# Using wildcards to filter alarms

**URL:** <https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/using-wildcards-to-filter-alarms/72437>\
**Category:** Ignition\
**Created:** [April 13, 2023, 9:31pm UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/using-wildcards-to-filter-alarms/72437 "2023-04-13T21:31:13Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Bharat\_Krishnan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/2acd7d/32.png) [@Bharat\_Krishnan](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/u/Bharat_Krishnan)\
**Post date:** [April 13, 2023, 9:31pm UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/using-wildcards-to-filter-alarms/72437/1 "2023-04-13T21:31:13Z")

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I have 55 blocking stations in a conveyor. Each blocking station is set up as a UDT and has its own set of alarms set up in a folder named "Alarms". I have a alarm icon set up on the blocking station view as well. I want to filter the alarms in a blocking station to return the highest active alarm in that folder so that I can bind that alarm with alarm icon view. The alarm icon color changes based on the priority as well. So the data I would like to be able to return is the highest active alarm display path and its corresponding priority. I tried using

> [isAlarmActiveFiltered](https://docs.inductiveautomation.com/display/DOC81/isAlarmActiveFiltered)

But the wildcard property does'nt seem to be working for me. Maybe I am doing something wrong with the syntax I have pasted the expression below:

```auto
isAlarmActiveFiltered("[IGNITION_TAGS]CONVEYOR/ALARMS/*","*","*",1,4,0,1,0)

```

 ![alarm_act](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/inductiveautomation/original/3X/e/0/e08aa2ffce1ead9bff1bf52bd0b5dc69d0c3ac8b.png)

Can anyone help with this please?

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![tyler.bennett](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/f04885/32.png) [@tyler.bennett](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/u/tyler.bennett)\
**Post date:** [April 13, 2023, 9:54pm UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/using-wildcards-to-filter-alarms/72437/2 "2023-04-13T21:54:15Z")

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Per the manual [isAlarmActive](https://docs.inductiveautomation.com/display/DOC81/isAlarmActive) and [isAlarmActiveFiltered](https://docs.inductiveautomation.com/display/DOC81/isAlarmActiveFiltered) only return a Boolean value (True if an alarm is active; False if no active alarms were found).

I have achieved similar results to your requested objective by using a transform to return values from python scripting using the [system.alarm.queryStatus](https://docs.inductiveautomation.com/display/DOC81/system.alarm.queryStatus) function. Though that was used for generating values bound to views and components and not for generating tag values.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Bharat\_Krishnan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/2acd7d/32.png) [@Bharat\_Krishnan](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/u/Bharat_Krishnan)\
**Post date:** [April 13, 2023, 11:02pm UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/using-wildcards-to-filter-alarms/72437/3 "2023-04-13T23:02:03Z")

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Hi, could you share the way u have created the scripting using the [system.alarm.queryStatus - Ignition User Manual 8.1 - Ignition Documentation](https://docs.inductiveautomation.com/display/DOC81/system.alarm.queryStatus) function.