Resource monitors in Snowflake can perform actions such as suspending a virtual warehouse when its credit usage reaches a defined limit and triggering a notification to account administrators when credit usage reaches a specified threshold. These actions help manage and control resource usage and costs within Snowflake.
Snowflake Documentation: Resource Monitors

For directory tables, a named external stage allows for the automatic refreshing of metadata. This capability is particularly useful when dealing with files stored on external storage services (like Amazon S3, Google Cloud Storage, or Azure Blob Storage) and accessed through Snowflake. The external stage references these files, and the directory table's metadata can be automatically updated to reflect changes in the underlying files.
References:
* Snowflake Documentation: External Stages

Snowflake's Continuous Data Protection (CDP) encompasses a set of features that help protect data stored in Snowflake against human error, malicious acts, and software failure. Time Travel allows users to access historical data (i.e., data that has been changed or deleted) for a defined period, enabling querying and restoring of data. Fail-safe is an additional layer of data protection that provides a recovery option in the event of significant data loss or corruption, which can only be performed by Snowflake.
References:
* Continuous Data Protection | Snowflake Documentation1
* Data Storage Considerations | Snowflake Documentation2
* Snowflake SnowPro Core Certification Study Guide3
* Snowflake Data Cloud Glossary
https://docs.snowflake.com/en/user-guide/data-availability.html