Resource groups
Create a resource group so related resources follow one schedule, start and stop in order, and report spend against a shared budget.
A resource group is a named bundle of resources you want to manage as one unit: a dev cluster, a staging stack, or a customer’s tenant. Once you’ve grouped them, you can attach a single schedule, run bulk start/stop in the order you configure, and see cost rolled up at the group level.
Governance → Resource Groups: related resources bundled per team, each with a resource count and spend against its budget.
Before you start
- A role with the
resource-grouppolicies (the built-in Editor and Admin roles have them). - The resources in your inventory. See Resources.
- To start and stop the group: its members’ cloud accounts at the Read + Write permission level.
How it works
When to use a group
Use groups when the same lifecycle policy applies to everything inside. If your “staging” environment is twelve resources that should all sleep on weeknights and weekends, that’s a group. If three of the twelve need to stay on, they belong to a different group (or to no group at all).
One group per resource
A schedule attached to a group applies to every member, and changes to the schedule propagate to all of them.
Create a group
Open Governance → Resource Groups → Create Group
Give it a name and an optional description. The description shows up in the group list, so use it to explain why this group exists.
Add resources
Search by name or UID, or narrow the list with its filters. Tick the resources you want and click Add. Bulk selection is supported.
(Optional) Attach a schedule
Pick an existing schedule or create a new one. All current and future members will follow it. See Schedules for cron syntax.
Sequenced execution
Some stacks have dependencies: databases need to be up before app servers, and app servers before workers. ZopNight runs group start/stop in a configurable order. See Scheduling for the same ordering model as it applies to schedules.
| Mode | Behaviour |
|---|---|
| Auto (default) | Storage first, compute second, applications third. Works for most stacks. |
| Custom | You define the exact order. Use this when auto-ordering doesn’t match your dependency graph. |
You can also set a delay between resources, in seconds (the members table’s Delay (seconds) column). A 120-second delay between a database start and an app server start gives the DB time to accept connections before the app tries to use it.
Bulk start and stop
Group → Start all or Stop all runs the action across every member through the worker pool. Four workers run in parallel, ordering and delays are honoured, and a single banner shows progress so you don’t have to refresh.
Budgets per group
Each group can have a monthly budget. ZopNight tracks live spend against it from your cost records. Spend is computed on every read, so there is no separate counter to keep in sync.
| Status | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Green | Spend is below the alert threshold. Nothing to do. |
| Yellow | Spend has crossed the alert threshold but is below the budget. A budget warning alert fires. Time to look. |
| Red | Spend is over budget for the period. A budget exceeded alert fires. |
Budget alerts reach the channels (Slack, Microsoft Teams, Google Chat, or a webhook) subscribed to budget events in Settings → Notifications → Channels & Alerts.
Overrides on a group
Like resources, groups can be overridden (Keep Running or Force Stop) for a window. A group-level override applies to every member, which is useful when the whole stack has to stay up tonight for a release.
See Overrides for the full behaviour.
Deleting a group
Deleting a group does not delete its resources: the resources keep running and stay in the inventory. The group’s schedule attachment, sequencing, and budget go away.
Group delete is a soft delete. You won’t see deleted groups in the list, but the audit log keeps the trail.
Troubleshooting
A resource can't be added to the group
It already belongs to another group. Remove it from that group first; each resource can be in only one group at a time.
Members started in the wrong order
Only the group’s own Start all / Stop all and its schedule follow sequencing. Bulk start/stop from the inventory sends every action in parallel. Run the action from the group, and switch to Custom order or add a delay if auto-ordering doesn’t match your stack.
The budget turned yellow but no alert arrived
Budget alerts go only to channels subscribed to budget events. Add a subscription in Settings → Notifications → Channels & Alerts.