Automatic Workspace Shutdown

Workspace Manager includes a background process that automatically detects idle workspaces and shuts them down to conserve resources. Understanding how this works helps you avoid unexpected shutdowns.

Best Practice

Manually shut down your workspace when you’re finished with it rather than relying on automatic shutdown.

How It Works

The idle detection system uses a multi-stage algorithm to determine when a workspace should be shut down:

Initial Expiration

When a workspace starts, it’s assigned an initial expiration time based on expected usage patterns.

Activity Detection

The system only scans workspace logs when a workspace is within 5 minutes of being shut down. When scanning, it looks for evidence of recent activity:

• Workspace startup
• New SSH session
• Web request
• SFTP transfer

If any of these activities are detected, the expiration time is extended.

Grace Periods

The grace period after detected activity varies based on time of day:

• Working hours: 30 minutes after last activity
• Off-hours: 15 minutes after last activity

Working hours are defined as 8am-6pm Monday through Friday in the timezone of the user who owns the workspace.

Setting Your Timezone

You can update your preferred timezone in your profile page, accessible from the navigation menu or by clicking your name in the top-right of the screen.

Shutdown Warnings

When a workspace is approaching automatic shutdown, the system provides advance notice:

• 5 minutes before shutdown: Warning message sent to all open SSH sessions
• 1 minute before shutdown: Final warning sent to all open SSH sessions

This gives you time to either:

• Save your work and allow the shutdown
• Trigger new activity to extend the expiration

Manual Expiration Control

The Workspace status page provides the ability to manually set workspace expiration times. This is useful when:

• You know you’ll be away from your keyboard but want to keep the workspace running
• You’re running a long process that doesn’t generate detectable activity
• You need to ensure a workspace stays available for a specific time period

Managing Costs

Keep in mind that running workspaces incur infrastructure costs. Setting longer expiration times when you don’t actively need the workspace can add up over time.

Best Practices

• Shut down manually: Don’t rely on automatic shutdown - explicitly stop your workspace when done
• Monitor warnings: Pay attention to shutdown warnings in your SSH sessions
• Set timezone correctly: Ensure your profile timezone matches your actual working hours
• Use manual expiration sparingly: Only extend expiration when truly necessary
• Plan for long-running tasks: If running processes that take longer than the grace period, consider using manual expiration or triggering periodic activity