risk Assessment features are NOT archived when edited or deleted by a user.  They cannot be recovered.
          • These features can only be deleted one at a time by users.
          • Intterra will provide a copy of all the data upon request at support@intterragroup.com.

      Best Practices

      • For incident mapping, follow the Incident Mapping Workflow. 
      • Plan ahead for what feature types you want to persist for future use in Intterra versus what should be removed once the incident is no longer active.  Many map features are available for collecting as both Incident/FOBS and Preplans.  Examples include a water source, safety zones, evacuation shelters, camp, ICP, helispots, and more.
        • Use Wildfire Preplan and Hydrant feature types if your intent is to have collected features persist in your system.
        • Use Incident or FOBS features for map features you want to remove at the end of the incident.
      • Incident features can be copied individually to a corresponding Preplan feature, if needed for future use.  See Copy to the Map.