Although it is possible to create a run-time policy that applies to all virtual services, this is not the common case. More frequently, you will create run-time policies that apply to a particular set of virtual services (or possibly even one specific virtual service). For example, you might define a run-time policy that monitors the response time for all virtual services that are considered to be “critical”.

To target a policy for a particular set of virtual services, you refine the policy's scope by specifying additional selection criteria based on the virtual service's Name, Description or Classification properties. For example, if you wanted to apply a particular run-time policy to critical services as described above, you would classify virtual services according to their criticality and create a policy that targets virtual services that are classified as critical.

In cases where you need to apply a run-time policy to one specific virtual service, you can use the selection criteria to identify the virtual service by name.

To use run-time policies effectively, you need to think about what selection criteria your policies will use to identify the set of virtual services with which they are to be used. You must also ensure that the virtual services in your registry adhere to the Name, Description and/or Classification conventions needed to support your selection scheme. For example, if you intend to enforce different logging policies for different classes of virtual services, you must define the taxonomy by which the virtual services will be classified (for logging purposes) and ensure that virtual services are classified according to this taxonomy before they are deployed.