Archiving Records

Archived records have been removed from Argos, and are no longer available for reporting. However, archived records can be exported to a CSV file and imported into Excel, SQL or other reporting systems if needed.

Records are typically archived for three reasons:

• The Argos database is reaching the limits of the server hardware where it is installed. Archiving records clears up database space and makes filtering and searching faster.
• Older printers, users, projects and media need to be removed from Argos, but cannot because they are referenced by allocated activity records.
• At the end of a fiscal year, records are moved to the archive so no further changes can be made.

Archiving records saves space and resources on your database server by limiting the number of editable records. Once records are archived, they are moved from a relational database structure to a flat table structure. This saves space but limits the ability to edit and filter records.

Archiving Records

Argos data can be archived by a date range, or by selecting specific records.

To archive by a date range, follow these steps:

1. Click on Data
2. Click the Billed or Deleted tab  
3. Click the gear icon in the upper right corner of Argos Manager and select Archive records… 
4. Choose Use date range and define start and end dates, click the Archive button
5. Confirm that you want to remove the records by clicking OK button
6. Click the Close button

To archive specific records, follow these steps:

1. Click on Data
2. Click Billed or Deleted tab
3. Highlight the records you want to remove. You may want to filter the records by date, project, media, etc to limit the number of records to be displayed.
4. Click the gear icon in the upper right corner of Argos Manager and select Archive records… 
5. Choose Use X selected records, click Archive button
6. Confirm that you want to remove the records by clicking OK button
7. Click Close button

Viewing Archived Records

Archived records are still available to view in Argos, but the reporting options are limited.

To view the archived records, click the Archived tab. Only the date filter is available for archived records.

Exporting Archived Records

Archived records can be exported in CSV format. If advanced filtering or reporting on archive records is required, we recommend exporting to a CSV file, which can be opened in Microsoft Excel or other programs.

To export archived records:

1. Click the Archive tab
2. Click the arrow on the Archive tab to bring up the menu, right-click the list of columns and select Configure Columns to choose which columns will be displayed/exported. The export will contain whichever columns are visible. Click OK.
3. Select the date filter to choose the date range to be exported
4. Click the gear icon in the upper right corner of Argos Manager and select Export to file
5. Choose a location and filename. The default filename will be ArgosArchive-DayMonthYear-Hour-Minute.csv, but any filename can be used.
6. All records/columns displayed in the Archive view will be exported.