Alarm Configuration
- Benedict Häfeli
This page explains the portal interface for alarm configuration on partner level. If you are not a superuser or above, with general camera permission for your partner account, you are on the wrong page and should instead go here. If you aren’t familiar with the core concepts of how alarms in the yellow portal work, I’d recommend reading up on that first
The alarm overview page
The alarm overview page is accessible through the side bar navigation, for all users of level superuser and above, with general camera permissions for their partner account.
On the overview page, you will see a list with all alarms that exist for your partner. You can right click on any existing alarm to edit it or delete it, or you can create a new one by clicking “create” in the top-right corner. When editing or creating, you will be brought to the alarm configuration page.
The alarm configuration page
The alarm configuration page is split into four major sections: The general configuration, the default peripherals, the condition and the actions. To learn more about the concepts behind these terms, please refer to this page: core concepts
General Parameters
The general parameters allow setting a name and description for your alarm, as well as more precisely configure the times at which actions should or should not be executed.
Name: A name for the alarm. Used for identification of the alarm by humans.
Description: Unused by the system itself, it is heavily recommended to use this to quickly explain what the alarm is supposed to do and when, so people can learn about it without having to decipher condition and action configurations.
Action Delay: When an alarm changes to ALARM state from another state, it will wait for at least this many seconds until it executes the alarms action for that camera for the first time. If the state changes back to OK before the delay expires, no actions will be executed. Use this to reduce noise from oscilations or irregular hickups.
Action Interval: When an alarm for a camera is in ALARM state, and actions have been executed at least once already, at least this many seconds will pass until actions are executed the next time. Use this to avoid spamming actions like notifications when an alarm state lasts for a longer time (which will be most of the time, unless you’re really fast at fixing things).
Action Execution Window: A time window specifying when during the day or week the alarm may execute actions. If an alarm for a camera is in ALARM state, but is outside the specified time window, no actions will be executed for the camera alarm until it enters the time window again. Trigger delay will start counting as soon as the state changes to ALARM. If it expires outside the execution window, actions will be executed immediately when entering it, provided the state is still ALARM. If it didn’t expire yet when entering the window, actions will defer execution until it expires. If the state changes to ALARM outside the time window, and changes back to OK before the time window is entered, no actions will be executed. Use this if you want to suppress for example notifications during the night when noone will read them (or wants to get woken up by them), or at weekends when you don’t want to be bothered by them. Right now, the time of day is always interpreted in CEST.
Default Camera Peripherals
The default camera peripherals section allows you to configure a pattern that specifies what sort of cameras this alarm is intended for. You can immediately add the alarm to all cameras matching the pattern by clicking on the “Apply to cameras” button.
You can assign each peripheral to the exclude or include list, or none of them (remove a peripheral from either list by clicking on the peripherals name). For more conceptual information about default peripherals, refer to the alarm concepts page
Exclude: A camera that has any peripherals that are in the exclude list will not have the alarm added to it when applying the alarm to all cameras. For example, if Solar and Heater are in the exclude list, and a camera has either a solar or a heater peripheral, it will not receive the alarm by default.
Tip: Exclude the webcam controller peripheral to apply the alarm to all non-yellow cameras (most commonly third-party IP cams).
Include: A camera that has all peripherals that are in the include list will have the alarm added to it when applying it to all cameras, unless prevented by the exclude list. The exclude list takes precedence! If the camera has further peripherals that are not listed in the include list, they are ignored. For example, for the above shown configuration (include controller and heater), a camera that has both the controller and the heater, will receive the alarm when applied. So will a camera that has a controller, a heater and a panorama. A camera having a controller and a panorama but no heater, however, will not. Neither (for the exact above configuration) will a camera that has a controller, a heater, and a solar peripheral, as the solar peripheral is on the exclude list.
There are certain combinations that make no sense, because no camera could ever match the pattern. These cases will be marked as errors when you configure them. For example, the include list must either be empty, or always include the controller peripheral, since no camera can ever have another peripheral without the controller.
Leaving both include and exclude lists empty means an alarm will be added to all your cameras when applied.
Condition and Actions
This paragraph does not cover the function and configuration of specific conditions and actions. for that information, please refer to the dedicated page Conditions and Actions
To the left, you have to configure one condition for your alarm, that determines when a camera using this alarm will have its alarm state change. Conditions are always evaluated for a specific camera. You can choose a type of condition, then configure it further to fit your specific needs.
The widget to the right allows you to define several actions to your alarm, one for each type. Actions will be executed for a specific camera when the state of a camera alarm changes to ALARM and all other requirements are fulfilled (see general parameters).