There are four main types of associations that can exist in the Axeda Platform. All assets have at least one of the following types of associations, and each type of association results in a specific behavior.
o No association at all
o Asset association only
o Model Association
o Self-Association
For the purposes of the rest of this topic, the assets running an Axeda Gateway, Axeda Connector, or Axeda IDM Agent and the wireless tracking devices are referred to as the "source assets" and the assets they are monitoring (including Composite Assets) are referred to as the "target assets".
Assets and models with no associations represent the basic behavior of assets and models in the Platform. Data items, alarms, events, mobile locations, and files uploaded by a source asset appear in the Asset dashboard for the source asset and are stored with the source asset in the Platform. The data, alarms, and uploaded files are not visible in the Asset dashboard of the target asset.
A single source asset is associated with a single target asset (or with itself). In this situation, all forwarded data and other information appears in the Asset dashboard for the target asset and does not affect the source asset. Uploaded files appear in the Asset dashboard for both the source and target assets.
As needed, refer to the procedures in the topics, Configure Asset Associations and View alarms, events, mobile locations, and uploaded files reported by source assets in the Asset dashboards of target assets
Important!
Alarms sent in from assets are always forwarded. In addition, alarms created
by the CreateAlarm action in an
Expression Rule are forwarded
to target assets. However, alarms
that are created by an Alarm action
(old style Actions) are NOT forwarded to target assets.
A model of a source asset is associated with a model of a target asset (or with itself). If only the source model and target model are associated, then no data item values are forwarded (however, files, alarms, events, and mobile locations are forwarded). Model associations along with data item associations are required to forward data items from a source asset to a target asset. To see data from a source asset on the Asset dashboard of a target asset, at least one data item from the source asset model must be associated with a data item of the target asset model. For example suppose that the Input_1 data item of the source asset model is associated with the Temp data item of the target asset model. The Input_1 data item from the source asset is forwarded to the Temp data item of the target asset; all other data items are discarded.
As needed, refer to the procedures in the topics, Configure Model Associations and View data item values reported by source assets in the Asset dashboards of target assets.
Important!
For the data item values to appear in the Asset dashboard for assets of
a target model, you must also associate the corresponding assets.
Associations are NOT created automatically for new data
items:
After initial associations between sources and targets have been created,
any new data items for a model must be associated with the target models
for them to appear in the Asset dashboards for assets of the target models.
For the new data items to also appear in the Asset dashboards of source
assets, the source models, source assets, and source data items must be
mapped to themselves. See Self Association
below.
Associations do not happen automatically.
If you have a composite asset and swap out one of its components with
another component of the same model, you must associate the new component
asset with the target composite asset for the data item values from the
new component to appear in the Asset dashboard of the composite asset.
A source asset, model, and/or data item are associated with themselves. In this situation, all information and data that is forwarded to a target is also forwarded to itself (the source), which means that all forwarded information and data is retained on the source. Without a self association, all forwarded information and data is lost and can never be viewed on the source asset dashboard. For example, if we continue with the example outlined under the Model Association section, if you want to see Input_1 in the Asset dashboard of the source asset, you need to associate the source model with itself, the source asset with itself, and Input_1 with itself.
If you have two models, one for TrackerABC and one for Container123 and two assets, trackerABC_1 and container123_A and an agent is reporting data for trackerABC_1, then the following behavior can be expected:
o If no associations exist, then all of the data reported by the agent appears in the Asset dashboard for trackerABC_1.
o If only an asset
association exists between trackerABC_1 and container123_A, then
alarms and mobile locations are shown in the Asset dashboard for container123_A.
If trackerABC_1 can upload a file, then the file appears in the Asset
dashboards for both trackerABC_1 and container123_A. Data items are not
stored for the source or target assets.
If you want to see alarms and mobile locations for trackerABC_1 on the
dashboard of trackerABC_1, you need to associate the asset with itself
(self association).
o Model associations require data associations,
so if only a model association exists between TrackerABC and Container123,
then nothing is forwarded. For data items to be forwarded to the asset
container123_A, associations must also exist between the data items of
the models and between the assets, trackerABC_1 and container123_A. If
model TrackerABC has a data item called Input_1 that is associated with
the model Container123 data item called temperature, the data item temperature
is reported in the container123_A dashboard and stored with that asset.
Unless other data items are also associated, they are not stored anywhere.
If you want to see data items in the Asset dashboards of both trackerABC_1
(source) and container123_A (target), you need to associate the source
asset, trackerABC_1, with itself, the source model, TrackerABC, with itself,
and the source data item, Input_1, with itself.