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Resource discovery

To perform backups, Alcion first needs to discover all resources that it can protect from your Microsoft 365 tenant. This happens for the first time when you create your account and then updates every 12 hours.

You can also initiate resource discovery manually by clicking Refresh under the pages for each resource type in the Alcion UI. In practice, this is only necessary if you are testing use cases around how Alcion handles new and deleted resources.

During resource discovery, Alcion determines how the state of resources has changed in Microsoft 365. The changes and how Alcion handles them can be classified as follows:

  • No change - Alcion continues to apply the existing backup policy if one has been set.

  • Resource type changed - Typically happens when an administrator converts a licensed user to a shared mailbox or vice versa. Depending on the changes, Alcion may re-classify the resource, but it continues to apply the existing backup policy if one has been set.

  • Resource removed - Most commonly occurs when a user, or another resource type, is deleted in Microsoft 365. Alcion marks the resource as Archived, removes any existing backup policy, and will no longer backup the resource. You can still access historical backups and restore from them. The backups are subject to your retention policy, and Alcion retains an archived resource as long as there is at least one associated backup.

  • Resource added - Occurs when a new user, site, shared mailbox, or team is provisioned in Microsoft 365. Alcion makes the newly discovered resources available for protection. If new resource auto backup policy is turned on, the new resource will also be protected without the need for administrator intervention.

  • Resource ineligible for backup - Occurs in the unlikely scenario when Alcion determines that an existing user, site, shared mailbox, or team is temporarily ineligible for protection. Reasons for suspension can include degraded or erroneous responses from downstream services (such as Microsoft 365) or extenuating operational circumstances. In such a scenario, Alcion will continue scheduling backups according to the resource's protection policy but changes to the resources' data won't be captured until Alcion determines that the issues is mitigated, at which point the resource will be un-suspended.