Enable the event logger

Event logging is disabled by default, to conserve runtime resources. To enable the saving of events to the history file, use the Event Logger in the Project Explorer.

1. Go to the Global tab of the Project Explorer, and then double-click Event Logger.

   The Event Settings dialog box is displayed.

   

2. Select Enable event logger.

3. To have the option to disable event logging during run time, enter a tag name or expression in the Disable box.

   While the value of the tag/expression is TRUE (that is, non-zero), event logging will be disabled.

4. Under Settings, select the types of events that you want to log to the history file.

   Option	Description
   Security System	Events generated by your project's security system, including: Log On / Log Off users User created/removed by calling the CreateUser or RemoveUser functions User blocked/unblocked by calling the BlockUser or UnblockUser functions User blocked by the security system after several attempts to enter an invalid password Password expired Password modified Invalid Log On attempt
   Display	Open Screen and Close Screen events.
   Recipe	Recipes loaded, saved, initialized, or deleted.
   Report	Reports saved to disk or sent to printer.
   Custom Messages	Events generated by calling the SendEvent function.
   System Warning	Various runtime warnings and errors, including: Errors that occur when sending alarms by email Tag was blocked/unblocked Division by zero Connection/Disconnection of the remote security system

5. To log changes in specific project tags, select Tags, and then in the table, specify the tags.

   Column	Description
   Tag Name	The name of the project tag that you want to log to the history file.
   Dead Band	A value to filter changes against, so that only changes greater than this value are logged. For example, if you specify a Dead Band value of 5 for a tag value of 50 and the tag value changes to 52, then the system will not register this variation in the event log, because the change is less than 5. However, if the tag value change is equal to or greater than 5, then the system will log the new value to the history file.
   Message	A string (message) related to this tag change. This field accepts String expressions.

   The Tags option is useful for logging events that are not important enough to be alarm conditions (for example, Motor On, Motor Off, and so on).

6. Click OK.

By default, the event log is saved as a series of text files in your project's Alarm folder (that is, \<project name>\Alarm). You can configure your project settings to save it to an external database instead.

Also, if you choose to log changes in specific project tags, that will include changes in tag quality. It is not an issue in most cases, but if your project has an unreliable connection to a device, your event log might become filled with irrelevant changes in tag quality as the connection is repeatedly lost and then reestablished. To disable the logging of changes in tag quality, use a text editor to open your project file (that is, \<project name>\<project name>.app) and then set the following property:

[Options]

EnableEventOnQualityChange=0