niagaraDriver-NiagaraNetwork
This component models other stations (NiagaraStations) under its Drivers container. These are the remote stations that a local station can communicate with. Its primary view is the Station Manager.
In general, a NiagaraNetwork uses the same driver architecture as other (non-NiagaraNetwork) drivers. By default it has a NiagaraStation component. A NiagaraNetwork differs from other networks in that:
All proxy points under a NiagaraStation are read-only points: BooleanPoint, EnumPoint, NumericPoint, StringPoint. And a proxy point inherits any actions from the remote (source) point or object.
Connections between stations occur as client and server sessions using the Fox protocol. The requesting station is the client, and target (responding) station is the server. Workbench is always a client and its station is the server. All Fox connections require client authentication (performed by the server).
Note: The Fox protocol runs over a TLS-encrypted connection with certificate-based server authentication. This secure Foxs is noted and mentioned in various subsections of this document.
To view these properties, expand the , right-click the NiagaraNetwork and click .
| Property | Value | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Status | read-only | Reports the condition of the entity
or process at last polling. {ok} indicates that the component is licensed and polling successfully. {down} indicates that the last check was unsuccessful, perhaps because of an incorrect property, or possibly loss of network connection. {disabled} indicates that the Enable property is set to false. {fault} indicates another problem. Refer to Fault Cause for more information. |
| Enabled | true or false | Activates (true)
and deactivates (false) use of the object (network,
device, point, component, table, schedule, descriptor, etc.). |
| Fault Cause | read-only | Indicates the reason why a
system object (network, device, component, extension, etc.) is not
working (in fault). This property is empty unless a fault exists. |
| Health | additional properties | Reports the status of the network,
device or component. This advisory information, including a time stamp,
can help you recognize and troubleshoot problems but it provides no
direct management controls. The Niagara Drivers Guide documents the these properties. |
| Alarm Source Info | additional properties | Contains a set of properties
for configuring and routing alarms when this component is the alarm
source. For property descriptions, refer to the Niagara Alarms Guide |
| Monitor | additional properties | Configures a network's ping mechanism,
which verifies network health. This includes verifying the health
of all connected objects (typically, devices) by pinging each device
at a repeated interval. The Niagara Drivers Guide documents these properties. The driver-PingMonitor topic documents the monitor properties. |
| Local Station | additional properties | Serves as a container for read-only system definition (Sys Def) properties that reflect information synchronized with if the remote local station is defined as a subordinate. Sys Def properties are of use to developers. The niagaraDriver-LocalSysDefStation topic documents the additional properties. |
| SysDef Provider | additional properties | Serves as a container for system definition (Sys Def) child components of the type ProviderStations, which are hidden slots by default. The niagaraDriver-BogProvider topic documents the additional properties. |
| Tuning Policies | additional properties | Configures network rules
for evaluating both write requests to writable proxy points as well
as the acceptable freshness of read requests. For more information, refer to the Niagara Drivers Guide. The niagaraDriver-NiagaraTuningPolicyMap topic documents properties. |
| History Policies | additional properties | Provides a container for the rules that specify how remotely-generated
histories should be changed when exported into another station (usually
the Supervisor station). The container also contains a poll scheduler
for the on-demand polling of histories. The rules identify the source stations and their histories files to import from remote stations and define storage limits in the target station. The driver-HistoryNetworkExt topic documents history policy properties. |
| Workers | additional properties | Configures the maximum number of concurrent threads and
maximum allowable queue size for the database connection. Tuning is for large NiagaraNetworks and is the only visible part of a shared thread pool scheme, which provides large-job scalability. A single station may support more than one thread and the number of threads grows uncapped while alleviating a former thread starving issue. Very large Supervisors with many stations may benefit from thread pool adjustments made via entries in the host’s system.properties file. Consult your support channel for details. Third–party drivers do not pool these worker properties at the network level as does the NiagaraNetwork driver. Each database driver has its own thread pool setting. In addition, tuning policies are simplified in a NiagaraNetwork, as compared to polling–type drivers. The niagaraDriver-CyclicThreadPoolWorker documents the Max Threads property. |
| Virtual Policies | additional properties | Configures how to handle Px files that include virtual objects
as well as some other virtual settings. The niagaraDriver-NiagaraVirtualNetworkExt documents the additional properties. |
| Persist Fetched Tags | true or false (default) | Controls the persistence of proxy point tags. true causes the false ignores proxy point tags. |
| tagsToFetch (optional) | comma delimited names | Identifies additional remote tags to fetch for the proxy points (and virtuals). |
| persistVirtualFetchedTags (optional) | true or false (default) | Adds fetched tags under the level of this property’s container as properties (read-only) for virtuals. |
Health
These properties are common to all Niagara components. They report information about the current condition of the component.
| Property | Value | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Down | true or false (default) | Displays the health of the network. |
| Alarm Source Info | additional properties | Contains a set of properties
for configuring and routing alarms when this component is the alarm
source. For property descriptions, refer to the Niagara Alarms Guide For more information, refer to the Niagara Alarms Guide |
| Last Fail Cause | text | Displays the reason for the last failure of the network health. |
| Last Fail Time | date time | Displays the last date and time the network health failed. |
| Last OK Time | date time | Displays the last date and time the network health was {ok}. |
Actions
Ping sends a message to a network object (device, database, etc). The message provokes a response, which indicates the current state of the object.
Reset All Connections resets all connections within the network.
Submit Station Discovery Job initiates a discovery job to populate the Station Manager view.
Force Update Niagara Proxy Points manually accesses and returns proxy point data to the Supervisor station. In a remote station, this action returns data identified with an n:history tag. This action is available on the following components: NiagaraNetwork, NiagaraStation, NiagaraStationFolder, NiagaraPointDeviceExt, and NiagaraPointFolder.