M-Alarm User's Guide

June 30, 2004

Table of Contents M-Alarm User’s Guide

Table of Contents .................................................................................. 1

Chapter 1 Introduction ......................................................................1-1

Introduction...................................................................................................... 1-1

Key Concepts................................................................................................... 1-2

M-Alarm Components ....................................................................................................1-2 BACnet OPC AE Server.................................................................................................1-2 N1 OPC AE Server ........................................................................................................1-2 N1 OPC AE Configurator ...............................................................................................1-2 Current Events Viewer ...................................................................................................1-3 Default Views .................................................................................................................1-4 Logger ............................................................................................................................1-5 Logger Configurator .......................................................................................................1-6 Reports...........................................................................................................................1-6 File Extensions...............................................................................................................1-7 Alarm..............................................................................................................................1-7 Condition ........................................................................................................................1-7 Event ..............................................................................................................................1-8 Event Categories............................................................................................................1-8 System Requirements....................................................................................................1-8 Related Information........................................................................................................1-8

© June 30, 2004 Johnson Controls, Inc. www.johnsoncontrols.com

2 M-Alarm

Chapter 2 Getting Started with M-Alarm on the M3 Workstation ..2-1

Introduction...................................................................................................... 2-1

Key Concepts................................................................................................... 2-2

M3 Workstation and M-Alarm.........................................................................................2-2 M-Alarm Configuration with the M3 Workstation............................................................2-3 M3 Workstation OPC Server Installation........................................................................2-3 M-Password ...................................................................................................................2-4 BACnet Alarms...............................................................................................................2-5

Detailed Procedures........................................................................................ 2-6

Adding the Current Events Viewer to an M3 Workstation ..............................................2-6 Configuring the Notification Class Object (NCO) for M-Alarm........................................2-6

Chapter 3 Getting Started with M-Alarm on the M5 Workstation ..3-1

Introduction...................................................................................................... 3-1

Key Concepts................................................................................................... 3-2

M5 Workstation and M-Alarm.........................................................................................3-2 Default Layouts ..............................................................................................................3-3 M-Alarm Configuration with the M5 Workstation............................................................3-3 M5 Workstation OPC Server Installation........................................................................3-3 M-Password ...................................................................................................................3-4 M-Series Workstation Alarms.........................................................................................3-4 BACnet Alarms...............................................................................................................3-5


Adding the Current Events Viewer to Screen Manager .................................................3-7 Configuring the Notification Class Object (NCO) for M-Alarm........................................3-7

Chapter 4 Viewing and Acknowledging Alarms .............................4-1

Introduction...................................................................................................... 4-1

Key Concepts................................................................................................... 4-2

Table of Contents 3

Current Events Viewer ...................................................................................................4-2 Current Events Viewer Configuration.............................................................................4-3 Alarm Acknowledgement ...............................................................................................4-3 Default Views .................................................................................................................4-4 Device Offline Application ..............................................................................................4-5 Sort.................................................................................................................................4-6 Filter ...............................................................................................................................4-6 Refresh...........................................................................................................................4-6


Acknowledging Alarms...................................................................................................4-7 Sorting Alarms................................................................................................................4-9 Changing Alarm Filtering Options ................................................................................4-10

Chapter 5 Configuring the Logger ...................................................5-1

Introduction...................................................................................................... 5-1

Key Concepts................................................................................................... 5-2

Logger ............................................................................................................................5-2 Logger Configurator .......................................................................................................5-2 Database Logging ..........................................................................................................5-3 GenTray .........................................................................................................................5-4 Column Settings.............................................................................................................5-5 Nodes.............................................................................................................................5-6 Subscriptions..................................................................................................................5-6 Printer Logging...............................................................................................................5-7


Starting or Stopping the Logger .....................................................................................5-9 Auto Starting the Logger ................................................................................................5-9 Viewing the Default Logger Configuration......................................................................5-9 Activating the BACnet Database..................................................................................5-10

Chapter 6 Configuring M-Alarm Reports.........................................6-1

Introduction...................................................................................................... 6-1

Key Concepts................................................................................................... 6-2

4 M-Alarm

Report ............................................................................................................................6-2 Configuration Mode and Runtime Mode ........................................................................6-2 Runtime Report Toolbar.................................................................................................6-3


Opening a Report...........................................................................................................6-5 Adding a Report to an M3 Workstation ..........................................................................6-5 Adding a Report to an M5 Workstation ..........................................................................6-6 Switching between Runtime and Configuration Modes..................................................6-6 Viewing a Chart Summary .............................................................................................6-6 Changing Report Sorting Options in Runtime ................................................................6-8 Changing Report Filtering Options in Runtime...............................................................6-9 Editing a Report ...........................................................................................................6-12

Chapter 7 Using M-Alarm with the N1 OPC AE Server ..................7-1

Introduction...................................................................................................... 7-1

Key Concepts................................................................................................... 7-2

N1 OPC AE Server ........................................................................................................7-2 N1 OPC AE Configurator ...............................................................................................7-4 Interactions with Metasys PMI .......................................................................................7-4 N1 OPC AE Server Startup............................................................................................7-4 Alarm Severity................................................................................................................7-6 Alarm States and Storage ..............................................................................................7-7 Event Subscription .........................................................................................................7-8 Filter ...............................................................................................................................7-8 Additional Attributes .......................................................................................................7-9 Refresh...........................................................................................................................7-9 Acknowledge (Ack) ........................................................................................................7-9 Network Browsing ..........................................................................................................7-9 Server Status .................................................................................................................7-9 Source, Condition, and Sub-condition..........................................................................7-10 Memory Requirements.................................................................................................7-10 Events, Categories, and Conditions.............................................................................7-11 Error Handling ..............................................................................................................7-16

Table of Contents 5

Detailed Procedures...................................................................................... 7-17

Configuring the N1 OPC AE Server .............................................................................7-17

Chapter 8 Using M-Alarm with the BACnet OPC AE Server ..........8-1

Introduction...................................................................................................... 8-1

Key Concepts................................................................................................... 8-2

BACnet OPC Alarm Events Sever (BACnet OPC AE Server) .......................................8-2 Standard Event Attributes ..............................................................................................8-2 Additional Attributes .......................................................................................................8-6 Multiple Site Access .....................................................................................................8-10 Filter .............................................................................................................................8-11 Condition Names..........................................................................................................8-12 Event Priority Mapping .................................................................................................8-12 Conditional Alarms Events ...........................................................................................8-12 Event Notification .........................................................................................................8-13 Refresh.........................................................................................................................8-13 User Interface...............................................................................................................8-13 Error Handling ..............................................................................................................8-13

Chapter 9 Advanced User’s Guide...................................................9-1

Introduction...................................................................................................... 9-1

Key Concepts................................................................................................... 9-2

Current Events Viewer Menus .......................................................................................9-2 Current Events Viewer Toolbar ......................................................................................9-4 Subscription ...................................................................................................................9-4 Current Events Viewer Properties..................................................................................9-8 Color Usage .................................................................................................................9-15 Offline Monitor Application ...........................................................................................9-16

6 M-Alarm

M-Alarm User’s Guide 1-1

Chapter 1 Introduction

Introduction M-Alarm allows the user to view, store, and manipulate current alarms received by N1 or BACnet® Object Linking and Embedding (OLE) for Process Controls (OPC) Alarm and Event (AE) servers connected to one or more subsystems.

© November 1, 2001 Johnson Controls, Inc. www.johnsoncontrols.com Code No. LIT-11537505 Software Release 5.0


Key Concepts M-Alarm Components

M-Alarm includes powerful alarm detection, sorting, filtering, viewing, and reporting from AE servers. M-Alarm is a collection of alarming components including the Current Events Viewer, Logger, and Reports. The client components of M-Alarm communicate with AE servers in order to receive and process alarm data. M-Alarm supports both the N1 OPC AE and BACnet OPC AE servers.

Note: Companion™/Facilitator™ alarms still appear in the M3 Workstation alarm bar. Refer to the M3 Workstation User’s Guide for details. The Metasys® alarms still appear in the Critical Alarm box. Refer to the Report Router/Alarm Management Technical Bulletin (LIT-636114) for details.

BACnet OPC AE Server The BACnet OPC AE server provides an interface for OPC-compliant Windows® client applications to access alarms and events from N30 Supervisory Controllers and any third-party BACnet-compliant controller, such as a Cardkey® access system. Refer to the Using M-Alarm with the BACnet OPC AE Server chapter.

N1 OPC AE Server The N1 OPC AE server provides an interface for OPC-compliant Windows client applications to access alarms and events from Metasys Person-Machine Interface (PMI) systems. Refer to the Using M-Alarm with the N1 OPC AE Server chapter.

N1 OPC AE Configurator The N1 OPC AE Configurator defines the N1 OPC AE server parameters and specifies connections to the Metasys Remote Server (MRS) at the defined location (for example, the local machine). The N1 OPC AE server retrieves all the initialization parameters in the registry, except the site Internet Protocol (IP) addresses, and stores the parameters in a database. The N1 OPC AE Configurator has a graphical user interface to view and modify these parameters. Refer to the Using M-Alarm with the N1 OPC AE Server chapter.


Current Events Viewer The Current Events Viewer (Figure 1-1) displays current alarm information and handles alarm acknowledgement. Refer to the Viewing and Acknowledging Alarms chapter in this user’s guide. Users can modify the layout of information including sort order, color, font, and displayed data.

Figure 1-1: Current Events Viewer – Runtime Mode Figure 1-2 is an example of the Current Events Viewer in Configuration mode, which defines the appearance in Runtime mode. See the Viewing and Acknowledging Alarms chapter in this guide for more information.


Figure 1-2: Current Events Viewer – Configuration Mode

As a Standalone Application You can launch the Current Events Viewer as a standalone application to view M-Alarm (.a32) files. However, we recommend adding it as an M3 Workstation workspace or M5 Screen Manager panel.

Default Views M-Alarm includes the following default views.

Table 1-1: N1 General Alarm Message Regular View.a32 Column Heading Description Condition Name of condition that caused the event to occur (e.g., High Alarm, Low Warning, etc.) Original Event Time that the event was originally generated Item (Tag) Name of the point that caused the event to occur Value Value of attribute that caused event to occur Units Engineering units of attribute/property name Latest Event Timestamp of latest event occurrence User ID Name of workstation/user that acknowledged an event Ack Comment Comment or Annotation entered for Acknowledgement Message Alarm Message associated with the point Special Text Special text associated with the particular event (usually from JC-BASIC Process) Alarm Type Type of alarm (e.g., Alarm, Acknowledged, Unacknowledged) Event Category One of OPC Event Categories. For example: General Alarm or General Message. New State Abbreviated condition of the alarm: active, enabled, acknowledged, etc. Quality OPC indicator as to reliability of event


Table 1-2: N1 General Alarm Message Simplified View.a32 Column Heading Description Condition Name of condition that caused the event to occur (e.g., High Alarm, Low Warning,

etc.) Original Event Time that the event was originally generated Item (Tag) Name of the point that caused the event to occur Value Value of attribute that caused event to occur Units Engineering units of the value/property name Latest Event Timestamp of latest event occurrence User ID Name of workstation/user that acknowledged an event Ack Comment Comment or Annotation entered for Acknowledgement Message Alarm Message associated with the point Special Text Special text associated with the particular event (usually from JC-BASIC Process)

Table 1-3: N30 BACnet Regular View.a32 Column Heading Description Time/Date Timestamp of latest event occurrence Alarm Type Type of alarm (e.g., Alarm, Acknowledged, Unacknowledged) BACnet Event Type

BACnet-specific event type

Event Type OPC-specific event type (Simple, Tracking, or Condition) Event Category One of OPC event categories. For example: General Alarm or General Message. Condition Name Name of condition that caused the event to occur SubCondition Name

More specific cause of the event

Tag Name of the point that caused the event to occur Priority Severity of alarm/event Quality OPC indicator as to reliability of event Description Description of event Vendor ID Identifier of BACnet subsystem Areas Specific locator of Tag (source) Property Name Attribute that caused event to occur From State Previous state before transition occurred Property Value Value of attribute that caused event to occur Units Engineering units of property name Ack Comment Comment entered by user when alarm was acknowledged Complete Ack Indicates if controller needs complete acknowledgement. Actor ID Name of workstation/user that acknowledged an event


Logger The Logger archives events and alarms to a database and/or printer. The Logger can process alarm information from several local alarm servers. Reports display the information contained in the log. Refer to the Configuring the Logger and Configuring M-Alarm Reports chapters in this user’s guide for more details.

Logger Configurator The Logger Configurator configures the Logger, determines which events to archive, and selects the columns or fields to log (Figure 1-3). Refer to the Configuring the Logger chapter for more details.

Figure 1-3: M-Alarm Logger Configurator

Reports The Logger archives events and alarms. Reports display alarms from the Logger database in a table format (Figure 1-4). Because a report is a snapshot of the alarms in the Logger database, it does not update as new alarms appear in the Viewer. M-Alarm Release 1.0 includes two default reports: N1 and N30 (BACnet) servers. Users can add reports to the M5 Workstation Screen Manager or the Report ActiveX® control to an M-Graphic file.


Figure 1-4: M-Alarm Report

File Extensions Table 1-4 lists the file extensions associated with M-Alarm.

Table 1-4: M-Alarm File Extensions File Extension Description .a32 M-Alarm Application .awv M-Alarm View Control/Object .awi M-Alarm Indicator Application .gdf M-Graphic Application

Alarm An alarm is an abnormal condition and, thus, is a special type of condition. Alarms are condition-related events. Condition related events may be initiated by field objects of integrated networks. For example are an interlock input object going into Hi Alarm, or a binary input object going into its alarm state.

Condition A condition is a named state of the OPC Event server or one of its objects.


Event An event is a detectable activity. There are three types of events: simple, tracking-related, and condition-related. Simple events include a component failure within the system/device. Tracking-related events involve the interaction of a client with an object. The operator’s changing the set point of a tag is an example. Condition-related events represent transitions into or out of the states. An object transitioning into Hi Alarm is an example.

Event Categories Event categories define a group of events supported by the AE server. An event category can only contain one type of event (simple, tracking-related, or condition-related). We are currently using the event categories GENERAL_ALARM, SECURITY ALARM, SECURITY TRANSACTION, GENERAL TRANSACTION, and GENERAL_MESSAGE for the N1 configurations, and a different set of event categories for the BACnet configurations.

System Requirements M-Alarm is available with M3 Workstation Release 5.0 or M5 Workstation Release 5.0. Refer to the Metasys Installation and Platform Requirements Technical Bulletin (LIT-12012) for information on Personal Computer (PC) requirements.

Related Information As a reference, Table 1-5 lists literature where further information related to M-Alarm can be found.

Table 1-5: Related Information Manual LIT number Metasys Installation and Platform Requirements Technical Bulletin

12012

M3 Workstation User’s Guide M5 Workstation User’s Guide N30 Supervisory Controller Quick Start Technical Bulletin 6891200 N30 Supervisory Controller User’s Guide


Chapter 2 Getting Started with M-Alarm on the M3 Workstation

Introduction This chapter explains how to get started using M-Alarm on an M3 Workstation. This chapter describes how to provide an alarm summary by adding a current event viewer to an M3 Workstation and how to route alarm messages using the Notification Class object. This chapter describes how to:

• add the Current Events Viewer to an M3 Workstation

• configure the Notification Class Object (NCO) to route alarms to workstations



Key Concepts M3 Workstation and M-Alarm

The M3 Workstation uses M-Alarm to process and display alarms received from an N30. A separate alarm panel accesses Companion/Facilitator alarms (Figure 2-1). The M-Alarm Container workspace appears as a default in M3 Workstation.

Figure 2-1: M-Alarm Application as a Workspace in M3 Workstation


M-Alarm Configuration with the M3 Workstation Table 2-1 describes the general steps needed to configure M-Alarm with the M3 Workstation.

Table 2-1: M-Alarm Configuration with the M3 Workstation Step Configuration Step Refer to 1 Install the M3 Workstation and the appropriate OPC

servers (Figure 2-2). The M3 Workstation installation also installs M-Alarm.

M3 Workstation Overview and Installation Technical Bulletin (LIT-1153100)

2 Use M-Password to assign access to receive and acknowledge alarms.

M-Password Technical Bulletin (LIT-1153150)

3 Add the M3 Workstation IP address as a recipient in the Notification Class Object (NCO) for each N30 Supervisory Controller (and qualified third-party BACnet devices).

The Configuring the Notification Class Object (NCO) for M-Alarm procedure in this chapter BACnet Notification Class chapter in the Object Dictionary

4 Start the M3 Workstation. The M-Alarm Container appears with the default BACnet view. The alarm panel appears for the Companion/Facilitator alarms.

M3 Workstation User’s Guide

M3 Workstation OPC Server Installation During the M3 Workstation installation, M-Alarm is automatically installed. You must select the N30 (BACnet) OPC server and/or Companion/Facilitator OPC server (Figure 2-2) depending on the controllers in your system. The BACnet server processes both data and alarms. Refer to M3 Workstation Overview and Installation Technical Bulletin (LIT-1153100) for details.


Figure 2-2: M3 Workstation Installation Options

M-Password Using M-Password, the machine administrator must determine which users have acknowledgement capabilities. Refer to the M-Password Technical Bulletin (LIT-1153150) for details.


N30 Alarms Figure 2-3 illustrates the path an N30 alarm follows.

A device generates an alarm.

Notification Class Object (NCO) or Event Enrollment Object, then NCO in the BACnet device

Alarm and Event (AE) OPC Server

Current Events Viewer and Logger

Appears in the M-Series Workstation.

Alarm

Alarm

Alarm

Alarm

bacnet alarm path

Figure 2-3: N30 Alarm Path

N30 Alarming Checklist Verify the following to ensure N30 alarming works properly: 1. The PC has added itself to the recipient list of the Notification

Class Objects in the N30 or third-party BACnet device. Refer to the Object Dictionary for details on the Notification Class Object.

2. The Current Events Viewer has subscribed to the AE server. Refer to the Advanced User’s Guide chapter in this guide for details.

3. The N30 or third-party BACnet device is online and configured to send alarms.

4. The Current Events Viewer is a workspace in the M3 Workstation (M-Alarm Container).

5. The site is connected. Refer to the Site Book User’s Guide (LIT-6893100) for details.

6. The BACnet IP port is properly configured in the device. Refer to the Site Book User’s Guide for details.


Detailed Procedures Adding the Current Events Viewer to an M3 Workstation

The M-Alarm Container appears as a default workspace when the M3 Workstation is started. If multiple views are desired, add them as objects in M-Graphics, then add M-Graphics as a workspace.

Configuring the Notification Class Object (NCO) to Route Alarms to Workstations

To configure the NCO to route alarms to workstations: 1. Select Start > Programs > Johnson Controls > M-Explorer. 2. Right-click on Alarm Notification in the N30 and select Inspect

(Figure 2-4). The M-Inspector dialog box appears (Figure 2-5).

Figure 2-4: N30 Notification Class Object in M-Explorer 3. Select the M-Command tab in the M-Inspector dialog box.


4. Select Add Recipient from the drop-down list box in the Command field.

Figure 2-5: M-Inspector Dialog Box for the Notification Class Object 5. Define the Command Parameters using Table 2-2.


Table 2-2: Command Parameters Command Parameter

Description

Valid Days Days of the week when this destination may be used From Time, To Time The window of time when the destination is viable Recipient Choice The destination devices to receive notifications. We recommend selecting Address.

This command uses the address of the PC you are currently using. Note: To change the IP address after you have executed this command, go to

the M-View tab and edit the address. Issue Confirmed Notifications

True if confirmed notifications are sent, and False if unconfirmed notifications are sent

Transitions A set of three flags that indicates the transitions for this recipient

6. Click the Execute button. 7. Click Close.


Chapter 3 Getting Started with M-Alarm on the M5 Workstation

Introduction This chapter explains how to get started using M-Alarm on an M5 Workstation. This chapter describes how to:

• add the Current Events Viewer to Screen Manager

• configure the Notification Class Object (NCO) for Routing Alarms



Key Concepts M5 Workstation and M-Alarm

The M5 Workstation uses M-Alarm to access N1 (Metasys system) and/or BACnet (N30) alarms. Screen Manager only supports one Current Events Viewer as a panel within a layout. If multiple Viewers are desired, add the Viewers as objects in M-Graphics, then add an M-Graphics panel in the Screen Manager (Figure 3-1).

Figure 3-1: Multiple M-Alarm Current Events Viewers in Screen Manager

Alarm Indicator The Alarm Indicator provides a user configurable visual and audible indication of the system’s current alarm state. When a new alarm is detected, the alarm indicator flashes and beeps. See Figure 3-2 for an example of an M5 Workstation Screen Manager with an Alarm Indicator added.


Figure 3-2: M5 Workstation Screen Manager with Alarm Indicator

Default Layouts All the M5 Workstation layouts contain default M-Graphics views. Refer to the M5 Workstation User’s Guide for details on layouts.

M-Alarm Configuration with the M5 Workstation Table 3-1 describes the general steps needed to configure M-Alarm with the M5 Workstation.

Table 3-1: M-Alarm Configuration with the M5 Workstation Step Configuration Step Refer To 1 Install the M5 Workstation software and the

appropriate OPC servers (Figure 3-3). Installing the M5 Workstation Technical Bulletin (LIT-1153300)

2 Use M-Password to assign access to receive and acknowledge alarms.

M-Password Technical Bulletin (LIT-1153150)

3 Add the M5 Workstation IP address as a recipient in the Notification Class Object (NCO) for each N30 and third party BACnet device.

The Configuring the Notification Class Object (NCO) for M-Alarm procedure in this chapter BACnet Notification Class chapter in the Object Dictionary

4 Define the USER_APP as the report destination for Metasys alarms.

Report Router/Alarm Management Technical Bulletin (LIT-636114)

5 Start the M5 Workstation. Add default views to the Screen Manager panels, or open a default layout with the Current Events Viewer as one of the panels.

M5 Workstation User’s Guide

M5 Workstation OPC Server Installation During the M5 Workstation install, you must select the N30 (BACnet) OPC server and/or the N1 OPC servers (Figure 3-3). The N30 (BACnet) OPC server processes both data and alarms. For Metasys N1 network communication, there are two OPC servers; one is for data access and the other is for alarm and events. If you choose a typical install, the N1 OPC AE and data access servers are installed if Metasys PMI is detected on the PC. If Metasys PMI is not detected on the PC, the BACnet OPC server is installed. If you select a custom install, the options are listed under data servers. Refer to the Installing the M5 Workstation Technical Bulletin (LIT-1153300) for details.


Figure 3-3: M5 Workstation Data Server Installation Options

M-Password Using M-Password, the machine administrator must determine which users have acknowledgement capabilities. Refer to the M-Password Technical Bulletin (LIT-1153150) for details.

M-Series Workstation Alarms BACnet and N1 alarming work differently. Refer to Figure 3-4 and Figure 3-5 for an outline of the path an alarm takes in each subsystem. Refer to the checklists that follow to ensure alarming works properly.


N30 Alarms Figure 3-4 illustrates the path a N30 alarm follows.

A device generates an alarm.

Notification Class Object (NCO) or Event Enrollment Object, then NCO in the BACnet device



Appears in the M-Series Workstation.

Alarm

Alarm

Alarm

Alarm

bacnet alarm path


N30 Alarming Checklist Verify the following to ensure N30 alarming works properly: 1. The PC has added itself to the recipient list of the Notification

Class Object in the N30 or third party BACnet device. Refer to the Object Dictionary for details on the Notification Class Object.

2. The Current Events Viewer has subscribed to the OPC AE server. Refer to the Advanced User’s Guide chapter in this manual for details.

3. The N30 or third-party BACnet device is online and configured to send alarms.

4. The Current Events Viewer is an application in the Screen Manager panel.

5. The site is connected. Refer to the Site Book User’s Guide for details.

6. The BACnet IP port is properly configured in the device. Refer to the Project Builder User’s Guide for details.


N1 Alarming Figure 3-5 illustrates the path an N1 alarm follows.

A Network Control Module (NCM) generates an alarm.

Report Router in the Operator Workstation (OWS)



Appears in the M5 Workstation.

Alarm

Alarm

Alarm

Alarm

n1 alarm path

USER_APP report destination

Alarm


N1 Alarming Checklist Verify the following to ensure N1 alarming works properly: 1. Verify that USER_APP is defined as a report destination in the

report access group in the Operator Workstation (OWS) where you want to receive alarm notification (i.e., site with which you want to connect).

2. Verify that all the points in the network, which generate different types of alarm reports (Normal, Alarm, Warning, Override), are defined as one of the following report types: CRIT1, CRIT2, CRIT3, CRIT4, STATUS, FOLLOWUP.

N1 OPC AE Server Notes M-Alarm acknowledgement is equivalent to the Metasys discard operation. Refer to the Report Router/Alarm Management Technical Bulletin (LIT-636114) for details on the Metasys alarm acknowledgement and discard process. Metasys acknowledgement is only a local operation used to mark the alarm as seen and changes the color of the alarm from red to black in the Metasys Critical Alarm summary.


Detailed Procedures Adding the Current Events Viewer to Screen Manager

Refer to the Using Screen Manager chapter in the M5 Workstation User’s Guide for information on populating layouts. If you are adding one Viewer, either select a layout that contains the Viewer, or add one of the predefined .a32 views to the current layout. To add a view, click on the Applications button and browse to Applications > M-Alarm > (C:\Documents and Settings…) > M-Alarm > Views >. If you’re adding multiple views, add the predefined M-Graphics files that contain views. To add multiple views, click on the Applications button and browse to Applications > M-Graphics > (C:\Documents and Settings…) > M-Alarm >.

Configuring the Notification Class Object (NCO) for Routing Alarms To configure the NCO for M-Alarm: 1. Select Start > Programs > Johnson Controls > M-Explorer. 2. Right-click on the Alarm Notification attribute of an N30, and

select Inspect (Figure 3-6). The M-Inspector dialog box appears (Figure 3-7).


Figure 3-6: N30 Notification Class Object in M-Explorer 3. Select the M-Command tab in the M-Inspector dialog box. 4. Select Add Recipient from the drop-down list box in the

Command field.


Figure 3-7: M-Inspector Dialog Box for the Notification Class Object


5. Define the Command Parameters using Table 3-2.

Table 3-2: Command Parameters Command Parameter

Description

Valid Days Days of the week when this destination may be used From Time, To Time The window of time when the destination is viable Recipient Choice The destination devices to receive notifications. We recommend selecting Address.

This command uses the address of the PC you are currently using. Note: To change the IP address after you have executed this command, go to

the M-View tab and edit the address. Issue Confirmed Notifications

True if confirmed notifications are sent, and False if unconfirmed notifications are sent

Transitions A set of three flags that indicates those transitions for this recipient

6. Click the Execute button. 7. Click Close.


Chapter 4 Viewing and Acknowledging Alarms

Introduction This document provides information on viewing and acknowledging alarms. This document describes how to:

• acknowledge alarms

• sort alarms

• change alarm filter options

© June 18, 2004 Johnson Controls, Inc. www.johnsoncontrols.com Code No. LIT-11537520 Software Release 5.0

M-Alarm User’s Guide

4-2

Key Concepts Current Events Viewer

The Current Events Viewer (Figure 4-1) displays current alarm information and handles alarm acknowledgement. Users can modify the layout of information including sort order, color, font, and displayed data. Each line in the Viewer displays information on a single event or alarm.

Figure 4-1: Current Events Viewer Note: Question marks in the N1 views represent events generated

by the N1 OPC AE server during startup. The N1 OPC AE server scans the Metasys® N1 network for points currently in alarm and generates events for those points. Since the server does not know the value that caused the alarm, it uses question marks for the value. If you acknowledge alarms with a ? value for the N1, the acknowledgements are not sent to the Metasys OWS.


4-3

Current Events Viewer Configuration Several default views are available to the user. These configurations support the most common Heating, Ventilating, and Air Conditioning (HVAC) and general event categories from both the N1 and BACnet® subsystems. The views are available as M-Alarm files and M-Graphics files. In the M5 Workstation Screen Manager, only one instance of M-Alarm can be added to a layout. For multiple instances, add M-Alarm as an ActiveX® control in M-Graphics. For details on adding ActiveX controls, refer to the M-Graphics ActiveX Control chapter in the M-Graphics User’s Manual. For details on editing the Current Events Viewer defaults, refer to the Current Events Viewer Properties section in the Advanced User’s Guide chapter. The configuration of the M-Graphic view and the Current Events Viewer should match. If an M-Graphic view is added to the Screen Manager and its configuration does not match the Current Events Viewer configuration, the graphical view does not display unless the Current Events Viewer is removed from the layout. Note: See the Adding the Current Events Viewer to Screen

Manager section of the Getting Started with M-Alarm on the M5 Workstation chapter in the M-Alarm User’s Guide for an easier method of adding M-Graphic views.

Alarm Acknowledgement The alarm acknowledgement options are the same for the N1 and BACnet OPC AE servers. In the Alarm Acknowledgment dialog box, users can also add comments. Note: You may need to add the DISABLED event type to your list

describing how events are inactivated. DISABLED is inactivated when another event is received for a zone object. This includes: ALARM, TROUBLE, and NORMAL.

Table 4-1 lists the acknowledgment options when users right-click on an alarm and choose ACK. If the quality of an alarm is bad, it cannot be acknowledged. The alarm quality is bad if an alarm object goes offline or the device is disconnected.


4-4

Table 4-1: Acknowledgement Actions Acknowledgment Action

Description

Point Acknowledges alarms currently selected. Global Acknowledges all alarms received. This option quickly

clears all alarms from the current view. Visible Acknowledges all visible alarms. For example, if the size of

the Viewer shows five alarms and a total of eight alarms came in, only the five visible alarms are acknowledged.

Filtered Acknowledges all alarms received (the same as the global option).

Area This option in not functional at this time.

Default Views By default, M-Alarm is configured to display all alarms in the system. To customize which alarms are displayed, right-click on the Current Events Viewer to display the M-Alarm Viewer Properties dialog box, select Display > Filter > New, and build an equation to restrict the alarms that are displayed in the Viewer. M-Alarm includes the following default views.

Table 4-2: N1 General Alarm Message Regular View.a32 Column Heading

Message

Condition Name of condition that caused the event to occur (e.g., High Alarm, Low Warning, etc.)

Original Event Time the event was originally generated Item (Tag) Name of the point that caused the event to occur Value Value of attribute that caused event to occur Units Engineering units of the attribute Latest Event Timestamp of latest event occurrence User ID Name of workstation/user that acknowledged an event Ack Comment Comment or Annotation entered for Acknowledgement Message Alarm Message associated with the point Special Text Special text associated with the particular event (usually from

JC-BASIC Process) Alarm Type Type of alarm (e.g., Alarm, Acknowledged, Unacknowledged) Event Category One of OPC event categories (e.g., General Alarm or General

Message) New State Abbreviated condition of the alarm: active, enabled,

acknowledged, etc. Quality OPC indicator as to reliability of event


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Table 4-3: N1 General Alarm Message Simplified View.a32 Column Heading

Message

Condition Name of condition that caused the event to occur (e.g., High Alarm, Low Warning, etc.)

Original Event Time the event was originally generated Item (Tag) Name of the point that caused the event to occur Value Value of attribute that caused event to occur Units Engineering units of attribute/property name Latest Event Timestamp of latest event occurrence User ID Name of workstation/user that acknowledged an event Ack Comment Comment or Annotation entered for Acknowledgement Description Alarm Message associated with the point Special Text Special text associated with the particular event (usually from

JC-BASIC Process)

Table 4-4: N30 BACnet Regular View.a32 Column Heading Description Time/Date Timestamp of latest event occurrence Alarm Type Type of alarm (e.g., Alarm, Acknowledged,

Unacknowledged) BACnet Event Type BACnet specific event type Event Type OPC-specific event type (Simple, Tracking, or Condition) Event Category One of OPC Event Categories. For example: General

Alarm or General Message. Condition Name Name of condition that caused the event to occur SubCondition Name More specific cause of the event Tag Name of the point that caused the event to occur Priority Severity of alarm/event Quality OPC indicator as to reliability of event Description Description of event Vendor ID Identifier of BACnet subsystem Areas Specific locator of Tag (source) Property Name Attribute that caused event to occur From State Previous state before transition occurred Property Value Value of attribute that caused event to occur Units Engineering units of property name Ack Comment Comment entered by user when alarm was acknowledged Complete Ack Indicates if controller needs complete acknowledgement. Actor ID Name of workstation/user that acknowledged an event


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Device Offline Application An application, Device Offline, runs in the background by default. This application sends an alarm if one of the N30s in a system goes offline. This alarm must be acknowledged at each N30. Refer to the Advanced User’s Guide chapter for details.

Sort Sorting determines the order of appearance for current alarms. The default sorts by Time/Date, which lists alarms in chronological order. The sort options are the defined columns for the view. Each sorting section also has a radio button for Ascending or Descending, which allows the user to choose the order in which to view sorted alarms. For example, use sorting to review all the security alarms.

Filter Filtering determines which alarms appear in the view. The default is to display all alarms in the system.

Refresh The following defines the refresh feature:

• To refresh a view, the vertical scroll position must be at the top.

• If you scroll down by one line, the view does not refresh.

• If the vertical scroll position is not at the top, the header (title line) of the view slowly cycles between the normal black-on-gray and white-on-black, creating a flashing effect.

• If you are not at the top, any new alarms are not added to the Viewer, and there is no indication that new alarms have been reported. When you scroll to the top, the new alarms appear.


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Detailed Procedures Acknowledging Alarms

To acknowledge alarms: 1. Double-click on an alarm to acknowledge it. Alternately,

right-click on an alarm message. The background color changes to aqua, the text color changes to blue on the selected alarm line, and a pop-up menu appears (Figure 4-2).

Figure 4-2: Alarm Pop-up Menu 2. Select Ack on the pop-up menu. The Alarm Ack dialog box

appears (Figure 4-3).

Figure 4-3: Alarm Ack Dialog Box


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Note: To enable and disable filters, click on the ActiveX Control column head.

3. Select the type of acknowledgment action described in Table 4-5.

Table 4-5: Acknowledgement Actions Acknowledgment Action

Description

Point Acknowledges alarms currently selected. Global Acknowledges all alarms received. An advantage of using

this option is that it will quickly clear all alarms from the current view.

Visible Acknowledges all visible alarms. For example, if the size of the Viewer shows five alarms and a total of eight alarms came in, only the five visible alarms are acknowledged.

Filtered Acknowledges all alarms received (the same as the global option).

Area This option is not functional at this time.

4. Add comments in the Comments field, if desired. Comments can

be used to make notes relevant to the acknowledgement action. The comments appear in the Ack Comment column of the acknowledged alarm in the Viewer, as well as in the report of the alarm if the Logger function is operating.

5. Click OK. After acknowledgment:

• If the point generating the alarm has not returned to its non-alarm condition, the alarm line changes color to green text on a white background.

• The alarm remains in the Viewer until the condition returns to normal. Refer to Table 4-6 for the default colors. Refer to the Advanced User’s Guide chapter for details on changing the default colors.

• The comments added in the dialog box are displayed in the cell for that alarm under the Ack Comment column heading. Holding the cursor over the cell in the Ack Comment column causes the entire comment text to be displayed in a pop-up window.

• If the M-Alarm Logger is active, after the point has returned to the normal (non-alarm) state and the alarm has been acknowledged, the comments made by the operator when the alarm was acknowledged can be reviewed by accessing the acknowledgement action in the Report Viewer of M-Alarm.


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Note: Unlike the Alarm Viewer and Graphics Alarm Viewer, the Report Viewer does not allow the expansion of the acknowledgment comments in a pop-up window when the cursor is positioned over the cell in the Ack Comment column. You may see more of the alarm acknowledge comments by either temporarily maximizing the Report Viewer display on the M5 and expanding the Ack Comment column width or by opening the Logger Access file (AWXLog32.mdb) in Microsoft Access and selecting Event Log.

Table 4-6: Default Colors Event Type Text Color Background Alarm/Condition Yellow Red Acknowledged/Condition Green White Unacknowledged/Condition Blue White Operator/Simple Black White Operator/Tracking Gray White

For details on refreshing the Viewer, refer to the Refresh section in this chapter.


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Sorting Alarms Alarms are sorted to temporarily group and review a class of alarms; for example, all security alarms could be grouped, rather than viewing alarms in the default Time/Date order. To sort alarms: 1. Right-click anywhere in Viewer. A pop-up menu appears

(Figure 4-2). 2. Click Sort in the pop-up menu. The Sort dialog box appears

(Figure 4-4).

Figure 4-4: Sort Dialog Box 3. Select the sort options. The drop-down list boxes contain the

names of the column defined in the report. You can define up to five sort criteria.

Note: Double-click on the header of the viewer to reverse the sort order (that is, Ascending to Descending, or Descending to Ascending).


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Changing Alarm Filtering Options To change alarm filtering options: 1. Right-click anywhere in the Viewer. A pop-up menu appears

(Figure 4-2). 2. Click Filter in the pop-up menu. The Client Filters dialog box


Figure 4-5: Alarm Filtering Dialog Box 3. Add or edit filters using expressions.


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Changing Alarm Filtering Options To change alarm filtering options: 1. Right-click anywhere in the Viewer. A pop-up menu appears

(Figure 4-2). 2. Click Filter in the pop-up menu. The Client Filters dialog box


Figure 4-5: Alarm Filtering Dialog Box 3. Add or edit filters using expressions.


Chapter 5 Configuring the Logger

Introduction M-Alarm contains several components including the Logger. The Logger stores alarm information in a database and routes messages to printers. The Logger creates a database, reports are used to view the information stored in the database. Refer to the Configuring M-Alarm Reports chapter in the M-Alarm User’s Guide for more information. This chapter describes how to:

• start or stop the Logger

• auto start the Logger

• view the default Logger configuration

• activate the N30 Logger database



5-2

Key Concepts Logger

The Logger archives events and alarms to a database and/or printer as a background process. An alarm is an abnormal condition. An event is a detectable occurrence, which is significant to the OPC AE server, the device it represents, and its clients. There are three types of events: Simple, Tracking-related, and Condition-related. Refer to the Using M-Alarm with the BACnet OPC AE Server and Using M-Alarm with the N1 OPC AE Server chapters in the M-Alarm User’s Guide for details. M-Alarm Logger can process alarm information from several local alarm servers. The Logger reads its configuration information from a Microsoft® Access database file. Note: The Logger works as a hidden client of the OPC server.

Closing all clients without disconnecting from a user-connected site keeps the site connected. Disconnect from sites whenever M-Explorer is shut down.

Logger Configurator The Logger Configurator (Figure 5-1) defines the events to log and changes the Microsoft Access database file used for configuration information. When launched, the Logger Configurator automatically opens the active configuration. We recommend not changing the default for M5 Workstations and N1 OPC AE servers.

Figure 5-1: Logger Configurator


5-3

Each configuration contains information about the following:

• The OPC AE server receiving alarms.

IMPORTANT: We recommend using the default views.

• The database where the alarm events are stored. By default, all alarm events are stored in the EventLog table of the same database as the configuration database (Figure 5-2).

• The name of the printer where alarm events are printed. The printer is selected from the list of printers installed on Windows. We recommend using a dot matrix or an ink-jet printer because users can see a partial output (Figure 5-6).

• The list of the attributes’ names or fields stored in a log file or printed to a printer. Each attribute requires a Name and a Column Type. Use any alphanumeric character and/or the underscore for the Name except spaces or special characters. The Column Type is either the predefined OPC or attributes specific to Johnson Controls (Figure 5-4). Note: To print an attribute, you must manually calculate and

enter the Line Number, Start Position, and Width fields. A value of zero (0) in these fields indicates that the field is not to be printed.

Database Logging Figure 5-2 shows an example of the default configuration shipped with the Logger. We recommend not changing this default for M5 Workstations and N1 OPC AE servers.

IMPORTANT: If you are using an N30 (BACnet) OPC AE server, you must switch to the N30 (BACnet) database. Refer to the Activating the N30 Logger Database procedure in this chapter.


5-4

Figure 5-2: Default Configuration

GenTray The GenTray utility, located in the workstation system tray, configures the startup of the Logger and can also start and stop the Logger manually.

Figure 5-3: GenTray Utility


5-5

Column Settings When a user clicks on a column on the left side of the Logger Configurator, the Column settings appear on the right side. The Column Type field contains a list of the available attributes. Note: Columns’ names contain underscores, because spaces are not

allowed.

Figure 5-4: Column Type


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Nodes The Node option is not supported by the N1 OPC AE or the N30 (BACnet) OPC AE servers.

Subscriptions Subscriptions define which object alarms a client wants to receive.

IMPORTANT: We recommend using the default views.

OPC Subscription is initiated in different locations depending on the application. The Current Events Viewer contains a Subscription tab in the property dialog box. The Logger Configurator contains an Edit Subscription button at the bottom of each configuration in the Configurations folder (Figure 5-5). Refer to the Advanced User’s Guide chapter in the M-Alarm User’s Guide for details. Please keep in mind that we recommend using the default views.

Figure 5-5: M-Alarm Viewer Properties - Subscription Tab


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Printer Logging The Logger sends each event directly to the printer as soon as it is received. Printing works best with a dedicated dot matrix or ink jet printer. If the printer is configured for single line printing, refer to the specific printer’s documentation. Laser printers work; however, the page is not ejected until it is full. The Logger can be configured to send events to multiple printers. Refer to Figure 5-6 and Table 5-1.

Figure 5-6: Printer Logging Tab


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Table 5-1: Printer Logging Fields Field Description Enable Printing

Print the log to a printer.

Printer Select the Primary Printer from the drop-down list. All event notifications print on the Primary Printer unless an error is detected (offline, out of paper, etc.). The backup printer automatically receives notifications used until the error is cleared.

Backup Printer

Select the Backup Printer from the drop-down list. The Backup Printer is used whenever an error is detected (offline, out of paper, etc.) on the Primary Printer.

Height Enter the number of lines printed on a single page using the default font. The Logger prints events one line at a time by sending raw text to the printer and bypassing the normal Windows printing. Printers that accept this raw text use an internal font. If you cannot find information in the printer manual, you may need to experiment to find an acceptable value. A value of 58 is safe for most printers.

Width Enter the number of characters the printer is capable of printing on a single line with the default font.

Header and Footer Button

Select the Header and Footer button to edit the lines of text that appear at the top and bottom of each printed page. The header and footer may contain more than one line. Refer to Figure 5-7. The following tokens are replaced at runtime with their appropriate values: %d - Name of the configuration %n - Computer name on which the Logger is running %p - Page number

Figure 5-7: Header and Footer Dialog Box


5-9

Detailed Procedures Starting or Stopping the Logger

To start or stop the Logger: Select GenTray > M-Alarm > M-Alarm Logger > Start or Stop in the Windows System Tray (Figure 5-8). Or Select Start > Programs > Startup > GenTray if the GenTray icon does not appear in the system tray. Note: At this release, we are not supporting the NT Service option.

If NT Service is selected, the Logger does not accumulate.

Figure 5-8: GenTray Menus

Auto Starting the Logger To start or stop the Logger: Select GenTray > M-Alarm > M-Alarm Logger > Auto Start in the Windows System Tray (Figure 5-8). Or Select Start > Programs > Startup > GenTray if the GenTray icon does not appear in the system tray. The feature automatically starts the Logger when you log in to Windows 98, Windows NT®, or Windows 2000 software.


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Viewing the Default Logger Configuration To view the default Logger configuration: 1. Select Start > Programs > Johnson Controls > M-Alarm > Logger

Configurator. The Logger Configurator appears (Figure 5-1). 2. Click on the + sign to the left of the default configuration. The

default configuration details appear (Figure 5-2).

Activating the N30 Logger Database

IMPORTANT: If you are using an N30 (BACnet) OPC AE server, you must switch to the N30 Logger database.

To activate the N30 (BACnet) database: 1. Select Start > Programs > Johnson Controls > M-Alarm > Logger

Configurator. The Logger Configurator appears (Figure 5-1). 2. Select File > Open. Browse to the N30 Logger configuration file,

n30BACLogCfg.mdb. 3. Select File > Make Active. Note: The Make Active option appears grayed out if the open

database is already the active database.


Chapter 6 Configuring M-Alarm Reports

Introduction Reports display information saved in the database. This chapter describes how to:

• open reports

• open a report using the M-Alarm viewer

• add a report to an M3 Workstation

• add a report to an M5 Workstation

• switch between Runtime and Configuration modes

• view a chart summary

• change report sorting options in Runtime

• change report filtering options in Runtime

• edit a report



6-2

Key Concepts Report

One of the M-Alarm components, the Logger, stores alarms in a database. Refer to the Configuring the Logger chapter in the M-Alarm User’s Guide for information on the Logger and Logger Configurator. Reports are displayed in the current events viewer. Reports display alarms from the database created by the Logger in a table format. M-Alarm includes several default reports: N1 Report View.a32 and BACnet Report View.a32.

Figure 6-1: M-Alarm Report

Runtime Mode Reports appear in two different modes: Runtime or Configuration. In the Runtime mode all messages that have been defined in the report file are displayed (Figure 6-1). We recommend using the default N1 and N30 (BACnet) reports included with M-Alarm.


6-3

Runtime Report Toolbar To view the Runtime Report Toolbar in Runtime mode, double-click anywhere in the report. Figure 6-2 shows the Runtime Report Toolbar. Table 6-1 describes each button.

Figure 6-2: Runtime Report Toolbar Table 6-1: Runtime Report Toolbar Toolbar Button Description Detailed Report Defines the columns of information defined in Configuration mode. Alarm Summary Lists tag names and the alarm summary. Data Grid Reports have two view options: data grid or chart summary. In data grid,

two options are available: detailed report (default) or an alarm summary. Chart Summary Defines the chart option. Reports have two view options: data grid or chart

summary. The chart summary shows all the alarm types in the current log. The number of items charted depends on the options selected in the filtering tab. If you leave the default filter, everything is shown. The data is organized from highest to lowest number of alarms. Use the chart summary to see the number of alarms for each type (Figure 6-5).

Chart Summary Pie Use a pie chart to show what percentage of each alarm type exists in the report (Figure 6-6).

Print Opens the standard Print dialog box, which defines printing settings. The default is printing the current view with the date, time, description, and page number at the top of the page.

Pre-configured Report Not implemented at this time. Update Alarm Data Updates the data shown with the most current alarm data. Sort Alarms Opens the Sort dialog box (Figure 6-7). Filter Alarms Opens the Records Filtering dialog box (Figure 6-8).

Note: To view the Runtime Report Toolbar in runtime mode, you must give access permissions to the Default Group for AWXReport32 in M-Password. This allows you to double-click and launch Runtime Report Toolbar from a remote PC. For more information, refer to the M-Password Technical Bulletin (LIT-1153150).


6-4

Configuration Mode Configuration Mode (Figure 6-3) allows you to change the default report format. See Editing a Report in this chapter for details on using Configuration Mode.

Figure 6-3: Configuration Mode


6-5

Detailed Procedures Opening Reports

There are several methods to open M-Alarm reports:

1. Open a report using the M-Alarm Viewer to open a report from M-Alarm without having a workstation running.

2. Add a report to an M3 Workstation to view an M-Alarm report as a workspace within the M3 Workstation.

3. Add a report to an M5 Workstation to add a report as an application in the M5 workspace.

4. Please see the relevant section of this chapter for instruction on using each method.

Opening a Report Using the M-Alarm Viewer To open a report:

1. On the Windows Start menu, click Programs > Johnson Controls > M-Alarm > Viewer from the Windows Start menu.

2. Select Open on the File menu. The Open dialog box appears.

3. Browse to a report: C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\ Johnson Controls\M-data\M-alarm\Views. We are shipping the following default reports:

• N1 report view.a32

• BACnet report view.a32

4. Click Open. The selected predefined report appears. Figure 6-1 is an example of the N1 predefined report.

5. If the Configuration Mode is displayed (Figure 6-3) from the menu, select Actions > Runtime Mode to switch to the screen showing the actual alarm events (Figure 6-1).

If alarm data does not appear, verify that the AE server is running. Adding a Report to an M5 Workstation, in this chapter, describes a quicker way to access a report.


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Adding a Report to an M3 Workstation To add a report to an M3 Workstation:

1. Add M-Graphics display as a workspace. Refer to the Using Workspaces chapter of the M3 Workstation User’s Guide for details.

2. Open a default report from the following directory: Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Johnson Controls\M-Data\ M-Alarm\Views.

Adding a Report to an M5 Workstation To add a report to an M5 Workstation:

1. Click Applications in the M5 Workstation Screen Manager. The applications directory appears.

Figure 6-4: Screen Manager Applications Directory 2. Select Applications > M-Alarm > Views > n1 report view.a32.

3. Drag n1 report view.a32 into an M5 Workstation panel. The report appears in Runtime mode.


6-7

Switching between Runtime and Configuration Modes To switch between Runtime and Configuration modes:

1. Open a report.

2. Press the CTRL and M keys to toggle between Runtime and Configuration modes. If you are unsure of whether you are in Runtime or Configuration mode, click on the Action menu. If a checkmark appears next to Runtime, you are in Runtime mode. If a checkmark does not appear, you are in Configuration mode.

Viewing a Chart Summary To view a chart summary:

1. Open a report, and verify that you are in Runtime mode.

2. Double-click anywhere in the Current Events Viewer, and the Runtime Report Toolbar appears (Figure 6-2).

3. Click the Chart Summary icon. A chart summary or pie chart appears depending on the report Configuration settings.

Figure 6-5: Chart Summary


6-8

Figure 6-6: Pie Chart Summary


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Changing Report Sorting Options in Runtime To change report sorting options in Runtime:

1. Open a report, and verify you are in Runtime mode.

2. Right-click and choose Sort in the pop-up menu which appears. Alternately, double-click anywhere in the Current Events Viewer, and the Runtime Report Toolbar appears. Click the Sort Alarms icon. The Sort dialog box appears (Figure 6-7).

Figure 6-7: Sort Dialog Box 3. Select the sort options. The drop-down list boxes contain the

names of the column defined in the report. You can define up to five sort criteria.


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Changing Report Filtering Options in Runtime Report filtering allows the user to display only those alarms and events that pass the filters defined for particular columns. To change report filtering options in Runtime:

1. Open a report, and verify you are in Runtime mode.

2. Double-click anywhere in the Current Events Viewer, and the Runtime Report Toolbar appears. Click the Filter Alarms icon. The Records Filtering dialog box appears (Figure 6-8).

Figure 6-8: Records Filtering Dialog Box 3. Select filtering options using Table 6-2.

Table 6-2: Records Filtering Options Filtering Option Description Available Filters Only Alarms - Selects only alarms to appear in the

report. This filter lists all abnormal conditions recorded for field objects. Only Events - Selects only events to appear in the report. Only Today’s records - Selects only today’s alarms and events to appear in the report.

Add Filter Allows users to add a filter. Refer to Figure 6-9 and Table 6-3.

Delete Filter The selected filter is removed. Configure Filter Allows users to define a filter. Refer to Figure 6-10

and Table 6-3. The options for configuring an existing filter are the same as the options for adding a filter.

Note: To enable and disable filters, click on the column header of the ActiveX Control.


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Figure 6-9: Record Filter - Adding Dialog Box

Table 6-3: Record Filter - Adding Options Filtering Option Description Filter Name Lists the filter name. Column Name Determines which column will be filtered. Included String/ Number Values

Identifies which values of the column are included or excluded. The choices for Included String/Number Values are based on the Filter Type.

Custom SQL WHERE statement

When using a custom filter, the SQL statement defines the filter conditions. Use Microsoft Access SQL syntax when creating SQL statements in M-Alarm.

Filter Type Inclusive - Includes selected values. Exclusive - Excludes selected values. Custom - Defines to include own values.

Included DateTime Values

Defines the range to include values. Choices include the current day, a specific day, or a range.


6-12

Figure 6-10: Record Filter - Configuring


6-13

Editing a Report To edit a report:

1. Open a report and verify you are in Configuration mode.

2. Double-click anywhere in the Current Events Viewer, and the Alarm Report ActiveX Properties dialog box appears (Figure 6-11).

Figure 6-11: Alarm Report ActiveX Properties Dialog Box - General Tab The properties dialog box contains several tabs: General, Grid Configuration, Fonts, Columns, Summary, Record Filtering, Charts Configuration, and Reporting, which are described in the next sections.


6-14

General Tab The General tab defines report title, border type, and data source connection parameters (Figure 6-11).

Table 6-4: General Tab Options Options Description Title Lists the name of the report. Border Type Determines the border type. Data Source Lists the status of the connection. Click Connection

parameters button to open the Database Connection dialog box (Figure 6-12).

To edit the data source:

1. Perform Numbers 1 and 2 from the Editing a Report section of this chapter.

2. Click the Connection Parameters… button. The Database Connection screen appears (Figure 6-12).

3. Fill in the fields in accordance with Table 6-5.

Figure 6-12: Database Connection Dialog Box


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Table 6-5: Database Connection Dialog Box Options Options Description Data Source Lists the type of database for the report. Connection Status Shows if the report is connected or disconnected. If it has

connected, a green light appears; if not, a red light appears. If the report is connected, all the fields are disabled. To modify a field, disconnect the report.

Database File Name Lists the database location and file name. Base Table Name Lists the table in the database where the data is retrieved. User Name Lists the user name. Password Lists the password using * for the characters.

Grid Configuration Tab The Grid Configuration tab defines the report’s appearance.

Figure 6-13: Grid Configuration Tab


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Fonts Tab The Fonts tab defines the fonts for the report.

Figure 6-14: Fonts Tab

Columns Tab The Columns tab defines which columns appear in the report.

Figure 6-15: Columns Tab Use the Add and Remove buttons to select which columns to include in the report, and use the up and down arrows at the right side of the screen to determine the order in which the columns appear.


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Summary Tab The Summary tab defines the appearance of summaries.

Figure 6-16: Summary Tab

Record Filtering Tab The Record Filtering tab defines filtering options.

Figure 6-17: Record Filtering Tab

Charts Configuration Tab The Charts Configuration tab defines a chart’s appearance in Runtime. This option is also available in the Runtime Report Toolbar (Figure 6-2).


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Figure 6-18: Charts Configuration Tab

Reporting Tab The Reporting tab determines if the report appears on screen.

Figure 6-19: Reporting Tab

Metasys® is a registered trademark of Johnson Controls, Inc. All other marks herein are the marks of their respective owners. © 2004 Johnson Controls, Inc.


Chapter 7 Using M-Alarm with the N1 OPC Alarm and Events Server

Introduction The N1 OPC Alarm and Events (AE) server converts Metasys® Reports to OLE for Process Controls (OPC) Events which can be displayed in the M-Alarm Current Event Viewer, logged in the M-Alarm database, or sent by E-mail or pager using M-Alarm Multimedia (MMX) software.

This document describes the events and attributes that are available for client subscriptions. This chapter also describes the N1 OPC AE server function and usage and how to

• configure the N1 OPC AE server

• set the N1 OPC AE server language


Using M-Alarm with the N1 OPC Alarm and Events Server 7-2

Key Concepts N1 OPC AE Server

The N1 OPC AE server runs on an M5 Workstation, Metasys Web Access (MWA), or the Metasys Application Enabler (MAE). The N1 OPC AE server supports multiple clients running on the same machine.

M-Alarm with the N1 OPC AE server supports:

• 5 active Metasys N1 networks

• 200 dial-up defined networks.

This section gives a brief description of the tasks performed by the server.

Note: For the best operation of dial-up networks, do not enable the initialization scan option. Initialization scan configuration is available with M5 Workstation Release 5.1 or Metasys Web Access (MWA) Release 5.1 or later.

Figure 7-1 shows an overview of the N1 OPC AE server function. An N1 alarm comes from an NCM device on the N1 network to the Metasys Remote Server (MRS). The MRS routes the alarm to the N1 OPC AE server which coverts the Metasys report into an OPC event and routes it to the alarm client subscriptions.

ConfigurationDatabase Client Subscriptions

Alarm Routing

N1 Network

M5 Workstation with PMI

alarming

ReportAlarm!

TCP/IPN1 OPC AE Server

M-AlarmLogger

M-Alarm

MetasysRemoteServer(MRS)

User_appfile

Event

Figure 7-1: Function of the N1 OPC AE Server


Signing Up for Change-of-State (COS) Messages The N1 OPC AE server gets continuous events by signing up for Metasys Reports with each connected MRS. The MRS then routes all reports it receives to the N1 OPC AE server. Each Metasys Report Server receives only the reports routed to its Operator Workstation (OWS). A report destination file called USER_APP must be defined in all appropriate report router groups on the OWS. The N1 OPC AE server receives the reports from Metasys OWS only if USER_APP is defined as a destination in the OWS. Refer to the Defining Report/Access Groups chapter (LIT-120151) of the Operator Workstation User’s Manual for information on defining report destinations.

Startup When the M5 Workstation starts up, the N1 OPC AE server connects to the MRS(s) defined in the configuration database. Then the server signs up for COS messages (Metasys reports routed to the User_App destination).

If the initialization scan is enabled, the N1 OPC AE server also scans the network for existing event-causing conditions of all software, hardware and device objects. The server stores the events in memory until they are acknowledged and no longer active. The events are created without regard for report routing destination.

Note: With M5 Workstation or MWA Release 5.1 or later, the initialization scan is disabled by default. You can use the N1 OPC AE Configurator to enable the initialization scan. Consider re-enabling the scan if all report router groups are defined to route to the workstation User_App destination and the M-Alarm is used for alarm summaries.

IMPORTANT: The scan ONLY runs at startup or, if configured, when a site connection is reestablished. There is no guarantee that an alarm summary is complete and accurate after any Metasys equipment is disconnected. If the customer is using M-Alarm to view alarm summaries, restart the M5 Workstation after any NCM with systems routed to the OWS User_App file is reconnected.

Note: The startup scan does not create an event for objects locked for COS reporting.

N1 OPC AE Categorization The N1 OPC AE server allows clients to subscribe to the OPC event categories listed in Table 7-1. However, the server today only routes events to General_Alarm, General_Message, and General_Transaction, and Security Transaction. All other categories are reserved for future use.


Table 7-1: OPC AE Categorization Event Type Description Event Category Condition Represents transition into or out of

state. In the case of the N1 OPC AE server, the condition is the Metasys Report status

HVAC_ALARM FIRE_ALARM SERVICES_ALARM SECURITY_ALARM ADMINISTRATIVE_ALARM GENERAL_ALARM

Tracking Represents operator actions. HVAC_TRANSACTION FIRE_TRANSACTION SERVICES_TRANSACTION SECURITY_TRANSACTION ADMINISTRATIVE _TRANSACTION GENERAL_TRANSACTION

Simple Represents all other events. HVAC_MESSAGE FIRE_MESSAGE SERVICES_MESSAGE SECURITY_MESSAGE ADMINISTRATIVE _MESSAGE GENERAL_MESSAGE

Process the Alarms/Events All reports received by the N1 OPC AE server are routed to all clients subscribed to receive the event.

All conditional events (Table 7-2) are stored in memory as long as they remain active OR unacknowledged.

To determine when the event causing condition changes, the N1 OPC AE server signs up for the trigger of the N1 object attribute which reported the state. When the N1 object comes out of the event causing state, the N1 OPC AE server cancels the signup, marks the condition as inactive, and removes the condition from the internal list (if it is already acknowledged).

For example, if an alarm is acknowledged and the N1 object is still in the alarm state, the alarm is marked as acknowledged and kept in the memory until the N1 object comes out of the alarm state. Alternatively, if an N1 object comes out of the alarm state before it is acknowledged, the N1 OPC AE server keeps the alarm event in memory until the alarm is acknowledged.

Some event causing states are cleared as soon as they are acknowledged. These are events that require acknowledgement but are reporting a normal condition. For example, ONLINE conditional events are cleared as soon as they are acknowledged.


Table 7-2: Metasys Report Handling and N1 OPC AE Server Event Types Metasys Report Handling N1 OPC AE Server Event Type Critical

Summary Followup Summary

File Conditional Simple Tracking

Metasys Status Routing Ack Required

Discard Required

No Ack

Ack Required

No Ack No Ack

CRIT1-4 X X Followup X X

Alarm/Hi Alarm/ Lo Alarm includes alarm message

Status X X CRIT1-4 X X Followup X X

Hi Warn/Lo Warn includes warning message


Trouble includes alarm message


SW OVR and AUTO

Status X X OFFLINE\ONLINE, HW Reset, Incompat, XTBUS_ER\OK

CRIT4 X X

CRIT1-4 X X Followup X X

Unspecified events


NORMAL

Status X X Acknowledgement Transaction X X Discard Critical Transaction (Acknowledges the conditional event)

X

Discard Followup Transaction X * Since M-Alarm view requires acknowledging events to remove them from the view, M-Alarm view does not

display acknowledged and inactive events. M-Alarm does log the acknowledged and inactive events. M-Alarm can annotate any event in the view. When a new client session is opened, only cached events at the server appear.

N1 OPC AE Configurator The N1 OPC AE Configurator tool (Figure 7-4) allows the N1 OPC AE server to be configured to connect from one to five Metasys Report Servers. The AE server stores all the initialization parameters in the registry except the site Internet Protocol (IP) addresses and related parameters, which are stored in the configuration database (alarms.mdb).


IMPORTANT: The alarms.mdb database contains configuration information and revision-specific data. Do not save and restore an alarms.mdb file from a previous release.

Note: After making any modifications, you must restart the server and the M5 Workstation. This can be accomplished by closing all N1 OPC AE server client applications.

Users can set various parameters for the N1 OPC AE server. Refer to Configuring the N1 OPC AE Server in this chapter.

Connection Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) sockets are used to connect to the Metasys Remote Server (MRS). Internally, the N1 OPC AE server connects to the MRS to receive Metasys reports and to send trigger signups.

If one the Metasys Person-Machine Interface (PMI) workstation or the Metasys Application Enabler (MAE) gets disconnected, the N1 OPC AE server tries to reconnect.

For OPC clients, which subscribe for Conditional General events, an offline event is created by the N1 OPC AE server for each MRS/network connection which is lost.

Notes: Since the event source is the same, only the last socket event remains displayed at M-Alarm.

For sites which log all events to a single database, it is recommended that the default IP address of the local MRS be modified to match the actual IP address of the workstation.

If a lost connection is reestablished, an ONLINE Condition report is created by the N1 OPC AE server.

If you want the initialization scan to run after the connection to the socket is restored, update the configuration using the N1 OPC AE Configurator Tool and select the Initialization Scan check box and to select the Enable Rescan check box for each site. Refer to Configuring the N1 OPC AE Server in this document.


Table 7-3: Connection Lost and Restored Event Values OPC Attribute Connection Lost Values Connection Restored Values Condition Offline Online Source Name Sitename/ Devices/ IP Address Sitename/ Devices/ IP Address Message* Subscription browsing will not function

Subscription browsing will not function, Initialization Scan is Suspended Event Reporting is Suspended, Access to Browse Data is suspended Access to Browse Data is Suspended, Initialization Scan is Suspended

Event Reporting is Resumed Access to Browse Data is Restored Access to Browse Data is Restored, Initialization Scan is Resumed

Expanded ID blank blank Value Offline Online Units blank blank * For message descriptions, refer to Table 7-4.

Table 7-4: Connection Lost and Restored Event Values Message Description/Meaning Event Reporting is Suspended Cos/trg socket not able to connect to metaserver during startup, or

Cos/trg socket goes offline subsequently after it was online previously

Subscription Browsing will not function

Cos/trg socket not able to connect to metaserver during startup

Subscription browsing will not function, Initialization Scan is Suspended

Cos/trg socket not able to connect to metaserver during startup and initialization scan is enabled

Access to Browse Data is Suspended

General socket goes offline subsequently after it was online previously

Access to Browse Data is Suspended, Initialization Scan is Suspended

General socket goes offline subsequently after it was online previously. The Initialization Scan should be enabled in this case. If the socket goes offline more than once, the Rescan Enabled should be enabled to generate this message

Event Reporting is Resumed When cos/trg socket comes online (except for the first time), or When an Offline was generated previously due to the failure in connection at startup

Access to Browse Data is Restored When general socket comes online(except for the first time) and init scan is not enabled, or When an Offline was generated previously due to the failure in connection at startup

Access to Browse Data is Restored, Initialization Scan is Resumed

When general socket comes online(except for the first time) and init scan is enabled, or When an Offline was generated previously due to the failure in connection at startup


Interactions with Metasys PMI The N1 OPC AE server interacts with the Metasys PMI as follows:

The N1 OPC AE server can only receive reports for report groups with the User_App OWS file as one of the destinations.

Severity The N1 OPC AE server supports a severity range from 1 to 1000 where a higher number indicates a higher priority. Metasys OWS uses a priority scheme of CRIT1-CRIT4, STATUS, and FOLLOWUP. CRIT1 is the highest priority. Table 7-5 describes equivalents between the BACnet® protocol event priority levels and Metasys N1 OPC AE server severity levels.

Base Priorities Base priorities are numbers between 0 and 255 that are used to calculate OPC severity numbers. For each N1 Destination report type of any N1 Status Report type, a particular base priority number is assigned. This relationship allows any N1 report type to be identified in the M-Alarm Current Events viewer with a defined OPC severity number. The OPC severity number (shown in Table 7-6) is important for indicating the priority of alarm messages displayed in the Current Alarm Viewer. The base priority numbers used also correspond to the BACnet protocol priority scheme.

The base priorities are defined in the N1 OPC AE and BN OPC AE servers to allow subscribing to events coming from both N1 networks and N30 networks. For example, to get only critical events from the N1 OPC AE server, subscribe for all events greater than 376.

Note: To apply the base priority range of 0-255 in the N1 OPC AE server, the Severity Scale and Severity Offset parameters in N1 OPC AE Configurator must remain at the default values, -3.9 and 1000 respectively.

The BACnet protocol defines groups for each priority range. The defined N1 OPC AE server severity scheme allows to view and sort event messages from N1 devices and from N1 devices with a similar severity scheme, as shown in Table 7-5.


Table 7-5: How a BACnet Priority Translates to an OPC Severity BACnet Protocol N1 OPC AE Server

Priority Group Severity Severity Level 30 Life Safety 883 High 35 Life Safety 863 High 50 Property Safety 805 High 65 Property Safety 746 Medium High 70 Property Safety 727 Medium High 75 Supervisory and

Trouble 707 Medium

90 Supervisory and Trouble

649 Medium High


610 Medium High


473 Medium

140 Other Group 454 Medium 150 Other Group 415 Medium 160 Other Group 376 Medium Low 200 Other Group 220 Low 210 Other Group 181 Low 220 Other Group 142 Low


Table 7-6: OPC Severity for the Reported N1 Status Status Reported CRIT1 CRIT2 CRIT3 CRIT4 Followup Status Transaction

Alarm and Alarm_Event and Trouble Event ALARM*, HI ALARM, LO ALARM

883 805 746 454 220 220 na

SILENCE, RESET, DATABASE, WARNING, ON, OFF, ALR CLR*, TBL CLR*, SUPERVSR*, SUPV CLR*, SECURITY*, SEC CLR*, SYS TBL, SYS T CL

863 727 707 415 142 142 na

TROUBLE* 649 610 473 376 142 142 na Warning

LOW WARNING, HIGH WARNING

649 610 473 376 142 142 na

Override S/W OVRD, H/W OVRD, S/W AUTO, H/W AUTO

863 727 707 415 181 181 na

Normal and Normal_Event NORMAL* 863 727 707 415 181 181 na

Non-Configurable Reports ONLINE, OFFLINE na na na 454 na na na HW RESET, HW FAIL, DEVMISM, UNREL

na na na 454 na na na

XTBUS ER, XTBUS OK

na na na 454 na na na

Transaction Reports Any FEATURE or STATUS

na na na na na na 376

Feature Reports TOTAL, JCB, DLLR 863 727 707 454 181 181 na

* Alarm and Trouble Events have an EVENT text appended in the condition name in order to differentiate them from the Fire Panel Alarm or Trouble conditions. The zone or fire address is included in the source name as network \ system \ object \ PointAddress


Conditional Events and Storage Conditional Events are reported to subscribed clients whenever there is a change in the Active or Acknowledged properties of the condition. The attribute used to report this state is the OPC NewState attribute.

Conditional events are stored at the N1 OPC alarm and event server as long as the event is either unacknowledged or is active.

Any condition can result in any of the following states:

• Active and Unacknowledged

• Active and Acknowledged

• Inactive and Unacknowledged

• Inactive and Acknowledged

Figure 7-2 shows how a condition can go from state to another.

storage

Active and AcknowledgedInactive and Unacknowledged

Active and Unacknowledged

Inactive and Acknowledged

Toggle (if not Inactive) / Mark Inactive

Event Causing Condition Inactive

Ack Condition (if not Acknowledge) / Mark Acknowledged

AckCondition (if not Acknowledged) / Mark Ack

Figure 7-2: OPC Event Processing


Table 7-7: Method to Inactivate the OPC Conditional Event Status Condition Inactive when

Acknowledged Inactive on Attribute Trigger

Inactive on Report Status

ALARM No Alarm = 0 ALR CLR HI ALARM No Hi Alarm = 0 na LO ALARM No Lo Alarm = 0 na HI WARN No Hi Warn = 0 na LO WARN No Lo Warn = 0 na NORMAL Yes na ALARM, HI ALARM,

LO ALARM, HI WARN, LO WARN, TROUBLE

OFFLINE No Offline = 0 ONLINE ONLINE Yes na OFFLINE TROUBLE No Trouble = 0 (except Fire

Object devices) na

S\W OVRD Configurable, No by default na S\W AUTO S\W AUTO Yes na S\W OVRD H\W OVRD No na H\W AUTO H\W AUTO Yes na H\W OVRD XT_BUS_ERR No na XT_BUS_OK XT_BUS_OK Yes na XT_BUS_ERR HW FAIL Configurable, Yes by

default na na

HW RESET Yes na na INCOMPAT Configurable, Yes by

default na na

TOTAL Configurable, Yes by default

na na

DLLR Configurable, Yes by default

na na

JCB Configurable, Yes by default

na na

UNREL Configurable, Yes by default

na na

Fire and Zone objects also have unique statuses. Some of these are used simply to report a condition requiring acknowledgement which does not have any way to become inactive. For example, a Warning status may be output due to an error in the Notifer® panel data base. Table 7-8 shows how the N1 OPC AE server handles Discards for these statuses.


Table 7-8: Method to determine Inactive Status for Fire and Zone Objects Condition Category Trigger Attribute Report Acknowledge

Sets Inactive Fire Object Type

ALARM General Alarm ALARM = 0 ALR CLR na ALARM EVENT General Alarm ALARM = 0 ALR CLR EVENT na ALR CLR General Alarm or

General Message na na Yes

ALR CLR EVENT General Alarm or General Message

na ALARM EVENT Yes

NORMAL General Alarm or General Message

na ALARM, TROUBLE

Yes

TROUBLE General Alarm or General Message

TROUBLE = 0* TBL CLR na

TROUBLE EVENT General Alarm TROUBLE = 0* TBL CLR EVENT na TBL CLR General Alarm or

General Message na na Yes

TBL CLR EVENT General Alarm or General Message

na TROUBLE EVENT

Yes

SILENCE General Transaction na na Yes RESET General Transaction na na Yes DATABASE General Transaction na na Yes WARNING General Transaction na NORMAL na SYS TBL General Alarm or

General Message TROUBLE=0* SYS T CL na

SYS T CL General Alarm or General Message

N/A SYS TBL Yes

SUPERVSR General Alarm or General Message

TROUBLE=0* SUPV_CLR na

SUPV CLR General Alarm or General Message

na SUPERVSR Yes

SECURITY General Alarm or General Message

TROUBLE=0* SEC_CLR na

SEC_CLR General Alarm or General Message

na SECURITY Yes

ON General Alarm or General Message

na OFF Yes

OFF General Alarm or General Message

na ON Yes

Zone Object Type ALARM General Alarm ALARM=0 na na NORMAL General Alarm or

General Message na ALARM,

TROUBLE Yes

TROUBLE General Alarm or General Message

TROUBLE=0 TBL CLR na

DISABLED General Alarm or General Message

na NORMAL, ALARM,

TROUBLE

na

* Fire objects can have more than one device in a trouble, supervisory, and/or security condition. Therefore, upon receipt of TROUBLE trigger set to 0, all cached conditions for the reported objects must be searched and all Trouble, Trouble Event, SYS TBL, Supervsr and Security conditions are cleared. Similarly the Alarm and Alarm Events are cleared when an ALARM trigger is set to 0.


Inactive and Unacknowledged If the N1 OPC AE server has an active event and it receives notification that the event causing condition is no longer true (from another COS Report or a trigger), then the event is reported to the client with the NewState attribute set to inactive. In this case the event remains stored at the N1 OPC server.

Inactive and Acknowledged If a user acknowledges an event and the OPC AE server receives notification that the event causing condition is no longer true (from another COS Report or a trigger), then the event is sent to the subscribed clients with the NewState attribute values set to inactive and acknowledged. It is then removed from storage at the server.

Note: The N1 OPC AE server keeps only one entry for each possible state of an object. Use the Logger to keep a record of all alarms and events.

The N1 OPC AE server keeps only one entry for each possible condition of an object. While the entry remains cached, changes in the condition’s NewState attribute are sent to subscribed clients. Although the entry’s OPC NewState attribute can be updated repeatedly to inactive and active over time, the entry’s OPC Condition and Value attributes remain as the values reported when the condition became active. Since the OPC Active Time attribute is the time of the latest occurrence of an event causing condition, not the first occurrence, use the Logger to determine how many times or for how long the event has been occurring.

See Table 7-9 for an example of a BO object, which repeatedly reports an alarm condition and then returns to normal several times prior to being acknowledged. Once the entry is acknowledged and the update to the entry is reported to all subscribed clients, the entry is removed from the server.


Table 7-9: M-Alarm Logger Records for a Single OPC Condition Example OPC Event Attribute Values

Description

Value Condition

Latest Time

Active Time

NewState Object Attribute Status (Viewable at a Focus Window)

Air Handler 1 fan OFF Alarm 9:01 AM 9:01 AM Active and Unacknowledged

ALARM

Air Handler 1 fan OFF Alarm 9:02 AM 9:01 AM Unacknowledged NORMAL Air Handler 1 fan OFF Alarm 9:03 AM 9:03 AM Active and

Unacknowledged ALARM

Air Handler 1 fan OFF Alarm 9:04 AM 9:03 AM Unacknowledged NORMAL Air Handler 1 fan OFF Alarm 9:05 AM 9:05 AM Active and

Unacknowledged ALARM

Air Handler 1 fan OFF Alarm 9:05 AM 9:05 AM Unacknowledged Normal Air Handler 1 fan OFF Alarm 9:06 AM 9:05 AM Acknowledged Normal Note: The AE server only retains one record for a Source-Condition pair. It cannot mimic Metasys CRITICAL

record summary and retain history or discard old conditions. The Logger retains a record of all conditions in a database.

Examples N1 OPC AE server keeps only one entry for each possible acknowledgeable state of an object from the controller. Hence, an event for a two state BO object, defined for Alarm CRIT2 reporting only that is toggling into Alarm whenever it is off appears as shown in Table 7-10.

Table 7-10: Alarm Condition Toggled by Value Source Value Condition Latest Time Original

Time NewState Event

Count Air Handler 1 fan OFF Alarm 9:01 AM 9:01 AM Active &

Unack 1

Air Handler 1 fan OFF Alarm 9:02 AM 9:01 AM Unack 1 Air Handler 1 fan OFF Alarm 9:03 AM 9:03 AM Active &

Unack 2

Note: The value for an event remains as the value reported when the event occurred.

If the same object is defined to report both ALARM and NORMAL conditions as CRIT reports, the same toggling would appear as shown in Table 7-11.


Table 7-11: Alarm and Normal Condition Toggled by Value Source Value Condition Latest Time Original

Time NewState Event

Count Air Handler 1 fan OFF Alarm 9:01 AM 9:01 AM Active &

Unack 1

Air Handler 1 fan OFF Alarm 9:02 AM 9:01 AM Unack 1 Air Handler 1 fan ON Normal 9:02 AM 9:02 AM Active &

Unack 1

Air Handler 1 fan OFF Alarm 9:03 AM 9:03 AM Active & Unack

2

Air Handler 1 fan ON Normal 9:02 AM 9:03 AM Unack 2

Since the server keeps only one Condition per object, only the last two events would be stored as shown in Table 7-12.

Table 7-12: Alarm and Normal Condition Toggled by Value – One Condition per Object Source Value Condition Latest Time Original

Time NewState Event

Count Air Handler 1 fan ON Normal 9:02 AM 9:03 AM Unack 2 Air Handler 1 fan OFF Alarm 9:05 AM 9:05 AM Unack 2

If the same object is defined to report NORMAL only, the same toggling would appear as shown in Table 7-13.

Table 7-13: Normal Condition Toggled by Value Source Value Condition Latest Time Original

Time NewState Event

Count Air Handler 1 fan OFF Normal 9:02 AM 9:02 AM Active &

Unack 1

Air Handler 1 fan ON Normal 9:03 AM 9:03 AM Active & Unack

2

Air Handler 1 fan OFF Normal 9:03 AM 9:03 AM Active & Unack

3

Since the N1 OPC AE server keeps only one record for a Source/Condition pair (see above example), it will not be able to mimic Metasys CRITICAL record summary, which keeps history and allows Discard on old conditions also. This has been done to match functionality with the BACnet OPC Event server. Every event can be viewed using M-Alarm Logger. The EVENT_COUNT attribute allows you to view the number of event occurrences while the event is stored.


The total number of alarms kept in memory is configurable via the N1 OPC AE Configurator. For example, when the number of alarms allowed in the memory reaches 90%, the alarms are purged into the Microsoft® Access database (named purge.mdb) until the memory goes below 90%. This purging is done for the lowest available priority alarms as follows:

1. inactive, unacknowledged alarms (first to be purged)

2. active, acknowledged alarms

3. active, unacknowledged alarms (last to be purged)

A configurable parameter specifies the number of records in one purge file. When the data reaches this limit, the server renames this file to purge1.mdb and starts purging the new event notifications into a new purge.mdb. This sequence continues until the server creates eight purge files. Then the server deletes purge8.mdb, renames all the files with one number lower (for example, purge7.mdb is renamed to purge6.mdb), and creates a new purge8.mdb file to store the new event notifications. The location of the purge.mdb is defined in the N1 OPC AE Configurator.

OPC Subscriptions An OPC client, such as M-Alarm, can set up one or more specific OPC subscriptions to filter events directly from the server. Each subscription can be filtered using one or more of the following criteria:

• type of event: simple, condition, or tracking

• event categories

• lowest severity (in other words, all events with a severity greater than or equal to the specified severity)

• highest severity (in other words, all events with a severity less than or equal to the specified severity)

• process areas (systems)

• event sources

If a filter is not specified, all events are given to the OPC client application. For example, an M-Alarm view can have a subscription to the N1 OPC AE server, which filters on only Conditional events, and another subscription for only simple events, for the General Event category for one specified area.


Standard OPC Attributes Supported by the N1 OPC AE Server N1 OPC supports all standard OPC attributes as defined by the OPC Foundation (for example, an OPC Source attribute is a reference to the object that generated the event). An OPC source attribute is a reference to the object that generates the events. For the N1 OPC AE server, the source is network\systemID\objectID.

An OPC condition attribute is a named state of the N1 OPC AE server or one of its objects, which is of interest to its OPC clients (Hi Alarm, Lo Alarm). The valid conditions for any object depend on the type of object (for example, Binary Input [BI], Binary Data [BD], Binary Output [BO], Analog Input [AI]; refer to Table 7-18).

OPC conditions can be single state or multi-state. When an OPC condition has multiple states, the OPC sub-condition attribute value is the substate of the condition. In OPC terminology, a sub-condition represents a substate of a multi-state condition. Since the N1 OPC AE server defines each possible state as its own condition, the value of sub-condition attribute is always the same as the condition attribute. Since the condition attribute only applies to conditional events and all Metasys reports have a status, consider subscribing to the vendor-specific Feature_Status category.

OPC Standard Quality Attribute Although the OPC Quality attribute is supported by N1 OCP AE server, its value is always good. Events do NOT show a bad quality if the current condition is unknown. For example, if a Metasys object is deleted while in alarm, it remains active.

Note: Whenever you delete Metasys objects, which are currently the source of a conditional event, close all client applications and restart the M5 Workstation to remove the events from your all client views. In addition, if your workstation is an MWA server, disconnect all remote users.

OPC Standard ActorID Attribute The OPC standard ActorID attribute in Conditional messages is often included under the column header User ID. It is the M-Password login ID or when that is not available, the workstation device name for clients subscribed to the n1 opc alarm and event server, which acknowledged the message. At other workstation clients, the User ID is System.


OPC Standard Source Attribute A source is a reference to the object which generates the event notification. The source is the value of the OPC Source standard attribute. The OPC source may be a process tag or possibly device or subsystem. In the case of the N1 OPC AE server, each object defined on the Metasys system is considered a source.

The format of the OPC Source attribute is: network id / system id / object id

Vendor-Specific OPC Attributes Supported by the N1 OPC AE Server

The N1 OPC AE server provides vendor-specific attributes with event notification. Clients can ask the N1 OPC AE server to receive these additional attributes with event notifications. If additional attributes are not specified, clients only receive the standard OPC attributes. M-Alarm clients request many of these vendor specific attributes by default. Refer to Table 7-15, Table 7-16, and Table 7-17 for definition of vendor-specific attributes.

Event_Count Attribute The attribute called Event_Count is incremented each time the condition for a cached conditional event is reactivated.

To store the event count in the M-Alarm Logger database, be sure to update the M-Alarm Logger subscription to include this attribute.

Feature_Status Attribute This attribute has the same value as the condition for conditional events. It is the report status for all events.

Use Feature_Status instead of condition in your views and databases to be able to sort on the status.

OPC Acknowledge (Ack) When a client acknowledges an event, all connected clients are notified. The AE server acknowledgement is equivalent to the Metasys OWS alarm discard for critical alarms. The AE server sends the Ack to Metasys OWS for critical alarms.

Note: Initialization created events acknowledged from an OPC client do not discard PMI reports.

Fire device events acknowledged by a OPC client are not acknowledged at other M5 workstations or are not discarded from PMI Critical Summaries. The events include SECURITY, SEC CLR, SYS TBL, SYS T CL , ON, OFF, SUPERVSR, SUPV CLR, TROUBLE EVENT, TBL CLR EVENT, ALARM EVENT, ALR CLR EVENT.


These reports have the zone or fire address included in the source name as:

network \ system \ object \ PointAddress

In case of the SYS TBL, the Trouble Code is included in the source name as:

network \ system \ object \ TBL CODE : #

An N1 OPC AE server event state of acknowledged and inactive is equivalent to a manual discard of a critical or followup alarm at the Metasys OWS. The N1 OPC AE server sends discard to the OWS for critical and followup alarms.

M5 Workstation

PMI

Critical Summary

M-Alarm Viewer

Alarm remains present.

ACK

ACK

Acking

M5 Workstation

PMI

Critical Summary

M-Alarm Viewer

Alarm remains present.

ACK

ACK DISCARD DISCARD

Figure 7-3: Acknowledging Alarms Any event of condition ONLINE, NORMAL, S/W Auto, H/W Auto, H/W Reset, TBL_CLR, ALM CLR , SYS_T_CL, SUPR_CLR, SEC_CLR, ON, OFF, TBL_CLR_EVENT, ALR_CLR_EVENT and XT_BUS_OK-are discarded on acknowledgement. In addition, if configured, S/W Override, –H/W FAIL, INCOMPAT, TOTAL, UNREL, JCB and DLLR events are discarded. Discard implies that the N1 OPC AE server does not keep the event of above specified condition in cache. On acknowledging of any such condition, it forcibly makes them inactive even if they are not inactive and sends the notification to client that condition is no longer active so client can delete it from the event viewer.


Internationalization The N1 OPC AE Server and the N1 OPC AE Configurator have limited support for Internationalization.

N1 OPC AE Server Support for Metasys Network Language Settings The server language of operation is determined at startup using the Johnson Controls® system language setting. The Johnson Controls system language setting is set using the M-Lang utility (shown in Figure 7-8). Refer to Setting the N1 OPC AE Server Language in this document.

Note: If the Johnson Controls system language is not available, then the language of the Operating System (OS) is used.

The language setting is used to:

• convert the OPC condition to the system language.

• convert server generated attribute strings to the system language, such as the OPC message string created for the OFFLINE and ONLINE events when the server loses its connection with the MRS.

No other report fields are converted and remain in the language and numeric format as originated by the NCM.

The server fully supports the same languages shipped with Metasys PMI, including French, German, and Spanish. For any report received in one of these languages, the report status and type is used to:

• determine the OPC severity

• determine that type and category of event. For example, a CRIT1 Alarm is converted to a Conditional General Alarm event.

• determine how the event can be inactivated using the report status. The statuses must match the text downloaded to the NCM.

The N1 OPC AE server stores status and report type strings in the language table of the Alarms.mdb database. If a status is not found in any of the supported languages, the event is created using a default severity and will likely never become inactive.

N1 OPC AE Server Configurator Support of Language Setting The N1 OPC AE Configurator uses the language of operation of the Johnson Controls User Language. The User language is set by M-Password for each user.


OPC LocaleID Since the N1 OPC AE server retains the language used by the Metasys N1 Network, the server does not allow clients to set the LocaleID.

Network Browsing Events and conditions available in an OPC AE server are organized within one or more process areas. An area is grouping of plant equipment configured by the user. In case of the N1 OPC AE server, all the systems defined on Metasys OWS are considered Areas.

Browsing the full network may take time on a large (or slow) network. We recommend browsing the network by area rather than the full network at once.

After browsing the network, the AE server displays the systems defined at Metasys OWS with DEVICES as one of those systems, and all the N1 devices appear below.

N1 OPC AE Server Status Clients can request the server status, which includes:

• server Start date/time

• current date/time

• time of last update sent to clients

• current server state

• major version of server

• minor version of server

• build number of the server executable

• vendor-specific information attributes

• event type categories

• areas

Memory Requirements Table 7-14 shows the memory requirement to keep the alarms in the N1 OPC AE server memory.

Table 7-14: Memory Requirements Number of Alarms in Memory Free Memory (MB) Required 2,000 5.2 4,000 10.4 6,000 15.6 8,000 20.8 10,000 26.0


Events, Categories, and Conditions The N1 OPC AE server can receive the following types of reports from the PMI report destination (User_App):

• CRITICAL (CRIT1, CRIT2, CRIT3, CRIT4)

• STATUS

• FOLLOWUP

• CARDREADER

• TRANSACTION

Table 7-18 maps these reports to the AE server events, categories, and conditions.

Each report field is mapped to an OPC Event Attribute as described in the following tables.

Table 7-15: CRITICAL, STATUS and FOLLOWUP OPC Event Attribute Format Information Description OPC Event Attribute ReportType CRITICAL for alarms. STATUS or FOLLOWUP not available – see SEVERITY AlarmType Alarm type, such as HI ALARM, LO WARNING CONDITION* and

FEATURE_STATUS** Date Date in full format (MM/DD/YYYY) of the report. The

format will follow the currently defined Windows format. The 4 digit year format allows support into the 21st century

ORIGINAL_DATE**

Time Time of day of the report. The time is in 24-hour format, HH/MM/SS, with hour, minute and second represented.

ORIGINAL_TIME**

Network Network Name SOURCE*, network field System System Name SOURCE*, system field Object Object Name SOURCE*, object field Zone Address Zone Address SOURCE* Fire Address Fire Device Address SOURCE* Trouble Trouble state for Fire Device SOURCE* Value Value of the object when the report occurred PRESENT_VALUE** Units Engineering Units (if any) assigned to the object UNITS** Attribute Attribute (if any) which had the report. ExpandedID Object Expanded ID (NAME attribute) EXPANDED_ID** Special Text Special descriptor text used by certain features such

as Card Reader Advisory messages. SPCL_TEXT**

AlarmMsg*** Alarm Message associated with this object MESSAGE if present* Alarm Priority Priority of the Critical Alarm (1-4) not available – see SEVERITY * OPC standard attribute ** OPC vendor specific attribute *** AlarmMsg This field is set to “????” for Initialization Scan Events. Because the message strings are

unique for each NCM and the server does not track which objects are included with each NCM. Note: DEVICE_TIME_PRESENT set if Report Date and Time can be converted to a valid time. It is never

set for an initialization created event.


Table 7-16: Card Reader OPC Event Attribute Format Information Description OPC Event Attribute Card Lists name of the card. CARD Status Contains the status NORMAL for a valid access and ALARM for

an invalid access attempt. FEATURE_STATUS**

Date Lists date of the report in full format (for example, M/DD/YYYY). ORIGINAL_DATE** Time Lists time of day of the report. The time is in 24-hour format,

HH/MM/SS, with hour, minute, and second represented. ORIGINAL_TIME**

Network Lists N1 Network name (for the Card Reader unit). SOURCE*, network field System Lists N1 System name (for the Card Reader unit). SOURCE*, system field Object Lists N1 Object name (for the Card Reader unit). SOURCE*, object field Card number Lists number of the card. BADGE_NUMBER Last Name Lists card owner’s last name. LAST_NAME** First Name Lists card owner’s first name. FIRST_NAME** Text Contains one of the following messages:

ACCESS DENIED ACCESS GRANTED - EXECUTIVE PRIVILEGE ACCESS GRANTED CARD IS IN ANTI-PASSBACK DELAY CARD IS INVALID AT THIS READER CARD REQUIRES VALID IN/OUT SEQUENCE CARD IS INVALID AT THIS TIME PIN CODE IS INVALID INVALID ISSUE LEVEL AREA IS AT MAXIMUM CAPACITY CARD HAS THE WRONG FACILITY CODE FOR THIS AREA CARD READER IS INACTIVE AT THIS TIME ENTRY DENIED - MULTIPLE PIN CODE ERRORS CARD HAS PARITY ERROR BAD SYSTEM FACILITY CODE

SPCL_TEXT**

* OPC standard attribute ** OPC vendor specific attribute Note: DEVICE_TIME_PRESENT set if Report Date and Time can be converted to a valid time. It is never



Table 7-17: Transaction OPC Event Attribute Mapping Format Information Description OPC Event Attribute Network Lists the network name. SOURCE*, network field System Lists the system name. SOURCE*, system field Object Lists the object name. SOURCE*, object field Attribute Lists the attribute from the critical report. ATTRIBUTE_NAME** Value Lists the value from the critical report. PRESENT_VALUE** Units Lists the units from the critical report. UNITS** Feature/Status For reports related to a Metasys object, such as commands

or discard of critical reports, this field contains the Status of the object (for example, ALARM or NORMAL). For Reports related to features such as Schedule changes, this field contains the feature name such as CALENDER or DWN_UPLD (NC download).

FEATURE_STATUS**

Report Date Lists the date the TRANSACTION report was generated. TIME* date field and DEVICE_TIME_PRESENT

Report Time Lists the time the TRANSACTION report was generated. TIME* date field and DEVICE_TIME_PRESENT

Original Date Specifies the date of the original report. The original date is used in cases such as Discard of Critical or Follow-up reports. For other type of Transaction reports, these fields are blank.

ORIGINAL_DATE**

Original Time Specifies the time of the original report. The original time is used in cases such as Discard of Critical or Follow-up reports. For other type of Transaction reports, these fields are blank.

ORIGINAL_TIME**

Transaction Type

Lists the transaction type. Options include: 0 = Report 1 = Logon/Logoff 2 = Object 3 = Feature

TRANSACTION_TYPE**

Location Lists the location where the transaction occurred. LOCATION** Device Name Lists the name of the Operator device where the

transaction occurred. DEVICE_NAME**

User ID The three-character user initials of the PMI operator who performed the transaction.

USER_ID**

Access Level For a Logon transaction, this field contains the user’s access level and, for Logoff, it contains 0. For all other reports, it contains the required access level to perform the transaction (not necessarily the access level of the user who is currently logged on).

ACCESS_LEVEL**

Text Contains a text description of the transaction. Some examples are: Logon Successful (OWS), Critical Report Discard, Scheduling Calendar Modified off 3 (a command to an object at priority 3).

MESSAGE*

* OPC standard attribute ** OPC vendor specific attribute Note: DEVICE_TIME_PRESENT set if Report Date and Time can be converted to a valid time. It is never



Table 7-18: OPC AE Server Events, Categories, and Conditions Event Type

Event Category Condition Name (Examples)

N1 Vendor Specific Attribute Names

N1 Report Type

Conditional Event Type

GENERAL_ALARM LO ALARM, HI ALARM, LO WARN, HI WARN, ALARM, NORMAL, S/W OVERD, S/W AUTO, ONLINE, OFFLINE, TROUBLE

VALUE,UNITS, SPCL_TEXT, DEVICE_TIME_PRESENT, NAME (Expanded ID), EVENT_COUNT, FEATURE_STATUS

Report type is CRITICAL or Report type is STATUS, FOLLOWUP with Status LO ALARM, HI ALARM, ALARM or Report type is FOLLOWUP with Status LO WARN, HI WARN, TROUBLE

SECURITY_ALARM* SERVICES_ALARM* HVAC_ALARM* ADMINISTRATIVE_

ALARM*

FIRE_ALARM Continued on next page . . . * The M-Alarm defaults do not implement this event category.


Event Type (Cont.)

Event Category Condition Name (Examples)

N1 Vendor Specific Attribute Names

N1 Report Type

GENERAL_MESSAGE N/A VALUE, UNITS, SPCL_TEXT, DEVICE_TIME_PRESENT, NAME (Expanded ID), FEATURE_STATUS

Report type is: STATUS with Condition NORMAL, S/W OVERRIDE, H/W OVERRIDE, HI WARN, LO WARN, TROUBLE (status string will return as Message of the condition) or Report type is: FOLLOWUP with Condition NORMAL, S/W OVERRIDE, H/W OVERRIDE

FIRE_MESSAGE* SERVICES_MESSAGE* SECURITY_MESSAGE* ADMINISTRATIVE_ MESSAGE*

Simple Event Type

HVAC_MESSAGE* GENERAL_ TRANSACTION

ATTRIBUTE, VALUE, UNITS, FEATURE_STATUS, ORIGINAL_DATE, ORIGINAL_TIME, LOCATION, DEVICE_NAME, USER_ID, ACCSS_LEVEL, DEVICE_TIME_PRESENT, TRANSACTION_TYPE

Report type is TRANSACTION and Transaction Type = 0 (Report) Transaction Type = 1 (Logon/Logoff ) Transaction Type = 2 (Object) Transaction Type = 3 (Feature)

SECURITY_ TRANSACTION

FIRST_NAME, LAST_NAME, SPCL_TEXT, CARD_NUMBER, DEVICE_TIME_PRESENT, FEATURE_STATUS

Report type is CARDREADER

FIRE_TRANSACTION* SERVICES_ TRANSACTION*

ADMINISTRATIVE_ TRANSACTION*

Tracking Event Type

HVAC_TRANSACTION* * The M-Alarm defaults do not implement this event category.


Table 7-19: Conditions Reported for Object Types Object ID Object

Type Conditions

ACM 285 LO ALARM, HI ALARM, LO WARN, HI WARN, NORMAL, S\W OVRD, S\W AUTO

AD 545 LO ALARM, HI ALARM, LO WARN, HI WARN, NORMAL, S\W OVRD, S\W AUTO

AI 289 LO ALARM, HI ALARM, LO WARN, HI WARN, NORMAL, S\W OVRD, S\W AUTO

AOD 294 ALM, NORMAL, S\W OVRD, HI WARN, S\W Auto AOS 550 ALM, NORMAL, S\W OVRD, HI WARN, S\W Auto BO 287 ALM, NORMAL, S\W OVRD, HI WARN, S\W Auto MC 119 ALM, NORMAL, S\W OVRD, HI WARN, S\W Auto MSO 543 ALM, NORMAL, S\W OVRD, HI WARN, S\W Auto BD 1067 ALM, NORMAL, S\W OVRD, S\W AUTO, TROUBLE BI 299 ALM, NORMAL, S\W OVRD, S\W AUTO, TROUBLE LCG 328 ALM, NORMAL, S\W OVRD, S\W AUTO MSI 555 ALM, NORMAL, S\W OVRD, S\W AUTO MSD 1323 ALM, NORMAL, S\W OVRD, S\W AUTO PIDL 305 ALM, NORMAL, S\W OVRD, S\W AUTO CSG 352 ALM, NORMAL, S\W OVRD, S\W AUTO ACS_CTLR 60 ONLINE, OFFLINE C210A 340 ONLINE, OFFLINE C260A 596 ONLINE, OFFLINE C260X 852 ONLINE, OFFLINE C500X 1108 ONLINE, OFFLINE CARD_RDR 61 ONLINE, OFFLINE DCDR 98 OFFLINE, ONLINE, XTBUS ER, XTBUS OK DCM 298 ONLINE, OFFLINE, HI WARN DCM140 554 ONLINE, OFFLINE DLLR 45 ALM, NORMAL ZONE 58 ALM, NORMAL, TROUBLE, ONLINE, OFFLINE, DISABLED FIRE 59 ALARM, NORMAL, TROUBLE, ONLINE, OFFLINE, TBL CLR, ALR CLR,

SILENCE, RESET, DATABASE, WARNING, SYS TBL, SYS T CL, ACTIVE, SUPERVSR, SUPV CLR, SECURITY, SEC CLR, WARNING, ON, OFF, TROUBLE EVENT, TBL CLR EVENT, ALARM EVENT, ALR CLR EVENT

DSC 83 ONLINE, OFFLINE DSC8500 355 ONLINE, OFFLINE FPU 356 ONLINE, OFFLINE JCB 26 --- (Not Applicable) LCD 293 ONLINE, OFFLINE N2OPEN 97 ONLINE, OFFLINE XM 291 ONLINE, OFFLINE


Metasys OWS Setup Requirements Users must define report destination file called User_App in all appropriate report router groups on the OWS. The server receives the reports from Metasys OWS only if User_App is defined as a destination in the OWS. Refer to the Defining Report/Access Groups chapter (LIT-120151) of the Operator Workstation User’s Manual for details.


Detailed Procedures Configuring the N1 OPC AE Server

Note: Launching of the N1 OPC AE Server Configurator can be controlled by M-Password.

To configure the N1 OPC AE server:

1. Select Start > Programs > Johnson Controls > N1 OPC AE Server > N1 OPC AE Server Configurator. The N1OPC Alarm & Event Server Configurator appears showing the Sites tab (Figure 7-4).

Figure 7-4: N1OPC Alarm & Event Server Configurator 2. Click the Add button. The Site Information dialog box appears

(Figure 7-5). The predefined address 127.0.0.1 is a default IP address that allows the N1 OPC AE server to connect to your local MRS.

3. Update the address to the actual IP address of your local workstation for improved OFFLINE event reporting.


4. Click the Update button to save the changes you made.

You can add another MRS by entering a new site name and IP address and clicking the Update button. You can edit a site by highlighting the site from the list and making changes to the information and clicking the Update button.

Notes: Verify the Enable flag is set for each address you wantto connec

t.

By default, Initialization Scan runs only at startup. If Rescan is enabled for a site, the initialization scan runs every time the site connection is reestablished if the connection is lost.

Figure 7-5: Site Information Dialog Box Note: Do not add more than one MRS connection per Metasys network.

5. Click OK to close the Site Information dialog box.

6. Click on the Paths tab. The N1OPC Alarm & Event Server Paths screen appears (Figure 7-6).


Figure 7-6: N1OPC Alarm & Event Server Configurator Paths Screen 7. Define the paths as described in Table 7-20.

Note: We recommend leaving the default paths and parameters.

Table 7-20: N1 OPC AE Server Configurator: Paths Tab Fields Field Description Error Log Path Location where the N1 OPC AE server generates the

Error_log.dat file. Trace Log Path Location where the N1 OPC AE server generates the

Trace_log.dat file. Database Path Location where the N1 OPC AE server looks for the

Alarms.mdb file at startup. If Alarms.mdb is not found at the specified path, the N1 OPC AE server does not run.

Purge File Path Location where the AE server generates the purge.mdb file where purged alarms/events in the database are stored.

8. Click the Parameters tab. The N1 OPC Alarms and Events Configurator Parameters screen appears (Figure 7-7).


Figure 7-7: N1 OPC Alarms and Events Configurator Parameters Screen 9. Define the parameters as described in Table 7-21.


Table 7-21: N1 OPC AE Server Configurator: Parameters Tab Fields Parameter Description Range Default

Advanced Section Alarm Count Determines number of alarms to keep in memory. If

number of alarms reaches 90% of this limit, the N1 OPC AE server starts putting the Alarms into the purge.mdb database.

2000 to 3000

3000

Queue Size Determines the maximum number of events the N1 OPC AE server keeps in its message queue. A warning message appears when the error log file is reaching this number.

100 to 500 100

Severity Scale Specifies the multiplication factor for base severity. -3.9 Severity Offset Specifies the maximum possible severity of an alarm. 1000 Max record count for purge

Determines the number of alarms each purge file contains. After the N1 OPC AE server reaches this limit, it renames the current purge.mdb to purge1.mdb. This continues for a maximum of 8 files (for example, purge8.mdb). The N1 OPC AE server then starts deleting the files, starting with oldest first.

500 to 10,000

500

Max Networks This field is reserved for future use. 1 to 20,000 200 Enable Initialization Scan

Determines if startup scan should be run. Checked or Unchecked

Not checked

Event Handling Options Section Discard Override on Acknowledge

SW OVRD conditional event is discarded on acknowledgement

0 (disabled)

Clear the Maintenance Events

H/W FAIL, INCOMPAT, TOTAL, JCB and DLLR conditional events are discarded when acknowledged.

1 (enabled)

Performance Section Thread Count Determines number of threads used to send Alarms/Events

to the client. 1 to 32 10

Setting the N1 OPC AE Server Language To set the N1 OPC AE server language:

1. Start the m_lang.exe utility. The M-Lang Language Selector utility appears (Figure 7-8).

Note: M_lang.exe is located in the Program Files\Johnson Controls\M-Shared Components directory. You can start it from the Run command or by browsing to the file using Windows Explorer and double-clicking it.


Figure 7-8: M-Lang Language Selector Utility 2. Set the options in the drop-down menus according to Table 7-22.

Table 7-22: M-Lang Language Selector Utility Fields Option Description User Level Indicates the language of the user. This is

specified in M-Password for all M-Series applications, but can be changed here.

Global Level Indicates the language of the N1 OPC AE server. This is the only setting used by the N1 OPC AE server.

3. Click OK.


Troubleshooting Error Handling

Error and Trace Logs The N1 OPC AE server uses ERRORLOG and TRACELOG parameters in the registry to generate error file and trace log files.

Note: All server errors are logged to ERROR.LOG file in the M-Data\ N1-OPC-AE directory. When the size of ERROR.LOG file exceeds 16 KB, all the messages are moved to ERROR.OL1 file. All messages in ERROR.OL1 are moved to ERROR.OL2 and so on until ERROR.OL8. All messages in ERROR.OL8 are overwritten.

Note: All alarm acknowledgements are logged in a TRACE.LOG file in the trace log directory. The same file structure used for error logging is used, as the file names are listed sequentially: TRACE.OL1… TRACE.OL8.

Losing a Connection to an MRS (Stop Receiving Events) If the N1 OPC AE server loses a connection to an MRS, a conditional event is generated using the event category General Alarm, the condition OFFLINE and the OPC severity used for Metasys CRIT1 reports. The event OPC source attribute includes the Network Name/DEVICES/the IP address of the MRS connection defined in the N1 OPC AE Configurator.

Note: By default, the IP address of 127.0.0.1 is used by for the local MRS connection. To ensure that the message is meaningful, define the actual address in the N1 OPC AE Configurator.

A similar ONLINE event is created if the N1 OPC AE server is able to reconnect to the MRS.

An OFFLINE event may occur during normal shutdown.

N1 OPC AE Server Does Not Shut Down The N1 OPC AE server may not shut down when you shut down all the clients. When this occurs, the file n1opcaeserver.exe continues running in memory. This situation can be caused by one of the following conditions:

• The M5 workstation (or MWA server) started the server and keeps it running after the clients are shut down.

• An OPC client or, particularly, a third-party OPC client is keeping the N1 OPC AE server open.


Stopped Receiving Events with Multiple Connected Sites If your M5 workstation (or MWA server) stops receiving events when you have multiple sites connected, verify that the PMI software installed on two separate PMI workstations are not trying to use the same network DDL file.

Running the same network DDL file on multiple workstations is not a supported configuration. This configuration can cause data discrepancy among the workstations.

N1 OPC AE Server Crashes If the N1 OPC AE server crashes, check the following scenarios.

Incomplete Copied Database Path The N1 OPC AE server stops responding if the path to the database file in the configurator (Figure 7-6) is incomplete or does not specify “alarms.mdb” at the end of the path.

If you copied and pasted the database path in the N1 OPC AE configurator, re-open the configurator and verify that the path is correct and complete. Do this before starting the M5 workstation.

Database File Write-Protected The N1 OPC AE server stops responding if the database file (alarms.mdb) is write-protected.

Condition and Feature Status Attributes are in a Different Language from the Rest of the Event

The language selected as the Global level must match the language downloaded to the NCMs.

If the language of condition does not match the rest of the event, verify that the system language set by M-Lang matches the Metasys N1 network.

Events Remain Active for Objects that Do Not Exist Whenever you delete one or more Metasys objects which are the source of active events, restart the M5 Workstation to remove them from all of your client views.

Controls Group 507 E. Michigan Street P.O. Box 423 www.johnsoncontrols.comMilwaukee, WI 53201 Published in U.S.A.


Chapter 8 Using M-Alarm with the BACnet OPC AE Server

Introduction The BACnet OPC AE server provides an interface from OPC compliant client applications to access alarms and events from Johnson Controls N30/N31 Supervisory Controllers and qualified third-party controllers compliant with BACnet.



8-2

Key Concepts BACnet OPC Alarm Events Server (BACnet OPC AE Server)

The BACnet OPC AE server is an OPC based interface for handling alarms and events on an M3 or M5 Workstation. It can access N30 Supervisory Controllers and qualified third-party devices compatible with BACnet and provide events to OPC client applications. The server has the following characteristics:

• runs on Windows 98 Second Edition (SE), Windows NT, or Windows 2000 Professional Operating System

• is able to receive events from different N30 sites

• supports multiple OPC AE clients

Standard OPC Event Attributes Table 8-1 lists standard OPC event attributes and their mapping to BACnet event attributes. In addition to these attributes, the server supports attributes specific to Johnson Controls.

Table 8-1: Standard Event Attributes Server Supported Event Attributes

BACnet Event Attribute

Source BACnet OPC AE Server uses the following fields with N30 site name to build OPC Source: Device_Object_Name Initiating_Object_Name Example: @Site:Device_Object_Name:Initiating_object_Name

Time Time Stamp (BACnetTimeStamp) BACnet time and date is mapped to OPC time.

EventType Notify_type and Op. acknowledge required for OPC event types. Simple OPC event type is Simple if:

Notify_type is EVENT, and acknowledgement is not required. Or BACnet (Un) confirmed text message received.

Conditional OPC event type is conditional if Notify_type is ALARM or Notify_type is EVENT and acknowledgement is required.

Tracking BACnet OPC AE server does not use this event type. Event Category Notify_type, Acknowledge Required, and Category field maps to the OPC

event category. If the Event Notification does not return Category, the event is mapped to General_alarm or General_event or General_message based on the Notify_type.

Continued on next page . . .


Server Supported Event Attributes (Cont.)

BACnet Event Attribute

Severity Range is 1 to 1,000. A higher number indicates higher priority. Priority is 0 to 255. A lower number indicates higher priority. BACnet priority is mapped to OPC severity by following linear equation: a*(Bp) + b Where a = -1 and b = 1,000 Note: Constants a and b are registry configurable using the REGEDIT

tool. If BACnet (Un) ConfirmedTextMessage is received, priority is NORMAL and CRITICAL only.

Message BACnet Message Text is used. ConditionName Acknowledgeable States: OFFNORMAL, FAULT, and NORMAL

Event field ‘To State’ of type BACnetEventState. Any State other than NORMAL and FAULT is mapped to OFFNORMAL.

SubConditionName Current Active State. The event field ‘To State’ of type BACnetEventState is used. SubConditionNames include: OFFNORMAL, FAULT, NORMAL, HIGH_LIMIT, or LOW_LIMIT.

New State Server changes based on current event state. (Enabled - 0x0001) (Active - 0x0002) (Acked - 0x0004)

Quality Quality options include GOOD, BAD, or UNCERTAIN. Quality is set to GOOD once the OPC AE server receives the alarm properly.

Acknowledge Required Operator acknowledge required field is used. ActiveTime Time Stamp JCI Specific Attributes In addition to the standard OPC event attributes above, the BACnet OPC

AE server sends attributes specific to Johnson Controls with the event notification.

Table 8-2 lists the event attributes returned by the BACnet OPC AE server to the OPC client on event notification. In addition to these attributes, the BACnet OPC AE server sends attributes specific to Johnson Controls, based on the event category. The following items are present for simple, tracking, and conditional OPC event types.


8-4

Table 8-2: Standard Event Attributes Returned Event Description SzSource The source of event notification (e.g., @site:N30:RoomTemp). The device name is

required in the source name because BACnet object names are not unique across the devices.

ftTime Time of the event occurrence for conditions. For example, if the event notification is for acknowledgment of a condition, this is the time the condition became acknowledged.

szMessage Event notification message describing the event dwEventType OPC_SIMPLE_EVENT, OPC_CONDITION_EVENT, or OPC_TRACKING_EVENT

for Simple, Condition-related, or Tracking events, respectively dwEventCategory Event category codes specific to Johnson Controls dwSeverity OPC event severity (1 to 1000). The BACnet OPC AE server provides a registry

option to the user to offset this priority to map to OPC severity. dwNumEventAttrs The length of the requested event attribute array specific to Johnson Controls dEventAttributes Pointer to an array of event attributes specific to Johnson Controls that are

returned for this event notification The following items are present only for Condition-related events (see dwEventType) szConditionName The name of the condition related to this event notification szSubConditionName The name of the current sub-condition, for multi-state conditions. For a single-state

condition, this event contains the condition name. wChangeMask Indicates to the client which properties of the condition have changed. The

condition may have one or more of the following values: OPC_CHANGE_ACTIVE_STATE OPC_CHANGE_ACK_STATE OPC_CHANGE_ENABLE_STATE OPC_CHANGE_QUALITY OPC_CHANGE_SEVERITY OPC_CHANGE_SUBCONDITION OPC_CHANGE_MESSAGE OPC_CHANGE_ATTRIBUTE If the event notification is the result of a Refresh, these bits are ignored. For a new event, OPC_CHANGE_ACTIVE_STATE is the only bit, which is always set. Other values are server specific. A new event is any event resulting from the related condition leaving the Inactive and Acknowledged state.

wNewState A WORD bit mask of three bits specifying the new state of the condition: OPC_CONDITION_ACTIVE, OPC_CONDITION_ENABLED, OPC_CONDITION_ACKED.

wQuality Quality of the value that has caused conditional alarm bAckRequired This flag indicates the related condition requires acknowledgment of this event. ftActiveTime Time the condition became active (for single-state conditions) or the time of the

transition into the current sub-condition (for multi-state conditions). The client uses this time when acknowledging the condition.

dwCookie Server-defined cookie associated with the event notification. The client uses this value when acknowledging the condition (using IOPCEventServer::AckCondition method). This value is opaque to the client.

The following item is used only for tracking events and for condition-related events, which are acknowledgment notifications (see dwEventType). szActorID For tracking events, this event is the actor ID for the event notification.

For condition-related events, this event is the AcknowledgerID when OPC_CONDITION_ACKED is set in wNewState. If the AcknowledgerID is a NULL string, the server automatically acknowledged the event. For other events, the value is a pointer to a NULL string.


Additional BACnet OPC AE Attributes Table 8-3 lists additional attributes supported by the BACnet OPC AE server for each event category. This attribute list is the superset of the possible additional attributes for a given category. These attribute values may not be available in the event notification.

Table 8-3: Additional Attributes OPC Event Type JCI Specific Event Category Attribute List

HVAC Message (200) Fire Message (201) Security Message (202) Services Message (203) Administrative Message (204)

BACnet Event Type Vendor Identifier Areas From State Property Value Property Name Unit

Access Grant Message (205) Access Deny Message (206) Card Trace Message (207)

BACnet Event Type Vendor Identifier Areas From State Badge Trace Badge Number Last Name First Name Issue Level Timed Override Facility Code Direction

Simple Event

T&A Access Grant Message (208) BACnet Event Type Vendor Identifier Areas From State Badge Trace Badge Number Last Name First Name Timed Override Direction Function Key Barcode Attachment

Continued on next page. . .


8-6

OPC Event Type (Cont.)

JCI Specific Event Category Attribute List

Output Point Status Message (209) Input Point Status Message (210)

BACnet Event Type Vendor Identifier Areas From State Property Value

Audit Message (213) Host Event Message (214) Host Log Message (215)

BACnet Event Type Vendor Identifier Areas From State User Name Audit Item Name Pegasys® Event Name Error Log Type

Host Logic Message (216) BACnet Event Type Vendor Identifier Areas From State Trigger Code Trigger Text Trigger Value

Panel Event Message (211) Panel HW Status Message (212)

BACnet Event Type Vendor Identifier Areas From State Terminal Name

Communication Error (405) NONE

Simple Event

General Message (402) NONE Device Failure Alarm (404) NONE Conditional Alarm HVAC Alarm (0) Fire Alarm (1) Security Alarm (2) Services Alarm (3) Administrative Alarm (4)

BACnet Event Type Vendor Identifier Areas From State Property Value Property Name Unit Ack. Comment Complete Acknowledge Reliability

Continued on next page. . .


OPC Event Type (Cont.)

JCI Specific Event Category Attribute List

General Alarm (400) General Event (401)

BACnet Event Type Vendor Identifier Areas From State Ack. Comment Complete Acknowledge Device Time Present Reliability

Panel Event Alarm (11) Panel HW Status Alarm (12)

BACnet Event Type Vendor Identifier Areas From State Terminal Name Ack. Comment Complete Acknowledge Reliability

Host Log Alarm (15) BACnet Event Type Vendor Identifier Areas From State User Name Audit Item Name Pegasys Event Name Error Log Type Ack. Comment Complete Acknowledge Reliability

Conditional Alarm

Output Point Status Alarm (9) Input Point Status Alarm (10)

BACnet Event Type Vendor Identifier Areas From State Property Value Ack. Comment Complete Acknowledge Reliability


8-8

Additional Attributes Description Table 8-4 describes additional attributes supported by the BACnet OPC AE server for each OPC event category.

Table 8-4: Additional Attribute Description Attribute Number

Attribute Name Data Type Comments

0 Property Value Variant Current value of the attribute associated with the object generating the alarm

1 Unit Enumeration Unit of the value of the attribute associated with the object generating the alarm. Available only in case of Analog objects.

2 Property Name Enumeration Name of the attribute associated with the object generating the alarm

3 From State Enumeration Previous state before transition occurred 4 Vendor Identifier Unsigned Integer BACnet Vendor identification number.

Johnson Controls devices use 5. 5 Areas String Array Query Filter String 6 BACnet Event

Type Enumeration Only Available in case of BACnet devices

7 Device Time Present

BOOL A Boolean flag indicates whether the device generating alarm has a real time clock in it. Set to true if device has a clock and the time stamp is the actual time of the event occurred.

8 Ack. Comment String Only returned in acknowledgement notifications. Comment entered by the operator acknowledging the event.

9 Complete Acknowledge

BOOL Indicates if controller needs complete acknowledgement.

10 Badge Number String Only available if device is returning this value in the event notification

11 Last Name String Badge holder last name. Only available if device is returning this value in the event notification.

12 First Name String Badge holder first name. Only available if device is returning this value in the event notification.

13 Badge Trace BOOL Specifies if this card event set to be part of trace. 14 Issue Level Unsigned Integer Current issue of badge that created event 15 Timed Override Unsigned Integer Override 16 Facility Code Unsigned Integer Facility code of badge 17 Direction Enumeration Enum=in,out,toggle,unknown,muster 18 Function Key Unsigned Integer 19 Barcode

Attachment String 32 character string-NULL if N/A

20 Terminal Name String NULL if N/A 21 User Name String NULL if N/A Continued on next page . . .


Attribute Number (Cont.)

Attribute Name Data Type Comments

22 Audit Item Name String NULL if N/A 23 Pegasys Event

Name String NULL if N/A

24 Error Log Type String NULL if N/A 25 Trigger Code Unsigned Integer 26 Trigger Text String NULL if N/A 27 Trigger Value Unsigned Integer 28 Reliability String Reliability is used.

NO-FAULT-DETECTED NO-SENSOR OVER-RANGE UNDER-RANGE OPEN-LOOP SHORTED-LOOP UNRELIABLE-OTHER

Multiple N30 Site Access Site Book, the site configuration tool, is provided for configuring different N30 site parameters. Refer to the Site Book User’s Guide for the maximum number of N30 sites connected at a time and all other communication details.


8-10

Filter A filter reduces unnecessary communication overhead to improve performance. If clients do not define specific filters, then they receive all events from the server. Table 8-5 describes the filters the BACnet OPC AE server supports.

Table 8-5: BACnet OPC AE Server Filters Filter Criteria Description Notes Event Type Simple, Tracking, or Conditional Supports all event type filtering. User has

option to select one or more event types for filtering.

Event Category

User sends a query for event categories, for each event type. Server returns event category list and user selects from these.

Supports Event Category filtering.

Lowest Severity

All events with a severity greater than or equal to the specified severity

Supports filter on severity.

Highest Severity

All events with a severity less than or equal to the specified severity

Supports filter on severity.

Sources Data points selected by the user User is allowed to set a wildcard for the source name.

Supports filtering on data source. Server does not expose area/source browser to client. However, client can send source strings for filtering. Source strings may contain wild cards. Since BACnet object names are not unique across the system, device names are required to provide uniqueness.

Filter on Area The AE server does not expose the area browser to the client. However, the client can send area strings for filtering. Area strings may contain wild cards.

For example, if the Query Filter String received from the device is: 507 Michigan: High School Milwaukee: Medical Center2 Area Filters received from the client: High School * Gym The server breaks the Query Filter String into: 507 Michigan High School Milwaukee Medical Center2 Since Client filter 1 (High School*) matches with filter sub string b (High School Milwaukee), the server will notify this event to the client.


Condition Names The BACnet OPC AE server supports the following three condition names for a given source: NORMAL, OFFNORMAL, FAULT. These conditions can be acknowledged. All BACnet event states (including standard and Vendor defined) other than NORMAL and FAULT are mapped to OFFNORMAL.

Event Priority Mapping BACnet OPC AE server supports severity range 1 to 1,000, where a higher number indicates higher priority. While BACnet event notification priority ranges are 0 to 255, a lower number indicates higher priority. The BACnet OPC AE server receives these BACnet priorities from the N30 supervisory controllers and maps them to OPC priority.

Conditional Alarms Events The BACnet OPC AE server maintains a condition state table for buffering conditional alarms and events. The condition table buffers 10,000 alarms and events. In order to delete an alarm from the condition table, the alarm must be acknowledged, inactive, and the complete_required state is false. By default, the complete required state is False. If it is True, the condition table entry is only deleted if alarm/event is inactive, acknowledged, and the complete_required state is false. The server keeps only one entry for each possible acknowledgeable state of an object from the controller. For example, a two-state BO object toggles: Air Handler 1 fan OFF ALARM 9:01am Air Handler 1 fan ON NORMAL 9:02am Air Handler 1 fan OFF ALARM 9:03am Air Handler 1 fan ON NORMAL 9:04am Air Handler 1 fan OFF ALARM 9:05am The ALARM at 9:03 overwrites the ALARM at 9:01. The NORMAL at 9:04 overwrites the NORMAL at 9:02. The final records stored would read: Air Handler 1 fan ON NORMAL 9:04am Air Handler 1 fan OFF ALARM 9:05am


8-12

Event Notification OPCEventNotifications are sent to subscribed OPC clients using the Connection Point callback interface supplied by the OPC client in the event subscription. If the BACnet OPC AE server receives a simple event and there is no OPC client available, the server discards those events. If the BACnet OPC AE server receives a conditional event, it buffers this event unless it is acknowledged and inactive. The BACnet OPC AE server supports buffering of 10,000 conditional events. Once the limit of 10,000 conditional events is reached, the BACnet OPC AE server starts purging events. It is assumed that there is at least one OPC client, such as the Current Events Viewer or Logger, receiving events all the time. Note: If an OPC client has set a filter with the event subscription,

and if the BACnet OPC AE server did not receive QueryFilterString string from the device, the server will not send this event to the OPC client.

Refresh An OPC client can send a refresh request to force a refresh for all active conditional and inactive unacknowledged events. Refresh is not available for simple and tracking events.

User Interface The BACnet OPC AE server does not have a user interface. The BACnet OPC AE server (jcbnopc.exe) can be launched at system startup to receive alarm events and maintain the condition state table. If the BACnet OPC AE server is launched at startup, it will not terminate even if there are no clients subscribed for the events.

Error Handling The BACnet OPC AE server uses error log files to log general errors. In case of buffer overflow, the server sends a special message to the BACnet OPC client. The server generates the errorlog.txt file in the directory where it is installed.


Chapter 9 Advanced User’s Guide

Introduction The chapter explains some advanced concepts related to M-Alarm. This chapter describes:

• M-Alarm Viewer menus

• Current Events Viewer toolbar

• subscription

• Current Events Viewer properties

• color usage

• N30 device offline monitor application



Key Concepts M-Alarm Viewer Menus

The following tables describe M-Alarm Viewer menus.

Table 9-1: File Menu Menu Description New Creates a new M-Alarm document. Open Opens an M-Alarm document. Close Closes the current M-Alarm document. Save to File* Saves the current view with an .a32 extension. Save As* Saves the current view with a different name. Print Prints the current window. Print Preview Previews the current window before printing. Exit Closes the M-Alarm application.

* Only available in Configuration mode. Note: We do not recommend using the Editing options.

Table 9-2: Edit Menu (Only Available in Configuration Mode) Menu Description Cut Cuts the object. Copy Copies the object. Paste Pastes the object. Paste Special Pastes the object. Delete Object Deletes the selected object. Insert New Object Inserts a new object into the document. Links Establishes links between the inserted object and any

other file or object. Object Properties:

Displays all configurable options for the selected windows.


Table 9-3: View Menu Menu Description Properties Window* Displays the Properties Window for the object in the

container. Display Preferences* Configures the display’s appearance. Application Preferences*

Determines how the application looks when started, how it starts, and how it behaves during Runtime.

Main Toolbar* Views/hides the main toolbar. ActiveX Toolbar* Views/hides the ActiveX toolbar. Status Bar Views/hides the status bar. Object Layout* Defines how current objects appear. Grid* Views/hides the grid. Select Language Selects the language for M-Alarm.

* Only available in Configuration mode.

Table 9-4: Actions Menu Menu Description Animate Mode Switches to Runtime mode for the current document. Runtime Mode Switches to Runtime mode for all documents.

Table 9-5: Tools Menu (Only Available in Configuration Mode) Menu Description Macros Creates a macro. Launch Configurator This feature is not installed. Logger Configurator Starts the Logger Configurator. Security Not available Set Working Directory Determines the working directory for loading and

saving documents.

Table 9-6: Window Menu Menu Description Window Displays a drop-down list of all open windows.

Table 9-7: Help Menu Menu Description Help Launches M-Alarm help. About Describes M-Alarm versions.


Current Events Viewer Toolbar Figure 9-1 displays the Current Events Viewer application toolbar. On the Viewer, a status bar contains time, date, and current mode (Runtime or Configuration).

Figure 9-1: Current Events Viewer Toolbar

Subscription The OPC AE server is selected and configured in the Subscription tab. Figure 9-2 shows the Subscription tab from the Current Events Viewer’s Property Page. Users can add or configure one or more OPC AE servers. Modify the predefined template files to point to the correct AE OPC server. OPC Subscription is initiated in different locations, depending on the application. The Current Events Viewer contains a Subscription tab in the property dialog. The Logger Configurator, however, has an Edit. . . button at the bottom of each configuration in the Configurations folder. Note: Subscription information must be repeated for both the

Current Events Viewer and Logger.


Figure 9-2: Current Events Viewer’s Property Page: Subscription Tab

If you select Edit. . ., the following tabs are available in the Event Subscription dialog box (Figure 9-3): Server, Types, Categories, Areas, Sources, and Attributes. Please refer to the following sections for descriptions.

Figure 9-3: Subscription Tab - Edit

Server Tab Server determines which servers are sending alarms to the client.


Types Tab Types allows for the selection of the desired Event Types and Severity range. The predefined configuration files already have the correct types selected.

Categories Tab The Categories tab allows the user to select one or more event categories available in the server (Figure 9-4). The predefined configuration files already have the correct types selected. The categories defined here are the columns in the Current Events Viewer for the N1 OPC AE server. Note: If none of the event categories is selected, all of the events

are subscribed to by default.

Figure 9-4: Event Subscription: Categories Tab

Areas Tab Areas allows additional filtering.

Sources Tab Sources allows additional filtering.


Attributes Tab The Attributes tab allows the selection of one or more attributes for each of the subscribed event categories (Figure 9-5). For every Event Category selected in the Categories tab, select the corresponding attributes. In order for M-Alarm to work properly, all attributes must be in the same order in all of the categories. This is especially challenging when mixing attributes among different OPC AE servers for the same view.

Figure 9-5: Current Events Viewer’s Property Page: Attributes Tab


Current Events Viewer Properties The Current Events Viewer contains several configuration categories laid out in tabs in its ActiveX Properties dialog box. The dialog box appears when you switch to Configuration mode and double-click anywhere in the viewer. Press Ctrl-M to toggle between Configure and Runtime modes. This section discusses the control’s properties and their settings.

General Tab The General tab defines the title and configuration file for a view (Figure 9-6). Refer to Table 9-8 for details.

Figure 9-6: M-Alarm Viewer Properties: General Tab

Table 9-8: M-Alarm Viewer Properties: General Tab Field Description Title Title of the view Configuration File Creates a configuration file that is independent of the

M-Alarm or M-Graphics application. Filename Lists the file name and location for the configuration file. Uniform Resource Locator (URL) Path

Enables the option to store the configuration in a file using a URL Path. This is useful if a shared configuration scheme is desired.


Default Tab The Default tab defines the font, color, and cell appearance in a view (Figure 9-7). Refer to Table 9-9 for details.

Figure 9-7: M-Alarm Viewer Properties: Default Tab

Table 9-9: M-Alarm Viewer Properties: Default Tab Field Description Base The default font is 8 point Arial.

The colors are definable; however, we recommend not changing the defaults in order to preserve a color standard among facilities.

Cell Do not select Show Row Header, because it serves no purpose. Select Auto-size Cells.


Row Tab The Row tab defines the color of the text and background for different event types (Figure 9-8). Refer to Table 9-10 for details and for row default settings.

Figure 9-8: M-Alarm Viewer Properties: Row Tab

Table 9-10: Row Default Settings Event Type Severity Text Color Background Font

Type/Size Flash Beep

Alarm/Condition 0 to 1,000 Yellow Red Arial 8 N N

Ack/Condition 0 to 1,000 Green White Arial 8 N N

Unack/Condition 0 to 1,000 Blue White Arial 8 N N

Operator/Simple 0 to 1,000 Black White Arial 8 N N

Operator/Tracking 0 to 1,000 Gray White Arial 8 N N


Table 9-11: M-Alarm Viewer Properties: Row Tab Field Description Event Type Lists available event types. Refer to Table 9-10. Severity 0 to 1,000 Color Determines the color for alarms for each event type and

severity. Font Lists the font for alarms. Click Configure to edit. Actions Lists whether flashing and beeping for alarms is

enabled/disabled. Click Configure to edit.

Column Tab The Column tab defines which columns appear in the Viewer (Figure 9-9). Refer to Table 9-12 for details.

Figure 9-9: M-Alarm Viewer Properties: Column Tab

Table 9-12: M-Alarm Viewer Properties: Column Tab Field Description Available Contains all available headers. Selected Headers Contains the headers selected to appear in the Viewer.

Normally, the names in the Description and Column Header columns are the same. However, some of the column names, especially the columns specific to Johnson Controls, have to be renamed. For example, “Attribute 1” is really “Present Value.” To rename a column, select the column name from the “Column Header” and single-click on it. Type in the new name and press <Enter>.


Subscription Tab The Subscription tab defines the OPC AE server for the Viewer (Figure 9-10). Modify the predefined template files to point to the correct AE server. Once an AE server entry is created, the subscription can be edited through the Edit button.

Figure 9-10: M-Alarm Viewer Properties: Subscription Tab


Display Tab The Display tab sorts and filters specific columns (Figure 9-11). The defaults are used in the predefined views. Refer to Table 9-13 for details.

Figure 9-11: M-Alarm Viewer Properties: Display Tab

Table 9-13: M-Alarm Viewer Properties: Display Tab Field Description Sort Determines the order in which alarms appear in the Viewer. Filter Determines which alarms appear in the Viewer.


Grids Tab The Grids tab defines the width and style for the horizontal and vertical grid lines (Figure 9-12).

Figure 9-12: M-Alarm Viewer Properties: Grids Tab

Settings Tab The Settings tab defines several options for the Viewer (Figure 9-13). The defaults are used in the predefined views. Note: It is important to make sure that Auto-Start is selected. If the

Viewer is embedded in an M-Graphic, the Auto-Start ensures that M-Graphics properly switches the view into Runtime mode.


Figure 9-13: M-Alarm Viewer Properties: Settings Tab

Color Usage Outside of raw data, color is probably the single most important piece of information for an alarm display. The color configuration of the Current Events Alarm Viewer is based on three levels: default, row, and column. These levels can greatly simplify configuration time. When a column or row setting is not provided, default color settings are used. If most settings require a background color of white, set the default background color to white. Row settings are used a majority of the time to provide specific colors for various alarm states. To avoid confusion, do not set color configurations for attributes that are not important to your application. For example, if severity is not important, it is not necessary to have multiple color configurations for severity. On the other hand, multiple color configurations for severity can be used to display sub-conditions. For example, if all high alarms are configured to be severity 700, then a color of purple for severity 700 would only show up for High alarms, even though High alarms are a substate of the limit condition. Column settings can be used to good effect to provide constant color combinations. This is a good place to set colors for help text or to set a column apart from the rest of the display.


N30 Device Offline Monitor Application This application (offlineclient.exe) periodically monitors the N30 Supervisory Controller’s devices to ensure they are online. By default, the application polls the N30 network every 60 seconds. If an N30 is offline, an alarm is sent to each N30 in the network. Users may want to edit this default rate or disable the polling for dial-in controllers. To edit the offline application: 1. Double-click on Program Files > Johnson Controls >

Commworx > offlineclient.exe. in Windows Explorer. The Offline Monitor Application appears (Figure 9-14).

Figure 9-14: Offline Monitor Application


2. Select Configuration > Build Customer Configuration. The Custom Configuration dialog box appears (Figure 9-15).

Figure 9-15: Custom Configuration Dialog Box 3. Double-click on the time interval, and enter a new one to change

the rate. To remove an N30 Supervisory Controller from the polling, deselect the checkbox to the left of the N30’s name.


Controls Group 507 E. Michigan Street www.johnsoncontrols.comP.O. Box 423 Release 5.0Milwaukee, WI 53201 Printed in U.S.A.


Chapter 10 Using M-Alarm with the LN OPC AE Server

Introduction The LONWORKS® Network (LN) OPC Alarm and Event (AE) Server uses the services of the LN OPC Data Access Server to provide alarm and event notification for Johnson Controls® LONWORKS controllers and any qualified third-party LONMARK® compliant controllers. As part of initial setup of the Metasys® system Connectivity to LONWORKS networks (MCL) components, the user defines which LN OPC tags are to report their alarm events to M-Alarm for viewing and logging on the M3 Workstation. Via .INI file defaults, initial setup can automatically define basic alarm parameters for all OPC tags as they are added to the LN OPC tag database. For most situations, this is sufficient to produce an alarm reporting system on the M3 Workstation for the LONWORKS network (for details, refer to the MCL Installation and Commissioning Technical Bulletin [LIT-1201120]); however, later the user may want to add or remove individual LN OPC tags from the alarm reporting system, or may want to modify the alarm parameters for individual LN OPC tags. This chapter describes how to use the LN AE Server Configuration tool to:

• add an LN OPC tag to the alarm server configuration

• define a digital alarm for a multistate LN OPC tag

• remove an LN OPC tag from the alarm server configuration

• modify the alarm reporting parameters of an LN OPC tag in the alarm server configuration

© June 30, 2004 Johnson Controls, Inc. Code No. LIT-1201122


Key Concepts Event Subscription

Clients, like the Current Events Viewer and Logger, must subscribe to event notifications. The two default views supplied with the MCL software are named:

• MCL Regular View

• MCL and N30 BACnet Regular View Both of these views define the correct event subscriptions for the LN OPC AE Server. If you create your own views, or modify the default views, you may need to redefine the event subscription. How to do this is described in Chapter 9: Advanced User’s Guide (LIT-11537545) of the M-Alarm User’s Guide. When selecting a server for event subscription, note that the name of the event server for the LONWORKS network (MCL software) is: ICONICS.AlarmServer.1, as shown in Figure 10-1.

Figure 10-1: OPC Universal Tag Browser Showing Event Servers

Using M-Alarm with the LN OPC AE Server 10-3

Default Views The MCL software includes two default views, which are located in the directory C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Johnson Controls\M-Data\M-Alarm\Views:

• MCL Regular View

• MCL and N30 BACnet Regular View Table 10-1 lists the columns (attributes) shown in the MCL Regular View. The “MCL and N30 BACnet Regular View” is a merged view that includes the columns listed in Table 10-1, and the columns from the standard N30 BACnet Regular View, which are described in Chapter 1: Introduction (LIT-11537505) and Chapter 4: Viewing and Acknowledging Alarms (LIT-11537520) of the M-Alarm User’s Guide.

Table 10-1: Default View: MCL Regular View Column Heading Description Time / Date Time stamp of the latest change of state of the tag, which also includes acknowledging

the event. Type Acknowledged state of the alarm, (Alarm, Acknowledged, Unacknowledged). Condition Name of the condition that caused the digital alarm or analog limit alarm to occur,

(Digital, LoLo, Lo, Hi, HiHi). Tag The Tag Name field in the Alarm Server Configuration dialog, which is user-definable

and is not necessarily the source OPC tag name. Description Message text associated with the alarm state. Areas Available, but not used in this default view. Specific locator of the tag (source). Priority The severity of the alarm from 0 to 1000, where 0 is the lowest severity (priority) and

1000 the highest. Ack Comment Available, but not used in this default view. Comment entered by user when alarm was

acknowledged. Complete Ack Available, but not used in this default view. Indicates if controller needs complete

acknowledgment. Quality OPC indicator as to the reliability of the event, (Good, Non-Specific, Bad, Device

Failure).

Default Logger Configuration The MCL software default logger configuration is C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Johnson Controls\M-Data\M-Alarm\Active Database\awxlog32.mdb.


LN AE Server Configuration Tool (A&E Server by Johnson Controls)

The LN AE Server Configuration tool (Figure 10-2) provides the interface for defining the alarms that alarm server clients can display and log on the M3 Workstation. The configuration tool works with the OPC tags that represent the field points and variables of the devices in the underlying subsystem, such as the LONWORKS network.

Figure 10-2: LN AE Server Configurator Note: The LN OPC AE Server can provide very sophisticated

alarm management, which is usually not required for most applications on the LONWORKS network. This chapter, in keeping with the default alarm parameters of the initial setup procedure, covers only the basics of defining alarm limits for analog LN OPC tags, and defining an alarm state for digital LN OPC tags. For information on defining more complex alarm and event reporting, refer to the Help provided with the LN AE Server Configurator.


The next two subheadings describe the parameters that must be defined for a new OPC tag that you add to the default alarm server configuration. You add a new tag by right-clicking in either the left pane tree view or in the right pane configuration view, and then selecting Insert > Tag from the pop-up menu that appears (see Adding an LN OPC Tag to the Alarm Server Configuration under Detailed Procedures later in this chapter). Note: The LN OPC AE Server database can store more than one

named configuration, but only one can be active at any given time. Always add your OPC tags to the configuration named Default (shown in the lower right corner of the window, see Figure 10-2)

Basic Analog Alarm Parameters Figure 10-3 shows an example of the LN AE Server Configurator screen that appears when you add a new OPC tag to the alarm reporting configuration. The Limit tab is selected under Alarm Type.

Figure 10-3: New Tag Analog Limit Screen


Table 10-2 lists the parameters that must be defined in the LN AE Server Configurator to set up basic analog alarm limits. Fields that are not listed in the table should be left blank or with their default values.

Table 10-2: Basic Analog Alarm Parameters Field Name Description Source information Section Tag name Freely definable name for the analog alarm. To remain consistent with the

automatically generated naming convention, type (or copy and paste) the full-path OPC tag name into this field (see OPC Input 1 below).

Enabled Enter the number 1 in this field to enable alarm reporting for the new tag. OPC Input 1 Click the Tag button to the right of this field to open the OPC Universal Tag Browser.

In the tag browser, use the tree view to select the location of the tag you want to add, and then select the tag itself from the list in the right-hand pane of the browser. Click OK in the browser to close its window, which also copies the selected tag to the OPC Input 1 field. You can highlight the OPC tag name following the JC.LNOPC.1\ part to copy and paste the name into the Tag name field described above.

Alarm type Section Limit Tab Click on this tab to display the limit definition fields for an analog OPC tag. Value Fields Enter the numeric values that should produce an alarm report for the respective limit:

LoLo (low alarm limit), Lo (low warning limit), Hi (high warning limit), HiHi (high alarm limit). Make sure that the limits are within the value range of the analog OPC tag.

Message text Fields Enter the message text that should be displayed when the respective limit is reached. Severity Severity is the OPC defined value for alarm Priority. The valid OPC severity range is

0 (lowest) to 1000 (highest). The severity can be used in the M-Alarm Viewer/Logger to filter alarms. The default M-Alarm Viewer/Logger configuration displays all severities. For consistency, you may want to use the MCL initial setup defaults, which are: HiHi/LoLo = 800, Hi/Lo = 600 Although you can’t enter a severity for Return to Normal, MCL initial setup uses a default of 100.

Requires Ack. Fields

Enter the number 1 in the respective field to require operator acknowledgment for that alarm report, or enter 0 to disable operator acknowledgment. For consistency, you may want to use the MCL initial setup defaults, which are: HiHi/LoLo = 1, Hi/Lo = 0

Return to normal Enter the message text that should be displayed when the analog OPC tag value returns to normal range. The return to normal range is the range between the Lo and Hi limit values.


Basic Digital Alarm Parameters Figure 10-4 shows an example of the LN AE Server Configurator screen that appears when you add a new OPC tag to the alarm reporting configuration. The Digital tab has been selected under Alarm Type.

Figure 10-4: New Tag Digital Alarm State Screen


Table 10-3 lists the parameters that must be defined in the LN AE Server Configurator to set up a basic digital alarm state. Fields that are not listed in the table should be left blank or with their default values.

Table 10-3: Basic Digital Alarm Parameters Field Name Description Source information Section Tag name Freely definable name for the digital alarm. To remain consistent with the

automatically generated naming convention, type (or copy and paste) the full-path OPC tag name into this field (see OPC Input 1 below).

Enabled Enter the number 1 in this field to enable alarm reporting for the new tag. OPC Input 1 Click the Tag button to the right of this field to open the OPC Universal Tag

Browser. In the tag browser, use the tree view to select the location of the tag you want to add, and then select the tag itself from the list in the right-hand pane of the browser. Click OK in the browser to close its window, which also copies the selected tag to the OPC Input 1 field. You can highlight the OPC tag name following the JC.LNOPC.1\ part to copy and paste the name into the Tag name field described above. If the LN OPC tag is multistate, meaning it can take on values other than 0 and 1, then see the Note below about creating an expression in this field.

Alarm type Section Digital Tab Click on this tab to display the alarm state definition fields for a digital OPC tag. Alarm State Value Enter the numeric value of the state that should produce an alarm report for the

digital OPC tag. The only valid state values for a digital alarm are 0 and 1 (see Note below).

Message text Field Enter the message text that should be displayed when the OPC tag changes to the alarm state.

Severity Severity is the OPC defined value for alarm Priority. The valid OPC severity range is 0 (lowest) to 1000 (highest). The severity can be used in the M-Alarm Viewer/Logger to filter alarms. The default M-Alarm Viewer/Logger configuration displays all severities. For consistency, you may want to use the MCL initial setup default, which is: Alarm State = 800 Although you can’t enter a severity for Return to Normal, MCL initial setup uses a default of 100.

Requires Ack. Field Enter the number 1 to require operator acknowledgment for the alarm report, or enter 0 to disable operator acknowledgment. For consistency, you may want to use the MCL initial setup default, which is: Alarm State Requires Ack. = 1

Return to normal Enter the message text that should be displayed when the digital OPC tag value returns to a normal state. The return to normal state is any state other than the defined alarm state.

Note: For digital alarms, the Alarm State Value must be binary, therefore, the only valid state values are 0 and 1. If the tag that is to generate the alarm is multistate, and a state value greater than 1 is to generate the alarm, then you must create an expression in the OPC Input 1 field. This is described under Defining a Digital Alarm for a Multistate OPC Tag in the Detailed Procedures section.


Detailed Procedures Adding an LN OPC Tag to the Alarm Server Configuration

To add an LN OPC tag to the alarm server configuration: 1. Start the LN AE Server Configurator by clicking on the Windows

Start menu button in the task bar, and selecting Programs > Johnson Controls > L-Tools > A&E Server Configuration Tool.

2. In the left pane Tree view, double-click on Data Source to open it, or from the main menu, select Go > Down One Level, or Go > Areas. Then click on the plus signs to open, one after the other, Areas and LN Alarming. You can instead double-click on each name to open the respective branch. Note: To make sure that you can see all of the tags already

defined under LN Alarming, select View from the main menu, and then place a check mark next to each type of tag displayed in the menu, as shown in Figure 10-5:

Figure 10-5: All Tag Types Checked on the View Menu


3. Right-click in either the left or right pane of the window to display a pop-up menu, as shown in Figure 10-6.

Figure 10-6: Right-click Pop-up Menu 4. Select Insert > Tag from the pop-up menu. This creates a new

entry, named New Tag by default, under the LN Alarming area, as shown in Figure 10-3.

5. Click on the Tag button to the right of the OPC Input 1 field to open the OPC Universal Tag Browser (Figure 10-7), which allows you to select the tag you want to add to the alarm server configuration.


Figure 10-7: OPC Universal Tag Browser 6. In the left pane Tree view of the tag browser, click on the plus

signs to open, one after the other: My Computer, Data Access, JC.LNOPC.1, and then the branches leading to the location of the LN OPC tag you want to add. You can instead double-click on each name to open the respective branch.

7. In the right pane Tag Name list view, select the tag you want to add, and click OK. The browser window closes, and the selected tag is copied to the OPC Input 1 field of the configurator.

8. Fill in the remaining fields of the configurator, as described under Key Concepts earlier in this chapter.

9. Click Apply to save the new tag in the alarm reporting configuration. Repeat Steps 3 to 9 to add additional tags.

Defining a Digital Alarm for a Multistate OPC Tag For digital alarms, the Alarm State Value must be binary, with the only valid state values being 0 and 1. Digital alarms for multistate OPC tags may require an alarm state value greater than 1. If this is the case, then you must create a relational expression in the OPC Input 1 field, such that the state value 3, for example, equates to a 1, and all other state values equate to 0. For this procedure, we will use the example of a multi-speed fan, where fan speed 3 is to generate an alarm. To define a digital alarm for a multistate OPC tag: 1. Add the multistate OPC tag to the alarm configuration, as

described in the previous procedure Adding an LN OPC Tag to the Alarm Server Configuration.


2. Click the Digital tab in the Alarm Type section of the New Tag’s right pane Focus view (Figure 10-4).

3. In the OPC Input 1 field, click the Equals button ( ) at the right end of the field. The Edit Expression dialog box appears, as shown in Figure 10-8.

Figure 10-8: Edit Expression Dialog Box 4. If a tag name appears in the dialog box, as shown in Figure 10-8,

then press the Del key to delete the tag name. 5. Type the state value that is to generate the alarm (3 in our

example) in the Expression box and then click the Relational button, as shown in Figure 10-9.

Figure 10-9: Relational Button Menu 6. Select == Equal To from the Relational menu. The relational

Equal To symbol (==) appears after the 3 in the Expression box. 7. Click the Tags button in the Edit Expression dialog box to open

the OPC Universal Tag Browser (Figure 10-7). 8. In the OPC Universal Tag Browser, locate and select the LN OPC

tag corresponding to the multi-speed fan we are using for this example.


9. Click OK in the tag browser to copy the selected tag to the Edit Expression dialog box, as shown in Figure 10-10 below. This completes the expression, which equates to Boolean true (1) when the fan speed is equal to 3, and equates to Boolean false (0) when the fan speed is any value other than 3.

Figure 10-10: Completed Expression 10. Click OK in the Edit Expression dialog box. The expression is

copied to the OPC Input 1 field, as shown in Figure 10-11.

Figure 10-11: Expression for Multistate Digital Alarm 11. Type the number 1, corresponding to the Boolean true result of

the expression, in the Alarm State Value field. Enter the desired severity for the digital alarm in the Severity field (the default


severity for LN OPC tags is 800), and enter the message text for the alarm state and the return to normal states in the respective fields.

12. Click Apply to save the new tag in the alarm reporting configuration.

Removing an LN OPC Tag from the Alarm Server Configuration To remove an LN OPC tag from the alarm server configuration: 1. Start the LN AE Server Configurator by clicking on the Windows



defined under LN Alarming, select View from the main menu, and then place a check mark next to each type of tag displayed in the menu, as shown in Figure 10-5.

3. Select the LN Alarming branch in the left pane Tree view to display a list of tags in the right pane. In the right pane, right-click on the tag you want to remove to display a pop-up menu, as shown in Figure 10-12.

Figure 10-12: Right-click Pop-up Menu for Selected Tag 4. Select Delete on the pop-up menu to delete the selected tag from

the alarm server configuration.


Modifying an LN OPC Tag in the Alarm Server Configuration To modify an LN OPC tag in the alarm server configuration: 1. Start the LN AE Server Configurator by clicking on the Windows



defined under LN Alarming, select View from the main menu, and then place a check mark next to each type of tag displayed in the menu, as shown in Figure 10-5.

3. Under the LN Alarming branch in the left pane Tree view, select the tag you want to modify. The right pane changes to show the alarm parameters for the selected tag (Figure 10-2 shows an example). You may have to click on the Limit or Digital tab under Alarm type to display the appropriate parameters for the tag type.

4. Make changes in the fields for the tag, as described under Key Concepts earlier in this chapter.

5. Click Apply to save the modified parameters in the alarm server configuration. You can repeat Steps 3 to 5 to modify additional tags.

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