Alarm Metrics not updating

Ignition
1

Hi,

I have an issue with Alarm Metrics in Ignition 8.3.

I have a folder with many UDT instances which can trigger alarms. I created a reference tag with reference to “[.]Alarm Metrics.activeAckCount”, however I noticed that the tag as well as the Alarm Metrics tags are not updating unless I open the particular folder in the tag browser.

The reference tag also includes a value change script writing the Alarm Count to a SQL table, which is not updated if the folder is not open in tag browser.

Does anyone have an idea about this?

Best regards

2

Try with an expression tag instead of a Reference tag. The alarm metrics have a lightweight internal implementation that avoids execution when not subscribed, and a reference tag isn't a subscription. (I think. Might be a bug worth reporting.)

3

Expression works fine, thank you.

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4

After some time, I noticed that it is not working reliably. After a restart, I have to open all folders where the instances are located to refresh the Expression Tag with activeAckCount.

I changed the execution mode from Event Driven to Tag Group (Default), but nothing changed.

These Alarm Metrics have taken a lot of my time and are only causing issues. It would be better not to include them in the Designer if they are not working as expected.

In the end, I implemented my own alarm metrics system.

5

Did you open a support ticket to report this apparent bug? If not, how would you expect it to get fixed?

Telling us volunteers here on the forum doesn't count as a formal bug report.

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6

To be honest, I thought you were part of the IA team or that someone from IA was reading this forum. I didn’t expect IA to fix this bug for me or update the documentation.

I mainly wrote this to inform other integrators like me about the issue, because over the past few years I’ve found many similar posts here that saved me a lot of time.

7

Some IA staff do hang out here (they have a badge on their avatars), and often jump in, but many issues need a formal IA support ticket.

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8

Phil is spot on with this:

If something else is actually subscribed to that set of Alarm Metrics, I would expect a Reference Tag to work. But the Reference Tag itself won’t generate a subscription. Expression Tags would be my approach as well in this use case.

To the other question/issue:

After some time, I noticed that it is not working reliably. After a restart, I have to open all folders where the instances are located to refresh the Expression Tag with activeAckCount.

If you’re able to provide more specifics as to your setup and what you’re seeing we’ll be able to help out more.

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