# What is considered bad quality on an alarm?

**URL:** <https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/what-is-considered-bad-quality-on-an-alarm/108276>\
**Category:** Ignition\
**Created:** [July 9, 2025, 4:05pm UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/what-is-considered-bad-quality-on-an-alarm/108276 "2025-07-09T16:05:50Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![justin.huggins](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/d07c76/32.png) [@justin.huggins](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/u/justin.huggins)\
**Post date:** [July 9, 2025, 4:05pm UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/what-is-considered-bad-quality-on-an-alarm/108276/1 "2025-07-09T16:05:50Z")

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In the documentation, the explanation is lacking a bit.

- **Bad Quality** `BadQuality` - Active if the tag value becomes a bad quality, for example, on communication loss.

Does this include Bad\_Disabled or Uncertain Values? Does it alarm on anything that is not a 'Good' status? I am primarily trying to catch Uncertain values. Would just like some clarity on what the expected bahavior is for this alarm selection?

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**Author:** ![Allan\_Feller](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/a9adbd/32.png) [@Allan\_Feller](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/u/Allan_Feller)\
**Post date:** [February 24, 2026, 6:19pm UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/what-is-considered-bad-quality-on-an-alarm/108276/2 "2026-02-24T18:19:49Z")

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From experience and testing, alarms that are set to go off on “Bad Quality” _will_ go off if the quality of the tag is “Uncertain.” Expressions has a useful function to use to test for it, [forceQuality()](https://www.docs.inductiveautomation.com/docs/8.1/appendix/expression-functions/advanced/forceQuality). Alarms also will _not_ go off for any tags that are disabled, no matter the alarm mode.