Designing and Managing Behavior Models - Using Alarms - Defining States -
Alarm Scope      Changing the Size of the State Icons

Defining States

When you first open the Alarm Definition window, the state-diagram drawing area contains one state. This state is named Ground and is dark green (by default), indicating that the severity of the state is "Normal." This state is unique not only because every alarm must contain it, but because no active alarm is ever in this state. The alarm manager instantiates an alarm when it receives a trigger corresponding to a transition from Ground to some other state, and if an alarm instance transitions back to Ground, that instance is deleted.

All of the other states that you want your alarm to track you must create yourself. For example, the author of the predefined alarm IfLoad (interface load) created two nonground states: medium and high.

IfLoad Alarm

The medium state is of Medium severity, and the high state is of High severity.

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   In the alarm in IfLoad Alarm, the author has renamed the Ground state "LowLoad." The Ground state can be renamed and its severity can be changed, but it cannot be deleted.

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For instruction on creating new states, resizing state icons, and deleting states, see the following sections:

• Defining a State
• Changing the Size of the State Icons
• Deleting a State

Defining a State

When you add a new state to a state diagram, you must provide two pieces of information about the state: its name and its severity. The name, of course, should indicate the role the state plays in the state diagram. For instance, if a state will indicate that a device is down, you should name it "DeviceDown," or something similar. The alarm's severity indicates whether the state represents a fault condition or a traffic condition and how serious the problem is.

 
  To add a state to a state diagram:

1. Select the Add State button at the top of the Alarm Definition dialog.

   The State Definition dialog appears.

   

2. Type the name of the state in the Name text field.

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      The maximum length for state names is 255 characters.

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3. Select a severity from the Fault folder or the Traffic folder.
4. Select the OK button.

The new state appears in the diagram area. Drag the state icon to the spot you want it to occupy in the diagram.

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   If you don't move the newly create state, subsequently created states won't be displayed.

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If the state icon's label won't fit on the icon, you should resize the state icons in your diagram. For information on how to resize these icons, see the section Changing the Size of the State Icons.