The Audit Trail feature generates a new audit message for each significant event occurring on the system that contains data associated with the event. See Audited Events. The Audit Viewer displays the audit messages residing in the Audit Repositories of the currently selected device and is accessible from the View Menu of the Metasys user interface in online mode. The window displays 1,000 audit messages per page for an ODS. Engines are limited to a maximum of 500 audit messages per page. See Launching the Audit Viewer.
You can only view the audit messages from one audit repository of one device at a time:
-
If you are viewing the contents of an Engine local audit repository, the audit messages displayed come from that Engine only.
-
If you are viewing the contents of a Engine local audit repository of an Engine device designated as the Site Director, the audit messages displayed come from that Engine local audit repository only.
-
If you are viewing the contents of an ODS audit repository, the audit messages displayed come from that ODS audit repository only. An ODS audit repository may contain audit messages that have been routed from other Engine or ODS devices, but the repository does not display the contents of multiple repositories.
When viewing an ODS device, a standard filter is applied to the Audit Viewer when it is first opened. This filter allows you to see all audit messages.
You can also use custom filters when viewing the ODS to narrow the list of audit messages to only those that meet specific criteria. Custom filters query the entire ODS database, not just the list of audit messages that appears on the screen. You can filter audit messages by any combination of Date/Time, User, Class Level, Action Type, and/or Discarded. New audit messages appear in the list only if they meet all criteria specified in the filter. Custom filters cannot be saved.
The following table describes the format of the audit message (and corresponding buttons and fields) as displayed in the Audit Viewer.
|
Item/Column |
Description |
|---|---|
|
Selected Device |
Indicates the device for which the Audit Viewer is displayed. The device name appears on the left side of the Audit Viewer above the table. This field corresponds to the selection made in the Device Selection Dialog box. See Launching the Audit Viewer. |
|
Audit Count (Engines Only) |
Indicates the number of audit messages that currently appear in the Audit Viewer. The Audit Count appears on the right side of the Audit Viewer above the table only for Engine devices. |
|
Standard Filter Radio Button ( ODS Only) |
Indicates that standard filtering is applied to the Audit Viewer for the selected ODS. This filter information appears on the right side of the Audit Viewer above the table. The count of entries that apply to this filter appears in parentheses next to the radio button. |
|
Custom Filter Radio Button ( ODS Only) |
Indicates that custom filtering is applied to the Audit Viewer for the selected ODS. This filter information appears on the right side of the Audit Viewer above the table. The count of entries that apply to this filter appears in parentheses next to the radio button. |
|
Custom Filter Table ( ODS Only) |
Allows you to apply custom filtering to the Audit Viewer when the Custom Filter radio button is selected. This table appears but is not active when the Standard Filter radio button is selected. You may need to adjust the slider bar to show the Custom Filter table. The buttons for this table are:
|
|
Status Icons |
Displays an icon indicating the status of the audit message:
Note: See Display Settings Tab in the Preferences section for information on changing
the amount of time audit messages are considered new using the New entry time
frame preference (default value = 15 minutes).
|
|
When |
Displays the date and time that the audit message was generated. The date and time format is defined by the Language selected in the User Profile (User Profile tab section of the Security Administrator System). |
|
Item |
Displays the name of the item that generated the audit message. An item name is the label displayed for the selected item in the All Items navigation tree (for example, AV1, NAE2, or Schedule1). Be sure you define unique item names. |
|
Class Level |
Indicates the class in which the audit message belongs. For more information on Class Level, see the Enabled Audit Level attribute in the Engine Device Object or ODS Device Object . |
|
Origin Application |
Indicates the application that performed the action that generated the audit message. For example, the origin application may be the Alarm and Event, Trend, or Security feature. |
|
User |
Indicates the user associated with the action that initiated the audit message (for example, the person who changed a setpoint). The generic user called jci is used to identify a user on a different computer who uploaded or downloaded a database archive with SCT. |
|
Action Type |
Indicates the type of action that initiated the audit message. |
|
Description |
Provides the description of the action that generated the audit message. For example, Enabled appears in this column if you send an Enable command to an item. The description appearing in this column comes from the State, Mode, and Type Sets associated with the time that generated the audit message. Note: If the Class Level is Non-Critical System Error or Diagnostics and the Action
Type is Error, then the associated error string appears. If the Action Type is
Command and there is no further definition of the type of command (for example,
Operator Override, Adjust, etc.), then Description will show the value of the new
command (for example, On or Off).
|
|
Previous Value |
Indicates the value and engineering units, if applicable, of the item before performing the action that generated the audit message. |
|
Post Value |
Indicates the value and engineering units, if applicable, of the item after performing the action that generated the audit message. Note: If the Action Type is Command and there is no further definition of the type
of command (for example, Operator Override, Adjust, etc.), then the actual Post
Value is shown in the Description column. If the Description is a User Login
Successful or Failed, then the Post Value shows the IP address of the client
computer from which the login attempt was made.
|
|
Status |
Indicates the status of the item at the time the audit message was generated. |
|
|
Specifies the column of data used to sort the audit messages in the current Audit Viewer (ascending or descending order). |
|
Paging Controls ( ODS Only) |
Allows you to navigate through the pages of audit messages in the Audit Viewer. Use the buttons to go to the first page, previous page, next page, or last page. Type a page number in the text box and press the enter key to jump directly to a specific page.
|
|
Forward Messages Button |
Sends audit messages from the Engine local audit repository to the Default Destination. See Forwarding Audit Messages to the Default Destination. |
|
Discard Button |
Removes the selected audit messages from the Audit Viewer. See Discarding Audit Messages. |
|
Copy Button |
Copies the selected audit messages to the Clipboard for pasting into other applications such as Microsoft Excel or Word. When you click this button with nothing selected in the audit viewer, all entries are copied to the clipboard. Note: You can also use Ctrl+A to select all entries and Ctrl+C to copy to the
clipboard.
|
- adds a filter using the Add Filter
dialog box 
- removes the selected filter 
- audit message is new (that is,
the message has occurred in the system within the new entry timeframe)
- audit message has one 
-
audit message has more than one annotation
- audit message has an
electronic signature
