A withdrawn rule is a rule that has the availability property pyRuleAvailable set to Withdrawn. A withdrawn rule is never selected by rule resolution. In addition, other rules that match this rule on the following fields are also hidden from rule resolution:
In addition, the version number of the other rules that match this rule must be lower than the version number of the withdrawn rule.
A blocked rule and a withdrawn rule are both invisible to rule resolution. Similarly, both blocked rules and withdrawn rules prevent lower-version rules with the same ruleset and visible key from being selected by rule resolution. However, a blocked rule can block other rules in any ruleset, and a blocked rule stops rule resolution from finding rules in higher Applies To classes. A withdrawn rule affects other rules only in one ruleset and one Applies To class.
When skimming to a new minor ruleset version, the resulting ruleset version contains the withdrawn rule. Withdrawn rules are not, however, copied forward during major skim operations since there will not be other instances in the ruleset name in earlier ruleset versions which need to be prevented from resolving.