Hello and welcome to a new quick start guide on how to best use
Movicon.NExT™.
In this technote we shall illustrate the use of active alarms in
a Movicon.NExT™
project by using the objects that are available for use from the product's
toolbox.
Alarm Viewers
Movicon.NExT offers two different object types for displaying active
alarms:
Alarm Window: this
is the most comprehensive object of those offered by the software. It
allows active alarms to be displayed, acknowledged, and reset.
It is normal practice to use it on screens dedicated to displaying
and managing the application's alarms.
Alarm
Banner: this very simple object is a derivative of the Alarm Window,
and it only displays active alarms with their most important information
without the possibility to acknowledge, or reset them, or enter
comments. This type of object is usually used on the application's
bottom or top bar remaining always visible to alert operators
when alarms need acknowledging, resetting, and commenting on in
the Alarm Window object.
Both these objects can be completely configured and customized by
using the editor or script.
Example
We shall now create an example to give you a better idea of how
these objects function at runtime.
Creating tags
Having already started up the software and loaded the project:
Open the I/O Data Server
in the project tree within the Project Explorer window.
Go
to the Tag List by selecting appropriate I/O Data Server tab.
Right
click on the workspace and select the Add New Tag from the menu
that appears.
Configure
the tag using the properties window in the following way:
Name
boolTest
Model Type
Variable
Data Type
Boolean
Confirm
these changes by clicking on the Accept Changes icon on the toolbar
at the top of the Properties window.
Creating and associating the alarm
We shall now create an alarm in the following way:
Open the I/O Data Server
in the project tree within the Project Explorer window.
Go
to the Alarms Tab by selecting the corresponding I/O Data Server
tab.
Expand
the item in the Alarms tab until you reach the source item.
Select
the source and right click to open the contextual menu.
Choose
the Add New Alarm Definition from the menu. Configure the alarm
in this way:
Name
boolTestAlarm
Alarm Type
Trip Alarm
Activation Condition
Equals
Activation Value
1
Confirm
the changes by clicking the Accept Changes button located on the
toolbar at the top of the alarm's properties window.
Now that the tag and alarm have been configured, we can associate
them to each other:
Select
the alarm we have just created within the I/O Data Server's Alarms
tab.
Right
click it and select the Assign Tag option from the menu that opens.
Select
the boolTest tag we have just created from the table that appears
and press the OK button.
Creating the Screen
At this point, we shall now create a screen:
Look
for the Screens resource in the project's tree structure in the
Project Explorer window and select it.
Right
click it and select the New option from the menu which opens.
A
New Screen popup will appear which will allow you to set the screen's
main properties. Configure the screen as follows:
Width:
1920
Height:
1080
Name:
Main
Click
the OK button to confirm the configuration.
Once the screen has been created, we can now change the project's
properties by inserting the screen as the project's Main screen to
show when the project starts up. To do this:
Select
the name of the project from the application's tree structure.
Open
the Properties window.
Change
following project's properties as follows:
Startup
Page Type: Main Screen
Startup
Screen Name: Main
Once you have finished configuring the project startup page, click
on the Save All icon located at the toolbar at the top to save the
project.
Make sure that the Main screen is open, click on the Toolbox tab
on the far left of the editor, next to the Properties window, to open
the Toolbox library provided by Movicon.NExT.
Drag the Vertical Switch from the Toggle Switches subfolder of the
Switches group on screen.
Drag the boolTest tag on top of the object to assign it.
Open the Toolbox library once more and insert the Alarm Window control,
which is found in the Alarms Viewer group, onto the Main screen.
Insert the Alarm Banner object using the same procedure used for the
Alarm Window.
Save the project by clicking on the Save All icon on the Movicon.NExT
Editor's toolbar at the top.
Runtime
Test
Now we shall test the object we have just created by clicking the Start Runtime icon.
Once you have started up the application and opened the screen, click on the switch to change the value of the boolTest tag from 0 to 1. In this condition, the alarm associated with the tag will activate.
The alarm will appear in the Alarm Window and on the Alarm Banner.
You should now be able to use the Alarm Window object to acknowledge and reset the alarm, and enter a comment.