[FEATURE] Add a native “Purge Now” action to the Dashboard / Control Panel

[evandromalmsteen]

Which component(s) does this affect?

• Full Dashboard
• Lite
• SQL collection scripts
• Installer
• Documentation

Problem Statement

Hi Erik,

Following the discussion in #898, I would like to open this as a formal feature request.

Currently, an immediate data cleanup can be performed manually from SSMS by running config.data_retention, and retention can be adjusted through config.collection_schedule. That works, but it would be useful to have a native option directly in the Dashboard / Control Panel for operational situations where the PerformanceMonitor database grows quickly and disk space needs to be recovered or controlled more easily.

Proposed Solution

Requested enhancement:

• Add a native “Purge Now” action in the Dashboard / Control Panel.
• Allow the purge to run using the existing configured retention values.
• Optionally allow a temporary retention override, for example:
  • purge data older than 1 day
  • purge data older than 3 days
  • purge data older than 7 days
  • custom retention value
• Show a confirmation prompt before running the purge.
• Ideally show a short result summary after execution, such as rows deleted, affected collectors, and whether additional database shrink actions may be needed if OS disk space must be reclaimed.

The goal is not to replace the existing config.data_retention procedure, but to expose a safe and convenient “run cleanup now” option from the UI for urgent or maintenance scenarios.

This would help avoid situations where the database grows very quickly and fills the host drive before the administrator has time to manually adjust retention or run the cleanup from SSMS.

Thanks.

Use Case

In production environments, the PerformanceMonitor database can grow quickly during periods of high workload, troubleshooting, or when multiple collectors are enabled.

A practical use case would be when the SQL Server hosting PerformanceMonitor starts running low on disk space and the DBA needs to immediately purge old collected data without opening SSMS and manually executing config.data_retention.

Example:

A DBA notices that the drive hosting the PerformanceMonitor database is close to full. Instead of manually connecting through SSMS, checking the retention configuration, and executing the cleanup procedure, they could open the PerformanceMonitor Dashboard / Control Panel and click “Purge Now”.

The action could either:

• Run using the currently configured retention settings; or
• Allow a temporary override, such as purging data older than 1, 3, or 7 days.

This would make emergency cleanup faster, safer, and easier to track directly from the UI.

Alternatives Considered

No response

Additional Context

No response

[erikdarlingdata]

Thanks for opening this with such a clear write-up — the scope is exactly right. config.data_retention already does the heavy lifting on the SQL side, so this is mostly a UI affordance:

• Lite: a Settings → Maintenance button that calls the proc against the configured target server, with a confirm dialog.
• Dashboard: same idea, parked on whichever tab makes sense (FinOps or a new Maintenance/Diagnostics area).
• Override dropdown (1/3/7/custom) maps cleanly to the proc's existing @retention_days parameter.
• Result summary: the proc already logs to config.collection_log with rows deleted and table count, so the UI can read that row back after execution.

Tagging good first issue / help wanted since it's well-scoped and doesn't require any new SQL plumbing. If nobody picks it up, I'll get to it on a future release.

[erikdarlingdata]

Shipped in PR #901 (merged to dev).