Version Number: v1.0.0
Published Date: 26 Aug 2025
The function should be considered a BETA function as it has not been generally released and access to this functionality is available via request only.
____________________________________________________________________________
Scope Directives Overview
The scope directives view is on the right side of the main pane. Here you can view, edit, delete or clone your current scope directives, and create new scope directives.
This view includes filter functionality and a toggle to swap between an descriptive list which describes the effect of each directive or a table list which displays each of the directives fields and values.
You can click the full-screen button on the top right to view the directives pane in full-screen or double click or drag the expander in the middle of the pane to adjust the width.
Creating a new scope directive
To begin creating a new scope directive, click on the "Add directive +" button on the top left of the pane.
You'll be presented with a modal with drop down selection from a predefined set of directives. These are basic directives which will apply to your entire sitemap. You may choose one of these or click the "advanced" button for more detailed options.
Advanced Configuration
The advanced configuration screen gives you a few options to select from to configure your new directive. Click here to learn more about these configuration options.
- Action: dictates whether the matching URLs will be in-scope for scanning.
- Value type: How URLs are matched against the given value.
- Value: The string value to match against, E.G: a URL or regex string.
- HTTP Method: What HTTP methods to match against.
- Inverse: If inverse is selected, the directive will match against all HTTP methods but the one selected.
Some actions such as exclude and sample have a few more configuration options, these will appear after selecting the action:
- Count: How many URLs to sample.
- Mode: The method of sampling, E.G: first will sample the first <count> URLs matched.
Previewing a scope directive
You can preview the effect your scope directive will have and what URLs it will match against before creating it. This is available on both the normal and advanced mode. Clicking on the preview button will display a list of URLs which have been matched and separates them into if they are currently included or excluded.
The preview loads a maximum of 1000 URLs at a time, if there is more than 1000 URLs to show, there will be a "load more" button visible. Clicking on this will load the next 1000 URLs.
Editing/Cloning a scope directive
You can edit or clone any of your directives by clicking on the edit or clone buttons for each directive. They both will open the same modal as in the create directive workflow, but with the current directive filled in. Here you can make changes to your directive and then save it.
Cloning a directive will create a brand new one while leaving the current one intact, while editing will only modify the current one.
Deleting a scope directive
You can click on the red "x" button besides a scope directive to delete it. This will open a confirmation modal to prevent accidental deletion. Deleting a scope directive will remove all of it's effects on your sitemap.
When will scope directives take effect?
Depending on what action they are configured with, scope directives can be applied during the crawling or the scanning phases. For example, the seed action takes affect during the crawling phase, while the exclude and exclude and sample actions take affect during the scanning phase.
Scope directives which are created, edited, cloned or deleted while crawling is ongoing will not take affect on the crawl. Similarly, directives which are created, edited, cloned or deleted while scanning is ongoing will not take affect until the next scan.
Why do I have to wait before creating/editing/deleting another scope directive?
When you create, edit, clone or delete a scope directive during the targeting phase, the scope directive must be applied to the sitemap before further edits can be made. This can take time depending on the size of the sitemap and the configuration of the directives. This ensures the consistency of your sitemap.
While a scope directive is being applied, you'll be unable to save changes to other directives. You can still navigate throughout the UI as you please, but the save buttons for all write actions will be disabled and show a loading/waiting state.
We also display a flag during this process so you can know when we've finished applying the scope directive.
