Scan History & Delta

Every EA scan is saved automatically. Nexus computes a delta between any two scans, showing exactly what changed in your Jamf instance over time — no manual exports required.

How Scans Are Saved

Every time you run the EA Dependency Scanner, Nexus automatically saves a complete snapshot of the results to your Mac. Scans are:

• Stored locally — saved to disk on your Mac, not uploaded to any cloud service or external server
• Named by timestamp — each scan is named with the date and time it was run (e.g. 2026-03-01 14:32)
• Server-scoped — scans are associated with the Jamf Pro server profile that produced them, so history from different servers never mixes
• Retained indefinitely — scans accumulate until you manually clear them from Settings

Scan data is written in a compact JSON format and is not human-readable by design. Use the Scan History view in Nexus to browse and compare scans.

Viewing a Previous Scan

To review a historical scan:

1. Open Scan History from the sidebar
2. Select a scan from the Scan dropdown — scans are listed in reverse chronological order
3. The EA results from that scan are displayed exactly as they appeared at the time
4. You can export any historical scan to CSV, JSON, or HTML using the export button

Viewing a historical scan does not trigger a new API call — all data comes from the locally saved snapshot. This makes it fast and works even when offline.

Delta Detection

The most powerful feature of Scan History is delta comparison. To compare two scans:

1. Open Scan History from the sidebar
2. Select the Compare tab
3. Choose a Before scan (the older one) and an After scan (the more recent one)
4. Click Run Delta — Nexus computes the diff and displays results in a color-coded table

Each EA in the delta report is tagged with one of four statuses:

Unchanged EAs are hidden by default to keep the delta view focused on what actually changed. Toggle Show Unchanged to include them.

Use Cases

Confirm a cleanup removed the right objects

After removing a batch of orphaned EAs from Jamf Pro, run a new scan and compare it against the pre-cleanup scan. The delta will show every EA that was removed (red), confirming no unintended deletions occurred.

Track configuration drift after admin changes

In environments with multiple Jamf admins, Scan History gives you a chronological audit of every EA change. If something breaks after an admin session, compare the before and after scans to identify which EAs changed and which smart groups or policies may now be affected.

Compliance audit trail

For organizations subject to compliance requirements (SOC 2, HIPAA, ISO 27001), Scan History provides a persistent record of Jamf EA configuration over time. Export any historical scan to HTML or JSON and attach it to your audit documentation.

Catch accidental EA deletions

EAs deleted from Jamf Pro break any smart group that references them — often silently. Running regular scans means you'll catch these deletions in the delta before they cause scope problems. Pair with the Blast Radius Analyzer for full impact analysis before any deletion.

Storage

Scan files are stored at ~/Library/Application Support/Nexus/scans/. In environments with many EAs and frequent scans, individual scan files are typically 50–200 KB. Even with daily scanning over a year, total storage use is well under 100 MB.

To clear scan history:

1. Open Settings (gear icon in the sidebar)
2. Navigate to Storage & Cache
3. Click Clear Scan History
4. Confirm the deletion — this action cannot be undone