Technical Tip: How to quickly remove all no-reference addresses or a group with a lot members

[ChrisTan]

Description	This article describes a fast way to clean all the unused IP addresses or delete a large group with hundreds of members
Scope	FortiGate.
Solution	When FortiGate runs long time, some address groups with many members will appear. Deleting the unnecessary groups and addresses is not easy.  For example, the group and addresses were created by automation or from external resources: To delete all the 'block' group and all members can be done as below: Release all the members from the group: config firewall addrgrp edit "block" unset member <----- It will remove all the members from the 'block' group. end Check all the '0' reference addresses and delete them: config firewall address purge <----- It will delete all addresses; those that had referenced addresses can not be deleted. This operation will clear all table! Do you want to continue? (y/n)y 185.39.19.126 can not be deleted because it is used by other entries. 185.39.19.127 can not be deleted because it is used by other entries. .... After that, the 'block' group and its members are all removed. Back up the configuration before issuing the above commands.