# Sandbox Pools

Sandbox pools in sfp are designed to provide instantly available Salesforce environments for development, testing, and review processes. By maintaining a pool of pre-created sandboxes, teams can significantly reduce wait times and streamline their development workflows.

### Key Benefits

1. **Immediate Availability**: Eliminate waiting times for sandbox creation, allowing developers to start work instantly.
2. **Reduced Overhead**: Minimize the administrative burden of creating and managing individual sandboxes for each task.
3. **Consistent Environment**: Ensure all team members work with standardized, pre-configured sandbox environments.
4. **Seamless Integration**: Easily incorporate sandbox allocation into automated CI/CD pipelines and development workflows.

### Sandbox Lifecycle

The following diagram illustrates the lifecycle of a sandbox within a pool:

{% @mermaid/diagram content="stateDiagram-v2 \[*] --> Created: Init (sfp pool sandbox init) Created --> Available: Monitor (sfp pool sandbox monitor) Available --> InUse: Fetch (sfp pool sandbox fetch) InUse --> Available: Lease Expired (sfp pool sandbox fetch) Available --> Extended: Extend (sfp pool sandbox extend) Extended --> Available: Extension Expired (sfp sandbox monitor) Available --> Expired: Monitor( sfp pool sandbox monitor ) Extended --> Expired: Monitor ( sfp pool sandbox monitor) Expired --> \[*] " %}

### Commands Overview

#### 1. Sandbox Pool Initialization

```
sfp pool sandbox init -f <path/to/config-file> -v <devhub-alias> -r <owner/repo>
```

Initializes sandbox pools based on configuration files.

#### 2. Fetch a Sandbox

```
sfp pool sandbox fetch --repository <owner/repo> --pool <pool-name> --branch <branch-name> --issue <issue-number> [--devhubalias <alias>] [--wait <minutes>] [--leasefor <minutes>]
```

Fetches an available sandbox from a pool and assigns it to an issue.

#### 3. Monitor Sandbox Pools

```
sfp pool sandbox monitor -v <devhub-alias> -r <owner/repo> -f <path/to/config-file> [<path/to/config-file>...]
```

Monitors sandbox status, handles activations, expirations, and deletions.

### Continuous Monitoring

The `sfp sandbox monitor` command is designed to be run as a continuous cron job. This ensures that:

1. Newly created sandboxes are activated promptly.
2. Expired sandboxes are identified and marked for deletion.
3. Marked sandboxes are deleted, freeing up resources.
4. The pool is kept in a healthy state, always ready for use.

It's recommended to set up this command to run at regular intervals (e.g., every 15-30 minutes) to maintain an up-to-date and efficient sandbox pool.

For detailed information on each command and the expiration process, please refer to the individual command documentation.


---

# Agent Instructions: Querying This Documentation

If you need additional information that is not directly available in this page, you can query the documentation dynamically by asking a question.

Perform an HTTP GET request on the current page URL with the `ask` query parameter:

```
GET https://docs.flxbl.io/flxbl/sfp/sfp-community/environment-management/pools/sandbox-pools.md?ask=<question>
```

The question should be specific, self-contained, and written in natural language.
The response will contain a direct answer to the question and relevant excerpts and sources from the documentation.

Use this mechanism when the answer is not explicitly present in the current page, you need clarification or additional context, or you want to retrieve related documentation sections.