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Alarm Handler
General
The alarm handler tool is part of the Epics package. It relies on a
configuration file which lists all the channels it has to watch. The channels
are combined into groups in order to bring some clarity and navigability
within the channel list.
This configuration file is maintained by the Monitoring expert. In
addition to a list of channel the configuration file also contains mask
settings for each channels. These setting are hardwired and allow us to
permanently mask some
faulty channels we know about but can't fix right away. This configuration
file is included by central babar monitoring into the central alarm handler.
Any changes in this file are propagated to central monitoring as soon as
the alarm handler is restarted.
Starting the alarm handler
There are two ways to start the alarm handler. The first one and easiest
one is to click on the "ALH" button
from the main monitoring display. The
second way is to source the script:
source ~paf/alarm.sh
Basic features
When the alarm handler is started a first window
comes up:
If any alarm comes up, this button will turn
Yellow (warning) or Red (Alarm). To get more information about the origin
of the alarm click on the button to get the Channel window:
This window displays the main groups of channels:
BB (Barrel Backward), BF (Barrel Forward), EC (End Cap),
TR (Transition Boards), GEN (General). The box
in front of the group name reflect the group's alarm status. If it is colored,
the alarm is coming from this group. Clicking on the box will acknowledge
the alarm and stop the beeping sound.
By doing this you will not make the alarm disappear
! A colored area will remain in front of the group name as long as the
alarm is valid. The "G" button provides guidance for each group or channel.
Clicking on it will display a short description of the group or channel
content. The "P" button will pop up the relevant Epics Display so that
you can see the extent of the damage or take action. The chain of characters
on the right of the channel or group describes the mask settings.
An explanation of the different mask settings
can be found at the bottom of the ALH display.
To display the Group content click on the group
name and an expanded view will come up:
You can also expand the group tree to its maximum
by selecting the "View" menu and clicking on "Expand All":
You can see on the display the list of channel
on the right side of the window. During Shutdown, when part of the detector
is off, somme alarm might be on all the time. If you don't want hear beeps
all the time you can stop the sound by clicking on "SilenceForever". Be
aware that this is dangerous because you might miss real alarm. The button
should NEVER by pressed when we are in normal operating mode.
How to mask noisy channels
Select the channel or group to mask by clicking on it's name:
Then go to "Action" and select "Modify Mask Settings" to get this
window:
click on "NoAck". This will disable the notification for this alarm
but it will still appear as alarm on the display. If you want to remove
completely the alarm, click on Disable. In any case write which channels
you masked in the logbook and/or in the shift report.
