Show user who disabled alarm in point status

[rlao]

Hi all,

If I look at the status of a point with disabled alarms, it shows me when the alarm was disabled but says alarm was disabled by 'User' without specifying who the actual user is (see attached jpeg).

I know I can dig through the event journal to chase down the specific user who disabled alarms, but is there a way to show the specific user on the point status itself? Or is this feature request territory?

[geoffpatton]

For one customer I have a Mimic that I embedded a list and the query is set to show all User events for the day. The supervisors only have to click on the list and select Previous Interval, or Go To Time to look for something.

You could do the same but filter the Message to only show Alarms enabled and Alarms disabled.

I think a feature request is a good idea. I have wondered a year after an alarm was disabled who did it (mostly to find out why it was done) and the event log was only kept for 6 months.

[BevanWeiss · Accepted solution]

The concept of a singular 'alarm disabled by' user unfortunately isn't really how the Geo SCADA Expert alarm disablement system works.

Good luck understanding this 🙂

https://tprojects.schneider-electric.com/GeoSCADAHelp/Geo%20SCADA%202020/Content/AlarmsGuide/EnableA...

But the conclusion is that having a singular 'Alarm disabled by' just doesn't apply for the default handling of alarms within Geo SCADA Expert.

I would recommend not using the default Independent Alarm setting.

So the way that I've got it in one customer's system is...

Turn OFF the ability for users to disable alarms (within server configuration settings).

Turn OFF the 'independent alarms' setting within the server configuration.

All alarm disablement should occur through script and a call to an ST Logic routine.

The ST logic routine can then write to a Data Table for the user that disabled the alarm.

In this way, it's also possible to get finer grained control over the alarm disablement periods.

i.e. a normal operator should be able to disable alarms for their shift duration (i.e. 8hrs or so), a senior operator should be able to disable alarms for a reporting period (i.e. 7 / 30days or so), a SCADA engineer should be able to disable alarms for a year or so.

With some appropriate settings (like additional object metadata) it is even possible to have these configurations be definable per-object and per security level.

[rlao]

Hi Bevan,

Thanks, so it looks like GeoSCADA only keeps track of the type of user (User, Logic, Schedule, Method Calls) but not the actual object that toggled the corresponding internal user type flag. It would definitely be useful if GeoSCADA also noted down the actual object itself when enabling/disabling alarms, not just the internal user type. I will put together a feature request.

The logic solution sounds interesting and would come with other alarm handling benefits, will keep in mind if this ever becomes a big enough issue for us.

[rlao]

Hi Geoff,

Yes I've also had to resort to trawling through the event journal at times to investigate further. I've also encountered the same issue as you if the disabling action was too long ago and no longer captured in the event journal.

I'll put a feature request in as I think it's good QoL to have.