Purpose and Key Concepts

Below is a list of key concepts essential to understanding the Alarms Module.

Alarm Item

An Alarm Item is a tag or expression monitored by the Alarms module. It contains information such as the tag name, the alarm condition (the trigger of the alarm), and the associated Alarm Group. Each Alarm Item can have its configuration properties, such as Limit, Deadband, and Message, that define the alarm behavior and characteristics.

Alarm Group

An Alarm Group is a collection of Alarm Items with common properties and characteristics. Each Alarm Group can have configuration properties, such as Ack Required, Auto Ack Time, and Sound, that apply to all its Alarm Items. 

Alarm Area

An Alarm Area is a structured grouping of Alarm Groups, providing an organized approach to alarm management. It can contain child Alarm Areas, creating a hierarchical structure for Alarm Groups and Alarm Items. This hierarchy enhances the organization and management of alarms.

Audit Trail

The Audit Trail is a feature that logs all changes made to the Alarm Group & item including creation, modification and deletion of events. Providing a clear audit trail of who made what changes and when, it is a way to track and record the history of changes made to the alarm configuration

Alarms Functionality

The Alarms Module is crucial for real-time monitoring and immediate notification of events, continuously assessing tag values to detect when predefined limits or conditions are met and generating alarms accordingly. It ensures swift identification and response to critical events, enhancing flexibility and control in managing alarms.

Features Highlights

The Alarms Module offers the following key features:

• The Alarm Window displays active alarms and their state changes on the screen.
• Real-time alarm processing to quickly identify and respond to critical events.
• Organizing and managing alarms in a hierarchical structure for enhanced flexibility and control.
• It considers universal time and daylight saving time for accurate timestamps.
• Dynamic language localization of alarm messages for easy understanding.
• High-precision timestamps up to 0.1ms for accurate and reliable data.

Configuring the Alarms Module

The basic process to configure the Alarms Module follows the sequence below:

1. Create Alarm Items to generate the alarms. 
2. Create Alarm Groups to define common attributes between a group of alarms.
3. Create Alarm Areas to enhance the organization and management of alarms.
   

The above steps are a simplified explanation of the configuration process.  For additional information on how to configure the Alarms Module, access Configuring the Alarms Module.

More on the Alarms Module

To learn more about the Historian module, you can use the additional pages available on the documentation:

• Learn how to use the Alarms Module together with other modules accessing the Working with the Alarms Module page.

• The Advanced Alarms Topics page presents complementary information about the Alarms Runtime attributes
• Use the Alarms Best Practices and Common Issues page to access tips and troubleshooting guides.

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