Alarm Category Properties

Category 254 is reserved for user-created alarm summary entries. Category 255 is reserved for hardware alarms.

The priority which will apply to alarms assigned to this alarm category (0- 255). Alarm priority governs the order in which alarms are displayed, acknowledged, enabled and so on. Enter a priority of 16 characters or less.

Priority 1 is the highest priority, and priority 255 is the lowest. For example, if alarms with priorities 1 to 8 were displayed, priority 1 alarms would be displayed first in their time/date order, then priority 2 alarms, then priority 3, and so on up to priority 8.

Priority 0 (zero) is the default priority and categories have priority zero (as well as the value entered in this field). Priority 0 is used to reference priorities. For example, to change the display parameters of an alarm list, so that alarms of priorities are displayed, AlarmSetInfo would be used with Type = 7, Value = 0.

Note: When priority 0 is used to display alarms of priorities, priority 0 only alarms will display first, followed by priority 1 alarms, then priority 2 etc. You can also customize the order in which alarms will be displayed on the alarm summary page using the SummarySort and SummarySortMode parameters. (This order will override the alarm category priority order.)

Defines whether or not alarms of this category will be displayed on the Alarm Page. The default for this field is TRUE. Enter a value of 6 characters or less.

Defines whether or not alarms of this category will be displayed on the Summary Page. The default for this field is TRUE. Enter a value of 6 characters or less.

The font to display alarms that are no longer active (but have not been acknowledged). This property is optional. If you do not specify a font, the font defaults to 10 pt. BROWN. Enter a value of 16 characters or less.

The font used to display alarms that are no longer active and have been acknowledged. This property is optional. If you do not specify a font, the font defaults to 10 pt. WHITE. Enter a value of 16 characters or less.

The font used to display an expression that has not been acknowledged. This property is optional. If you do not specify a font, the font defaults to 10 pt. YELLOW. Enter a value of 16 characters or less.

The font used to display an active alarm

that has been acknowledged. This property is optional. If you do not specify a font, the font defaults to 10 pt. CYAN. Enter a value of 16 characters or less.

The font used to display disabled alarms. This property is optional. If you do not specify a font, the font defaults to 10 pt. WHITE. Enter a value of 16 characters or less.

A Cicode command that is executed when an alarm of this Category is triggered. For example:

The digital variable STOP_PROCESS is set to ON when an alarm in this category is triggered.

Note: Do not put a Cicode blocking function

in this field. The alarm system executes ON, OFF, or ACK actions within the polling loop. A blocking function will affect the polling of alarms, and may result in slow or delayed alarm processing.

A special case of this command occurs when the Alarm ON Action is self-referring, with a form such as TAG1 = TAG1 + 1. This command will not work properly since tags are not reread before processing the Alarm On action (for performance reasons). This particular command will therefore initially set the value of TAG1 to 1 rather than incrementing it.

To correctly run a command of this type in the Alarm ON Action, use TaskNew() to run your own Cicode function to perform the tag command:

A Cicode command that is executed when an alarm of this Category is reset. For example:

The digital variable ENABLE_PROCESS is set to ON when an alarm in this category is reset.

Note: Do not put a Cicode blocking function

in this field. The alarm system executes ON, OFF, or ACK actions within the polling loop. A blocking function will affect the polling of alarms, and may result in slow or delayed alarm processing.

A Cicode command that is executed when an alarm of this Category is acknowledged .

Note: Do not put a Cicode blocking function

in this field. The alarm system executes ON, OFF, or ACK actions within the polling loop. A blocking function will affect the polling of alarms, and may result in slow or delayed alarm processing.

The screen display format for alarms in this category. The Alarm Display format specifies how the data (for alarms in the category) are displayed on the alarms page (on the screen only). Each alarm displays on the alarms page in a single line, for example:

The Display Format property is optional. If you do not specify a Alarm Display format, the format defaults to:

When alarms are displayed using variable width fonts (such as Arial or Helvetica), the alarm fields may not align properly across different rows. This problem can be avoided by using a field separator in the alarm format configuration instead of just a space. Tab characters, denoted by either "^t" (horizontal tab) or "^v" (vertical tab), between the alarm fields will act as alignment points in your alarm display.

You can change this default Alarm Display Format for alarms by setting the [Alarm]DefDspFmt parameter.

Note: If an alarm value is longer than the field it is to be displayed in, it will be truncated or replaced with the #OVR ("overflow of format width") alert message. When the alarm is logged to a device (i.e. printed or written to a file or database), the format specified for the logging device overrides the display format.

The summary display format for alarms in this category. The Summary Display format specifies how the alarm summary displays on the alarms summary page (on the screen only).

The display format is defined exactly as the Alarms Display Format. However, you can also use additional data fields.

This property is optional. If you do not specify a Summary Display format, the format defaults to:

You can change the default Summary Display Format for alarms by setting the [Alarm]DefSumFmt parameter.

Note: When the alarm is logged to a summary device (i.e. printed or written to a file or database), the format specified for the logging device overrides the display format.

An acquisition error is an error related to acquiring data from I/O sub-system for the underlying tag and/or expression, for example, Device Offline, Tag Unknown, etc. (Integer length 6).

All acquisition errors are stored for each alarm record separately within the alarm server as a new AcqError field. They are not logged and no hardware alarm is raised from them. The AcqError field stores the error as the Citect error code (for example, CT_ERROR_NO_ERROR). This field is made accessible through the alarm browse functionality.

If there are multiple acquisition errors for a single alarm record, then the first of these is stored within the system.

An alarm is logged to the summary device when it has gone off, and has been displayed for a longer period than the time specified in the [Alarm] SummaryTimeout parameter. When the alarm is logged to the device, it is removed from the alarm summary page.

When the alarm is printed, or written to a file or device, the format specified in the device overrides the display format.

This property is optional. If you do not specify a Summary Device, alarm summaries are not logged.

An alarm entry is made in the log device each time an alarm changes state (for example, on, off, acknowledged, enabled, and disabled).

When the alarm is printed, or written to a file or device, the format specified in the device overrides the display format.

This property is optional. If you do not specify a log device, alarm state changes are not logged.

Logs the alarm details when the alarm becomes active. The default for this field is TRUE.

Logs the alarm details when the alarm becomes inactive. The default for this field is TRUE.

Logs the alarm details when the alarm is acknowledged. The default for this field is TRUE.