Conference azur::mcc

1953.0. "PM customization. Possible ? Complex ?" by TAEC::WEBER () Mon Dec 16 1991 12:52

    
	Anybody could give me some information about customization aspects
	of DECmcc iconic map ?

	I get a number of interesting questions from the customers
	about DECmcc iconic map possibilities, for
	which I would like to understand the complexity/feasibility.
	
	One of those customers would like to add a feature to DECmcc iconic map
	to be able to notify visually that some new information stands in
	an entity. This information is, of cause, not an alarm, but rather some
	note written by an operator. The operator would be able, by some 
	mechanism, to write a note in an entity, and then notify another
	operator that some new information stands in the entity.

	Because the customer wants it on the map and not in a special window,
	I identify, at least, two ways of modelling that feature.

	1) I can model my entity with having a settable a characteristic,
	that some operator will write.
	Then the problem is to be able to notify that some new information
	stands in the entity. I would not model it as an alarm because
		- it is not an alarm,
		- if a new alarm with severity higher is detected, it will
		overide the previous information.
	I could possibly model the information change as an event.
	Then I have to link the detection of that event with what is displayed
	on the map.
	=> Is it possible to use "asynchonous" (possibly graphic)
	kind of information in conjunction with alarm colors in the PM ?
	=> Is it complicated ?

	2) I can model the operator "note" as an entity itself,
	and allow an association type of operation be performed
	at the time the operator wants to add new information to an entity.
	Then, something has to be displayed on the screen to inform another
	operator that something happened. And this "thing" may be the note
	entity itself. 
	I see some similarity with the automatic configuration functionality
	where existence of a node, for instance, will appear asynchronously
	on the screen (will it?).
	=> Has this feature been already analysed ?
	
	Any information/suggestion welcome,
	Florence.

    
    This feature will be supported by the data collector access module,
    which will provide the means for a user to specify their own events on
    any entity they want. We are working (Jean actuallY) to get this built
    into mcc, for now you have to link with the api that the collector
    provides and write your own application (or use our sample one) to
    generate the events. Note that it only supports the decnet transport
    right now for passing the events to remote nodes running mcc (or the
    local node, your choice).