Maintain Custom Timeouts for Data Center Applications

Easily maintain custom timeouts for applications as you move from a port-based policy to an application-based policy. Use this method to maintain custom timeouts instead of overriding App-ID (losing application visibility) or creating a custom App-ID (expending time and research).

To get started, configure custom timeout settings as part of a service object:

Then add the service object in a policy rule to apply the custom timeouts to the application(s) the rule enforces.

The following steps describe how apply custom timeouts to applications; to apply custom timeouts to user groups, you can follow the same steps but just make sure to add the service object to the security policy rule that enforces the users to whom you want the timeout to apply.

1. Select ObjectsServices to add or modify a service object.

   You can also create service objects as you are defining match criteria for a security policy rule: select PoliciesSecurityService/URL Category and Add a new Service object to apply to the application traffic the rule governs.
2. Select the protocol for the service to use (TCP or UDP).
3. Enter the destination port number or a range of port numbers used by the service.
4. Define the session timeout for the service.

   • Inherit from application (default)—No service-based timeouts are applied; instead, apply the application timeout.
   • Override—Define a custom session timeout for the service.
5. If you chose to override the application timeout and define a custom session timeout, continue to:

   • Enter a TCP Timeout value to set the Maximum length of time in seconds that a TCP session can remain open after data transmission has started. When this time expires, the session closes. The value range is 1 - 604800, and the default value is 3600 seconds.
   • Enter a TCP Half Closed value to set the maximum length of time in seconds that a session remains in the session table between receiving the first FIN packet and receiving the second FIN packet or RST packet. If the timer expires, the session closes. The value range is 1 - 604800, and the default value is 120 seconds.
   • Enter a TCP Wait Time value to set the maximum length of time in seconds that a session remains in the session table after receiving the second FIN packet or a RST packet. When the timer expires, the session closes. The value range is 1 - 600, and the default value is 15 seconds.
6. Click OK to save the service object.
7. Select PoliciesSecurity and Add or modify a policy rule to govern the application traffic you want to control.
8. Select Service/URL Category and Add the service object you just created to the security policy rule.
9. Click OK and Commit your changes.