Prepare the Navigation Menu
- Last UpdatedApr 07, 2025
- 5 minute read
Runtime navigation for a Situational Awareness project is primarily managed via the Navigation Zone on the operator dashboard. The image below shows the Navigation Zone from the Example SA project.
The layout of the tabs and buttons in the Navigation Zone is determined by a project's Menu Configuration, which is created using the Visualization activity in Plant SCADA Studio (see Menu Configuration).
The navigation menu for a Situational Awareness project needs to have "Navigation" entered in the Page field for each menu entry.
To prepare the navigation menu for a Situational Awareness project, follow the instructions below using the Menu Configuration properties as described.
Set the home page for a workspace
To set the home page for a workspace, use the Target Page field for the highest Level 1 menu entry.
In the case of the ExampleSA project, the home page is the "What's New" page that displays when runtime is launched.
You can access the specified home page at runtime from the Home button on the header bar.
If your project was created using the Situational Awareness Starter Project, you can also access the home page using the Home keyboard key.
Note: Alarm counts will not work if the home page specified for your navigation menu differs to the home page specified for your equipment hierarchy (defined via the Page field at the hierarchy's root level). See Enable Navigation Zone Alarm Counts.
Configure the startup context for a workspace
The Level 1 field can be used to specify a startup context for a workspace. This creates a starting point for any navigation that occurs within the workspace.
If you have a display client with multiple monitors, you can use assign a different Level 1 entry to each screen.
To associate a Level 1 entry with the workspace on a particular screen, use the Context column on the Screen Setup page of the Computer Setup Wizard.
At runtime, the Level 1 entry will appear in the menu breadcrumbs on the workspace header bar.
Create the Navigation Zone tabs
The Level 2 entries set the tabs along the Navigation Zone header.
By default, only five tabs will fit across the Navigation Zone for a project based on the HD1080 master page, and six will fit for a UHD4K master page. Be aware that these limits will be reduced by one if you customize your navigation tabs to include an additional alarm count (see Add an Additional Alarm Count to the Navigation Zone). A compile error message will be generated if the number of Level 2 entries exceeds these limits.
In the case of Level 2 menu entries, the Order field is used to determine how the tabs will appear from left to right.
Note: It is recommended that you do not specify a Target Page for a Level 2 menu entry, as this will allow an operator to select a tab and assess the associated alarms without navigating away from the page that is currently displayed.
Configure the page buttons
The Level 3 fields set the buttons that appear on each tab. Up to 20 menu entries are supported on each tab.
The Order field determines the arrangement of buttons on a tab (see Set the Order field below).
Notice that the "Overview" button indicates that it links to an "(L2)" (level 2) page. This refers to the location of the page in the hierarchy of pages (see Page Levels), it does not relate to the fields in your menu configuration. The page buttons you create using Level 3 of the menu configuration can link to any level in your project's page hierarchy.
Set the Order field
The Order field determines the arrangement of buttons on a tab, as mapped out below.
If no value is specified for the Order property, a default value of zero (0) is applied. If two or more items on a common branch of the menu hierarchy have the same value, the layout is determined by the order in which they appear in the in the menu configuration database. The first item in the database will fill the first available gap in the layout of buttons, the next item will fill the next available gap, and so on.
Set the Target Page field for each button
The Target Page field specifies the page to open when the button associated with a menu item is clicked.
Note: Each target page name must be unique across the entire navigation menu structure. This will ensure the correct page navigation tab and button is highlighted in the Page Navigation user interface.
The Menu Command field specifies the command to use to open the page associated with a menu item. Use the command "Navigation_ShowTargetPage" in the property.
Where duplicated variations of a page exist to suit HD1080 and UHD4K screen resolutions, the page that is displayed is determined by the resolution of the host workspace. This means it is not necessary to add the suffix "_HD1080" or "_UHD4K" to the end of a page name specified in the Target Page field. For more information, see Configure a Project that Supports Multiple Screen Resolutions.
Note: The page name you specify in the Target Page property needs to be the same as the name used for the Page property for the associated equipment definition. This allows the system to count the top three priorities and shelved alarms for all equipment that is ‘homed’ on that page.
To enable alarm counts in the Navigation Zone, there are a number of project settings that need to be configured correctly. For more information, see Enable Navigation Zone Alarm Counts.