Product Lifecycle Support
Use the end‑of‑life (EOL) information published by most vendors and publishers in BMC Discovery by applying Product Lifecycle patterns from the Extended Data Pack.
Application
Product Lifecycle patterns help you identify software and hardware installations that are exposed to security or stability risks due to a lack of support and patch updates, are no longer shipping (which can increase costs and risks related to product variance), and may incur higher costs because of premium maintenance subscriptions.
Product lifecycle support in the BMC Discovery UI
A product's lifecycle information is stored in a SupportDetail node. This EOL information can be viewed in an overview format on the parent node or directly in the SupportDetail node, as shown in the following screenshots:
Certain nodes, such as those for a host, network device, or storage system, can be associated with two support Detail nodes: one for the hardware itself and amother for its operating system:
Product lifecycle support terminology
The product lifecycle dates are based on the following milestones, as defined and used by the vendor or publisher:
| Retirement / End Of Life (EOL) | End Of Support (EOS) | End Of Security Support (EOSS) | End Of Extended Support (EOES) |
| The vendor or publisher stops selling and/or shipping the particular product. | The publisher stops providing patch updates for the particular product. Such End of Support Date relates to the normal support applicable to all of its customers as provided by the vendor or publisher. | The vendor stops providing security patches for the particular model. | The publisher stops providing support for the particular product. Such End of Extended Support Date might also indicate the date when technical documentation will be removed from the vendor's or publisher's site. |
Mapping terminology and definitions from disparate product lifecycle policies
Almost every vendor or publisher uses unique terminology and definitions in their product lifecycle policies. BMC Discovery aligns these to the closest matching standardized definitions. The following table provides examples of the challenges encountered in standardizing EOL data across different sources.
| Vendor | (This date is not exposed in the BMC Discovery UI) GA Date | End Of Life (EOL) | End Of Support (EOS) | End Of Security Support (EOSS) | End Of Extended Support (EOES) | Provenance URL | Policy |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| BMC | Release Date | NA | Full Support End Date or Full Support | Limited Support | End of Support Date or End of Version Support | BMC Discovery supported versions | BMC Software Product Support Policy |
| Cisco Systems | NA | End-of-Sale Date | End of Routine Failure Analysis Date: HW | End of Vulnerability/Security Support: OS SW | Last Date of Support: HW | End-of-Sale and End-of-Life Announcement for the Cisco Catalyst | Cisco End-of-Life Policy |
| Microsoft | Start Date | Mainstream End Date | Extended End Date [Top table] or End Date [Bottom table] | NA | Extended Security Update Year 3 | Windows Server Support Details | Microsoft Lifecycle Policy |
| Oracle | GA Date | NA | Premier Support Ends | NA | Extended Support Ends | Oracle Lifetime Support Policy | Oracle expected lifetime support |
| Quest | Full Support as of | Limited Support as of | Support Discontinued | NA | Continuing Support | Quest Product Support | Quest Product Support Policies |
| Red Hat | General availability | Full support ends | Maintenance support ends | NA | Extended update support Term 2 ends | Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform Life Cycle Policy | Red Hat Enterprise Linux - Top Support Policies |
How BMC Helix gathers the EOL data
BMC Discovery maintains all its EOL data in an internal EOL tool. This tool runs scripts to scrape vendor sites for EOL information and to detect new releases. Because web content can be unstructured, some EOL data still needs to be collected manually. The tool also uses AI to identify missing version numbers, predict likely release dates, and derive new EOL entries from existing data. Additionally, customer-provided query results in CSV format are essential for identifying data gaps and discovering new product versions.
BMC Helix relies on EOL dates that are publicly available on the vendor's sites and provides direct references to these pages in the BMC Discovery UI when displaying lifecycle dates.
What if EOL data is unavailable?
It is not always possible to obtain EOL data for every product because some vendors never publish this information. In BMC Discovery, when EOL data is unavailable, a failure reason attribute is attached to the Support Detail node. This attribute explains why End Of Life data is missing, providing customers with context about the current state of the Support Detail node. For example, it might indicate that the vendor does not publish EOL dates or that the information could not be verified.
For more information, see End-Of-Life Failure Reasons.
Tailored Extended Support
Microsoft offers Extended Security Updates (ESU) and Red Hat provides Extended Update Support (EUS) subscriptions for additional support beyond standard end-of-life dates. BMC Discovery includes patterns for Microsoft and Red Hat that detect whether an ESU or EUS subscription has been purchased for a host. Based on this detection, the operating system EOL data for that host is adjusted accordingly.
Microsoft Windows
The following examples illustrate how EOL data for Microsoft Windows (Server 2012) is presented, both in standard cases and when extended support subscriptions are applied. The EOL information is taken from Windows Server Support Dates.
Normal End of Life Data
Product Version | ESU Applied | Start Date -> GA Date | Mainstream End Date -> Retirement Date | Extended End Date [Top table] OR End Date [Bottom table] -> End of Support Date | End of Security Support Date | Extended Security Update Year 3 -> End of Extended Support Date |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Server 2012 | This EOL entry assumes we are unable to ascertain if the customer has purchased any extended support from Microsoft following the final service pack in the form of an ESU subscription. | 2012-10-30 | 2018-10-09 | 2023-10-10 | NA | 2026-10-13 This date is the EOL date for the ESU subscription with the maximum number of years (3) that may be purchased from Microsoft for additional cost. |
Tailored End of Life Data
Product Version | ESU Applied | Start Date -> GA Date | Mainstream End Date -> Retirement Date | Extended End Date [Top table] OR End Date [Bottom table] -> End of Support Date | Extended Security Update Year X -> End of Security Support Date | Extended Security Update Year 3 -> End of Extended Support Date |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Server 2012 | ESU Year 1 | 2023-10-11 This is the day following the End of Support date. | 2018-10-09 | 2023-10-10 | 2024-10-08 As you have purchased a one‑year ESU subscription, this date reflects the availability of security support beyond the normal End of Support date. | 2026-10-13 This date reflects the availability of an extended option, under which you can pay an additional cost to increase your Microsoft ESU subscription from one year to three years. |
ESU Year 2 | 2024-10-09 | 2018-10-09 | 2023-10-10 | 2025-10-14 As you have purchased a two‑year ESU subscription, this date reflects the availability of security support beyond the normal End of Support date. | 2026-10-13 This date reflects the availability of an extended option, under which you can pay an additional cost to increase your Microsoft ESU subscription from two years to three years. | |
ESU Year 3 | 2025-10-15 | 2018-10-09 | 2023-10-10 | 2026-10-13 As you have purchased a three‑year ESU subscription, this date reflects the availability of security support beyond the normal End of Support date. | No date appears here because you have already purchased the maximum number of years of ESU support. |
End Of Life-related queries
The following queries can be run in BMC Discovery to help you ensure effective management of your EOL data:
- SoftwareInstance nodes without an associated SupportDetail node
SEARCH SoftwareInstance WHERE product_version not in [none, ""] AND nodecount(TRAVERSE ElementWithDetail:SupportDetail:SoftwareDetail:SupportDetail) = 0 SHOW join([type, product_version], ' ') as 'SI Type and Version' PROCESS WITH countUnique(0)
- SupportDetail nodes by failure reason
SEARCH SupportDetail WHERE type = "SI Support Detail" AND failure_reason SHOW failure_reason PROCESS WITH countUnique(0)
- Software products whose End of Support date is in the past
SEARCH SupportDetail WHERE type = "SI Support Detail" AND end_support_date AND end_support_date < currentTime() SHOW join([publisher, product, product_version], ' ') as 'Publisher, Product and Version', formatTime(end_support_date, "%Y-%m-%d") as 'End of Support Date', whenWasThat(end_support_date) as 'When Was That' PROCESS WITH countUnique(0)
- Software Products whose support ends this year
SEARCH SupportDetail WHERE type = "SI Support Detail" AND end_support_date AND end_support_date >= parseUTCTime(formatUTCTime(currentTime(), "%Y-01-01")) AND end_support_date <= parseUTCTime(formatUTCTime(currentTime(), "%Y-12-31")) SHOW join([publisher, product, product_version], ' ') as 'Publisher, Product and Version', formatTime(end_support_date, "%Y-%m-%d") as 'End of Support Date', whenWasThat(end_support_date) as 'When Was That' PROCESS WITH countUnique(0)
- Software products whose support ends next year
SEARCH SupportDetail WHERE type = "SI Support Detail" AND end_support_date AND end_support_date >= parseUTCTime(fmt("%s-01-01", int(formatUTCTime(currentTime(), "%Y")) + 1)) AND end_support_date <= parseUTCTime(fmt("%s-12-31", int(formatUTCTime(currentTime(), "%Y")) + 1))) SHOW join([publisher, product, product_version], ' ') as 'Publisher, Product and Version', formatTime(end_support_date, "%Y-%m-%d") as 'End of Support Date', whenWasThat(end_support_date) as 'When Was That' PROCESS WITH countUnique(0)
- Software products whose End of Support date is within a year of today's date
SEARCH SupportDetail WHERE type = "SI Support Detail" AND end_support_date AND end_support_date >= currentTime() AND end_support_date <= (currentTime() + 365*24*3600*10000000)
SHOW join([publisher, product, product_version], ' ') as 'Publisher, Product and Version', formatTime(end_support_date, "%Y-%m-%d") as 'End of Support Date', whenWasThat(end_support_date) as 'When Was That' PROCESS WITH countUnique(0)
Reports
The Software Products Lifecycle Analysis dashboard is a default feature in BMC Discovery that provides access to EOL reports for software products. By using those reports, you can:
- Identify cases where a product's serial number is required.
- Recognize when a product has been open-sourced, and support is provided by a commercial entity.
- Track changes in vendor ownership that may affect provenance links.
- Clarify confusing published EOL data, sometimes with the help of third-party sites, such as endoflife.date.
- Address situations where legacy EOL data has been removed for older product versions.
- Note when EOL data is unavailable for newly released product versions.
- Understand when a support login is required to access EOL data.
Available reports are as follows:
- Software Product EOL Failure Reasons
- Software Product Lifecycle Analysis
- OS Product EOL Failure Reasons
- OS Product Lifecycle Analysis
Examples of EOL reports are as follows:
