Requesting help interpreting some info from a controller's log

johnnyd

Hi,

We have a Netlinx NI-900 system spitting out projector offline alerts on RMS for an unknown reason.

I've telnetted into it and copied the log below.

Can anyone please assist me to understand what may have been happening at 1.30pm on the 28th of February please? There was a projector offline alert at 1.34pm on that day.

Thanks in advance.

1: 02-29-2012 WED 17:30:09 TelnetSvr
Accepted Telnet connection:socket=28 addr=130.1xx.xxx.xxx
2: 02-28-2012 TUE 13:34:08 Interpreter
CIpEvent::OnLine 0:3:1
3: 02-28-2012 TUE 13:34:08 SocketManager
Connected Successfully
4: 02-28-2012 TUE 13:34:00 Interpreter
CIpEvent::OnError 0:3:1
5: 02-28-2012 TUE 13:34:00 SocketManager
SendString to socket-local port (3) invalid
6: 02-28-2012 TUE 13:33:11 Interpreter
CIpEvent::OnError 0:3:1
7: 02-28-2012 TUE 13:33:11 SocketManager
IPSocketManConnectTask - connect Timed Out
8: 02-28-2012 TUE 13:33:00 Interpreter
CIpEvent::OnError 0:3:1
9: 02-28-2012 TUE 13:33:00 SocketManager
SendString to socket-local port (3) invalid
10: 02-28-2012 TUE 13:32:41 Interpreter
CIpEvent::OnError 0:3:1
11: 02-28-2012 TUE 13:32:41 SocketManager
IPSocketManConnectTask - connect Timed Out
12: 02-28-2012 TUE 13:32:00 Interpreter
CIpEvent::OnError 0:3:1
13: 02-28-2012 TUE 13:32:00 SocketManager
SendString to socket-local port (3) invalid
14: 02-28-2012 TUE 13:31:59 Interpreter
CIpEvent::OnError 0:3:1
15: 02-28-2012 TUE 13:31:59 SocketManager
SendString to socket-local port (3) invalid
16: 02-28-2012 TUE 13:31:39 Interpreter
CIpEvent::OnError 0:3:1
17: 02-28-2012 TUE 13:31:39 SocketManager
IPSocketManConnectTask - connect Timed Out
18: 02-28-2012 TUE 13:31:09 Interpreter
CIpEvent::OnError 0:3:1
19: 02-28-2012 TUE 13:31:09 SocketManager
IPSocketManConnectTask - connect Timed Out
20: 02-28-2012 TUE 13:30:00 Interpreter
CIpEvent::OnError 0:3:1

DHawthorne

For whatever reason, the IP connection failed and couldn't be re-connected, and all the invalid socket errors are the results of strings being sent to it while it was not online. I see several connect timeout messages, so it was trying to reconnect ... but strings should not have been sent out until that connection was confirmed in an online event.

But I'm afraid there's nothing here to help understand why it went off line in the first place. It could have been just a network hiccup, and in all likelihood was something of that nature. I find you can minimize those kinds of things a great deal if you connect all your control devices to a common switch (not always feasible, I know), and give them all static IPs (which, by the way, you must make absolute sure fall outside the DHCP lease range). But that's by no means a comprehensive solution.

johnnyd

DHawthorne wrote: »

For whatever reason, the IP connection failed and couldn't be re-connected, and all the invalid socket errors are the results of strings being sent to it while it was not online. I see several connect timeout messages, so it was trying to reconnect ... but strings should not have been sent out until that connection was confirmed in an online event.

But I'm afraid there's nothing here to help understand why it went off line in the first place. It could have been just a network hiccup, and in all likelihood was something of that nature. I find you can minimize those kinds of things a great deal if you connect all your control devices to a common switch (not always feasible, I know), and give them all static IPs (which, by the way, you must make absolute sure fall outside the DHCP lease range). But that's by no means a comprehensive solution.

Hi Dave,

Thanks for the reply.

All our systems are configured with static ip's and are on their own private vlan. It's only inhabited by control devices, and a few ipcams.

So to clarify your answer in my mind, the projector might be sending strings ( RS-232 controlled device ) whilst the system is temporarily offline?

Wouldn't I receive a system offline alert at the same time as the projector offline alert?

vining

If the projector is a RS232 device then what IP connection uses DPS 0:3:1?

Are you possibly using an serial-ip server?

johnnyd

In the code, the notes say that the device 0:3:0 is the RMS IP socket.

I was wondering about the 0:3:1.

But the projector is rs-232, definitely doesn't use a serial-ip server

vining wrote: »

If the projector is a RS232 device then what IP connection uses DPS 0:3:1?

Are you possibly using an serial-ip server?

johnnyd

I may not be on the right track so apologies if I am...

Found a difference between two identical rooms in the RMS Main .axi file.

The room with the spurious offline alerts appears to reference the device "PROJ" while the system without the spurious alerts is referencing "dvPROJ"

Faulty system:

RMSNetLinxDeviceOnline(TP,'Touch Panel')

RMSRegisterDevice(PROJ,'Data Projector','Sanyo','XT20')


Working system:

RMSNetLinxDeviceOnline(dvTP,'Touch Panel')

RMSRegisterDevice(dvPROJ,'Data Projector','Sanyo','XT20')


Does this mean that the wrong info may have been entered in RMS codecrafter when it was first commissioned?

vining

So those errors are the master attempting to open a socket with the PC running the RMS server. The master is also trying to send strings to RMS even though it's not online.

Now i've never used RMS but I'm pretty sure it runs on a PC running Windows 2003 server so you need to check the PC, connections, etc.

DHawthorne

A few points:

0:3:0 means port 3 on the master running the program where it's referenced.
0:3:1 means port 3 on master #1.

If the program is loaded on master #1, it's the same thing, which is probably the case in your setup. If so, you can safely ignore the distinction. the whole :0 notation is just a shortcut to make similar code easily adapted to different masters without having to change the system number every time. This of it like a "this" pointer in C, if that helps.

dvPROG and PROG are simply symbolic device names. It's the device stored in them that matters ... as long as the usage is consistent (ie., nowhere is dvPROG used where PROG was intended), you should be OK. It's more than likely the name was changed from one to the other because they are in an axi file, and you could have a duplicate declaration otherwise. I would have gone with dvPROG1 and dvPROG2 myself, to avoid confusion, but in and of itself, it's not necessarily a problem.

My money is on something going flaky with the connection to the RMS server. I had been assuming in my first post that your projector was the IP device, but since you clarified that, the messages you posted are not a problem with the projector.

Andrew G Welker

johnnyd wrote: »

I may not be on the right track so apologies if I am...

Found a difference between two identical rooms in the RMS Main .axi file.

The room with the spurious offline alerts appears to reference the device "PROJ" while the system without the spurious alerts is referencing "dvPROJ"

Faulty system:

RMSNetLinxDeviceOnline(TP,'Touch Panel')

RMSRegisterDevice(PROJ,'Data Projector','Sanyo','XT20')


Working system:

RMSNetLinxDeviceOnline(dvTP,'Touch Panel')

RMSRegisterDevice(dvPROJ,'Data Projector','Sanyo','XT20')


Does this mean that the wrong info may have been entered in RMS codecrafter when it was first commissioned?

It depends on how the projector is defined in the main code. If it isn't defined as PROJ in the code for the faulty system, then the RMS system will never ever find an online event for the device PROJ, since the main code is using dvProj. I would suggest fixing the RMS Main.axi and see if that fixes the issue.