Configure the Alarm Control to require a SHELVE signature

Operators can temporarily shelve selected alarms from the list of an Alarm Control’s active alarms. A shelved alarm is suppressed and removed from the list of active alarms. Typically, operators shelve lower severity nuisance alarms because they provide little diagnostic value and interfere with the operator’s ability to manage a plant process.

An alarm is shelved for a specified period. After the period ends, alarms are automatically unshelved and appear again in the list of active alarms. Operators can also manually unshelve an alarm before the end of the specified shelved period.

By default, Medium and Low severity alarms are enabled for shelving. Critical and High severity alarms are not because of the potential risk of shelving and ignoring alarms that represent serious operating states. For more information about enabling shelving based on alarm severity, see "Configuring Alarm Severity to Priority Mapping" in the Application Server User Guide.

The Alarm Control provides a configuration option to restrict alarm shelving only to operators authorized by application security. When an operator selects one or more alarms and attempts to shelve them, the Alarm Control verifies if a shelve signature is required.

• If no SHELVE signature is required

  The Alarm Control shows a simple Shelve Comment dialog box with a Duration field to select the number of hours (1, 2, 4, 8, 12) to shelve the alarm and a Reason field to enter a mandatory comment.

  

• If a SHELVE signature is required and application security is active

  The Alarm Control shows a Shelve Comment dialog box with fields for the operator to enter user credentials (name, password, domain) in addition to selecting a shelve duration and entering a mandatory comment.

  

  By default, the logged-in user appears in the Username field. If the application security type is ArchestrA, then ArchestrA appears in the Domain field and cannot be edited. If the credentials are valid, the Alarm Control attempts to shelve the selected alarms.

  The Alarm Control shows an error message if the operator enters invalid credentials. When the operator clicks OK on the error message, the Shelve Comment dialog appears again with the entered user name, comment, and duration. The Password (or PIN) is blank. The operator can attempt to authenticate again or cancel.

To configure the Alarm Control to require a SHELVE signature

1. Place an Alarm Control in the drawing canvas.

2. Double-click the Alarm Control on the canvas. The Edit Animations dialog box appears.

3. Click Run-Time Behavior. The Run-Time Behavior page appears.

4. Select or clear Requires SHELVE Signature based on whether operators need to enter their credentials to shelve alarms or not.

5. Click OK.