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Tags

This interface is located under General in the Project Profile.

Tags are singular data endpointsData endpoint
A scalar or array variable that can be viewed and manipulated in the Pages interface. that can be either read from devices or computed programmatically using a built-in or a user-defined function.

The tag interface lists the following types of entities:

  • Devices
  • Folders
  • Tags

in this order, further sorted alphabetically. It is a tree-like hierarchy that opens at the root level and represents devices and folders as lower-level locations.

This article focuses on the tag management interface as seen when at the root of the tag hierarchy or inside a folder, which is the default view; alternative views are covered below. The default view has the following elements:

Header toolbar

Header Toolbar

Provides the following tools:

Export and Import

Main article: Export and Import

Tools for bulk export and import of devices and tags:

  • Export devices  Export devices (only available if the current location contains any devices or is a device)
  • Import devices  Import devices (only available at the root level)
  • Import BACnet devices  Import BACnet devices (not functional at the moment; updates are on the way)
  • Export tags  Export tags (only available if the current location contains any tags)
  • Import tags  Import tags (only available at the root level)
While not an export or import tool as such, Rename  Rename tags behaves similarly and is covered in the same article.

Devices

Open protocol-appropriate device creation dialog where the device needs to be configured first. Each device has two sets of parameters:

Click on CREATE to complete the configuration process and open the newly created device, shown in Device View.

Function Tags

Open the Tag Editor that contains configuration parameters specific to the type of the newly created tag:

Once created, the tag will be shown in Tag View; see also Function Tags.

Create new folder Create new folder

Opens the folder creation dialog.

In portrait mode or on mobile devices, the header toolbar collapses; use to expand.

Provides basic navigation over the tag hierarchy:

Breadcrumbs

Show the path to the current location inclusive of its non-custom name. Can be used to navigate up the hierarchy.

Filter

Provides basic search functionality, see Search/Filter for details.

Bulk Actions

Item List

Selects/deselects all items at the current location, followed by the count of entities at the current location:

  • folders (including devices)
  • tags

Operations listed below apply to all selected items:

DELETE

Only visible to managers and admins.

Deletes the selected items (confirmation required).

MANAGE PERMISSIONS

Only visible to managers and admins.

Opens permission manager, which lists users with any level of access to the project and provides a Filter field for convenience. Permissions are set per user or user group and affect their ability to edit the values of writable tags. Three options exist:

  • None
    Default editing rights in accordance with the user’s role.
  • Allow
    Grants editing rights independently of the role.
  • Forbid
    Revokes editing rights independently of the role.

Requires tags-only selection.

MOVE TAGS

Only visible to managers and admins.

Opens tag movement master. Selected tags will be moved to the location (folder or device) of choice. Restrictions apply to device-based tags, see Device View.

COPY TAGS IDS

Copies an array of tag IDs1 for the selected items into the buffer. The array itself is rendered as a string and can be further pasted into a text editor or any other application that accepts textual input.

RESTORE HISTORICAL VALUES

Opens the value restoration interface, which consists of two parts:

  • Tag values table
    Lists all qualifying2 tags found recursivelyIncluding tags in the selected folders and subfolders. within the selection, with three columns:
    • Name — Name of the tag, non-custom.
    • Current value — Last registered value for the tag as of when the interface was opened.
    • Restored value — Value retrieved from the tag’s history to be the closest to the selected datetime; not prefilled. The table is paginated with up to 10 tags per page. Use the PREVIOUS and NEXT buttons below for navigation.

  • Datetime picker
    The datetime picker selects the timepoint to recover historical data from, down to a minute. Only dates earlier than today can be selected.

    Once the date and time has been picked, click on GET VALUES to populate the table with restored values. Tags with no history will be ignored.

Review the restored values and click on  Apply changes to proceed to the confirmation dialog:

Attempting to restore values of $N tags. Continue?

where $N is the number of the affected tags. Click on OK to overwrite the tag values as shown in the table; or CANCEL to make pick another datetime. Once the restoration process is complete, you will receive an email with a .csv report, specifying the previous and newly written value as well as the result (success or error) for each tag.

To exit the interface without restoring historical values, click on Back to tags  Back to tags.

Value restoration is non-reversible; exercise caution.

MASS EDIT TAGS

Only visible to managers and admins.

Opens the generic tag editor, a tabular interface where:

  • rows enumerate the selected tags as well as tags found within the selected devices and folders, including any child folders further down the tag hierarchy;
  • columns correspond to the parameters found across the listed tags.

Two tools control the view:

  • Turn on filters, Turn off filters
    Adds/removes a filter field atop each column.
  • Manage columns visibility
    Lists all applicable tag parameters and allows to toggle their visibility in the table.

A tag’s parameters can be edited by entering or selecting new values in its row. Alternatively, several or all rows can be checked in the leftmost column to apply the newly entered or selected value in any cell to multiple tags at once. Direct (non-dropdown) value input requires pressing ↵ and can be cleared by using × in the same field.

The generic tag editor will show but not edit parameters that require using Tag Selector or any other browsing interface. It also locks ( ) the parameters that cannot be edited because their specific configuration requirements are not met. For details on tag parameters, see Tag Editor.

To go back to tags, click on  Save (only visible if changes have been made); alternatively, click on Back to tags  Back to tags to exit without saving.

Views

The default view as described in this article is used at the root level and in any folder (Export and Import tool availability may vary). For each entity listed, this view shows a pane that consists of the following elements, left-to-right:

  • Checkbox
    Selects the entity as an item for Bulk Actions
  • Icon
    Shows folder icon for folders, device-specific icon for devices, and tag-specific icon for tags.
  • Name
    Device name or tag name.
  • Content
    Counts child entities, whereby devices are counted as folders; does not count grandchildren. Only visible on folder and device panes.
  • Current value
    Only visible on tag panes.
  •  Options (expandable):

Clicking on a pane opens its entity in an appropriate view. Thus, in addition to the folder view (default), two alternative views exist:

Device View

Devices are structurally treated as folders: they are represented as such in breadcrumbs and may contain child entities. Many actions involving folders interact with devices similarly or identically. Logically, the device view is similar to the folder view, with the following major differences in the toolbar:

  • A device may not contain other devices; thus, device creation tools are not shown in this view.
  • Import tools are not available inside devices, whereas device export will only export the device itself.
  • A device may only contain tags specific to its protocol; thus, instead of function tags, the header toolbar will only allow creating one tag that matches the device's protocol. By extension, protocol-specific tags, or device-based tags, can only be created within appropriate devices.
    • These restrictions do not apply to folders: any folder can contain devices and any device can contain folders within itself.
  • Settings  Settings
    Opens the device's configuration in view mode. Parameters shown in this mode are identical to those in the the device creation dialog and are covered in Device-Based Tags and its sub-articles. The view mode provides two more tools:
    • Delete  Delete deletes the device (confirmation required).
    • Edit  Edit opens the device in edit mode.

    Settings view has breadcrumbs but cannot be exited back to the device level, only to its parent location.

Tag View

Shows the tag’s name and current value, followed by its configuration in a three-tabbed interface (except Regulator) identical to the tag-appropriate layout of the Tag Editor.

The header toolbar contains three tools:

  • Recalculate history  Recalculate History
    See below.
  • Delete  Delete
    Deletes the tag (confirmation required).
  • Edit  Edit
    Opens the Tag Editor, with two options to go back to view mode:  Save the configuration or  Cancel to exit without saving.

Recalculate History

Only available for Accumulator, Counter, and Virtual Tag; see respective articles for details.

For tags that continuously pull data from other tags to dynamically change their output value, allows to retrospectively adjust this output using the source tag’s historical data.

Explanatory Note

A counter or an accumulator launch their respective data collection models upon being created, ignoring any values of the source tag that had been recorded prior to such creation. If the source tag’s history is available, history recalculation allows to circumvent that limitation.

Two parameters affect how data is filtered for recalculation purposes:

  • Source data
    • Raw uses all available data points in the source tag’s history; the number of recorded data points may also depend on the Request interval or similar parameters.
    • Hours uses one data point per hour of history, computed by averaging all data points available in each hour; this option reduces computation time for the procedure at the expense of data resolution and accuracy.
    • Days uses one data point per 24-hour period of history, computed by averaging all data points available in each such period, to further reduce computation time at a greater expense of data resolution and accuracy.
  • Whole history period
    If checked, uses all available data points recorded in the source tag’s history, filtered as described above. Uncheck to specify a different start and end of the retrospective data collection timeframe.

Several important considerations apply:

Virtual Tag may or may not have source tags. History recalculation does not check for their absence; in case the recalculated virtual tag does not have source tags or the output produced by its logic does not use their data, history recalculation will run but will not have effect.

In addition, virtual tags may have source tags with different historical coverage, duration-wise. Using the whole history period sets the retrospective data collection timeframe to match the longest recorded history of these tags. Absent corresponding data points in other tags are substituted with 0.

Similarly, when a non-whole history period is set, the UI will not check if the source tag’s recorded history is available for the entire period; unavailable data points are also substituted with 0.

  1. On creation, each tag is assigned a unique ID string consisting of its name (exclusive of the preceding path, not custom) followed by a semicolon (;) and a randomly generated suffix. ↩

  2. Tag restoration applies to device-based tags that support writability as well as to virtual tags that contain a writable script. ↩

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